This is Crazy

The economy is not good for most people. War is active in the Middle East and lurking in the South Seas of China, Iran and Russia. The threat of deportations, exiles and migrants is shaking the world. Capitalism is doing what it is supposed to do by widening the income gap. It is crazy.

Why?

First of all, most governments are elected by a curious mixture of widespread voting and the influence of money. The intelligence index of the electorate is easily found. Its IQ is 100, by definition the median raw score of the population. That means that democracy has an IQ of 100. Arguably, the intelligence of money’s paid advisors is higher. Thus, propaganda, lies and half-truths work quite well to convince the electorate about the ‘right path.’ Which by no coincidence benefits the super-rich. Whom I suspect are so arrogant and greedy that their thinking ends up below 100. As shown by many of their actions. Their advisors know this, but capitalism promotes greediness and they are well paid.

No wonder governments are inept.

On the other hand, amazing technology is fast approaching this disturbed system. One of its byproducts is that soon the world will be in a situation of overproduction of everything. This translates to some of us into an economy of abundance. To others it translates into an economy of forced shortages. I assume they think that this is advantageous to their greed.

Poverty will be obsolete, unless it is forced upon the people. As in the middle-ages, where reading and writing was restricted to the elite. If poverty is enforced, there will be two major civilizations: the super-rich and the poor. With a thin layers of servants in between. And a multitude of robots.

The rich will live extremely good lives, maybe long ones when life-prolonging medicine is discovered. The rest will live in poverty, maybe only when compared to the rich, maybe their standard of living will be better than ours is now, but still they will feel that they are poor by comparison. I have no idea what will happen, but history tells us about revolutions, most of the time led by even worse people.

The whole idea of forced poverty seems wrong, but it is already happening. In most countries there is enough food to feed everybody. Yet, people are hungry. Car, appliances, and most manufacturers have trouble selling what they can produce. The buying capacity of the middle and poor classes is not up to their productivity. And I already said that the rich are greedy, most live out of perks and try to limit their lifestyles, and spending, in a very curious manner.

Democracy is not working, the economy is not working. It is crazy.

Blueprint for Utopia

In my opinion, a utopia needs three things to be successful: no material needs, a health system which assures wellbeing for everybody and personal freedom. In my series ‘living dangerously in utopia’ these conditions are met as follows:

• There are no material needs and everybody receives a generous stipend called ‘Basic Income.’ That is, until conditions of extreme abundance make it more convenient to provide everything for free.

• Youthfulness and as a consequence, very good health, is provided by a biological implant called iMed.

• Personal Freedom is enhanced by a lack of sexual taboos.

This point-of-view may sound naive to many. I know that war is a historic reality. There are many causes of war and associated conflicts, but what I see is that the people are not promoting or doing it. Governments and opposition groups do it, supposedly to get rid of a bad government. The main idea is to gain something: land, oil, natural resources, slaves or something. Sadly, religion is another reason for war and its cause, and benefits, are even more diffuse.
In the USA, middle-class people do not go to war, except for a few officers whose families are associated with war because their ancestors have profited from it. If we think about this: it is the lack of economic opportunity that forces the poor to enroll. It could be argued that there are patriots/religious people who will gladly give their lives for the glory or to go to heaven.
The USA and Russia have lost their recent full-fledged wars, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Afghanistan, and there is no reason to believe that it will not keep on happening. Even Korea was a tie.
There are many reasons, but I sincerely believe that war is rewarding only when you have a bunch of indigent and ignorant male peasants and draft them with the promise to rape, loot and maim. It helps if you add a flag or a religious icon.
Thus, war is propaganda driven, to satisfy the greed of politicians-industrialists-aristocrats and normal people would rather do without it. Especially if they are not poor! I believe war will disappear on its own when everybody in the world grows out of poverty.
To reinforce my point, there is tremendous biotechnological progress and it is thinkable that means to prolong human lifespan could be discovered. It then becomes very stupid to sacrifice a long life full of promise in exchange of an elusive, and unprovable, trip to heaven.
However, just in case I am wrong, my novel, ‘The War that Saved the World‘ assumes that the concept of war is ingrained in human nature.
Governments will also fizzle away, when Artificial Intelligence becomes smarter and more organized than a CEO, it will not take long to see that AI could also supplement/supplant the people in charge of making those non-optimal decisions.

My Solution to Austerity

We hear that more and more governments opt for austerity. Most likely the new administration of the US will also go into austerity, especially if a republican is elected as president,

Austerity is provoked because the poor, who are the only ones who really pay taxes, are poor. And there are more poor people every day, thanks to the well-known problem of growing income disparity. Really it is not that people are poorer, it is more like there is more wealth and more of everything, but the poor are restricted to the same level as before. They do not get a proportional portion of the added wealth produced by technology, which only goes to capital, aka the very-rich, who have the means to avoid paying taxes (by buying out the governments to get favorable laws, by going to tax shelters or simply by avoiding paying through loopholes). Thereby, the governments are also poorer, because the people that they can tax are poorer.

My solution is simple. Establish a 10% value added tax and apply it to all transactions. You buy a car, you pay 10% of its value to the governments. Go to a restaurant, or McDonalds, pay 10%. Supermarket, 7-Eleven, clothes, appliances, everything. Everything, including buying or trading stocks, derivatives, putting money in savings, everything. For example, if I buy a book on the Internet, I pay sales tax. If I buy a stock, I do not. Of course some states do not charge sales tax, but this is only an example, and those states make up for the lack of sales tax with other taxes, which impact the poor much more than the rich.

That would be the end of austerity. Of course, the burses in the US would close the next day and go to China or Singapore. But the idea would solve the problems of austerity.

This brings the question. Why should poor people pay sales taxes for essentials, like clothing or a new range, if the rich do not pay sales taxes to buy a not needed stock? It should be the other way around.

Maybe that is the problem. Austerity is caused because the tax codes punish the poor and benefit the rich. It used to be that the poor were taking part in the progress. Nowadays it is evident that is not happening anymore. Poor and middle classes are being relegated, the extra money, due to technological advances, is going to the capital, the super-rich, who have never been properly taxed.

That is the reason of government austerity in a richer world. Governments are not taxing the growing money supply, because it is in the hands of the very-rich.

Ohh, I forgot that the very-rich control the governments. Maybe that is why they are not taxed properly.

Why?

Why?

Why very few notice that the economy is in flux?

It is amazing. Several facts stand out:

• At least since 2010, here is enough food for everybody on earth.
• Machines are becoming better and more intelligent.
• Goods are cheaper and better.
• There is a hint that our civilization is entering into an economy of abundance. Worldwide.

The curse of humanity (by nobody else but God) is to toil. Seems like there could be an end to that curse. Let the machines work.

Let’s see: If somebody is hungry in the United States, Europe, Mexico, … it is because that person does not have enough money to buy the food. The food is there, in excess.

If you do not have a new car, or at least a decent car that works well, it is because you do not have the money. There are plenty of cars for sale, new and used. And factories are working at 50% capacity.

If you are homeless, at least in the United States and in most of the world, it is because you cannot rent one of the empty houses. By the way, construction of new homes has gone down because there is no demand. Few mortgages and even less money in the pockets of needy customers.

Thus it seems, to a naïve person, that there are plenty of goods, food and services. What is lacking is money!

Shouldn’t it be the other way around? Money is extremely easy to fabricate and costless, nowadays just bits on a database. It used to be that fabricating goods and having enough food was the problem.

Why there is no money to buy what we fabricate or want to sell?

An economist will argue that too much money leads to inflation. I argue that too little money leads to enforced poverty.

Why does the system want to keep most people poor?

Why?

Could it be that very few have noticed that we are not living anymore in the terrible scarcity of the past?

Could it be because it is human nature to uselessly exploit other people?

Could it be that we like war and this is a clear path to revolutions?

Why?

The (Inevitable) End of Scarcity

For 4 billion years life on Earth has survived under the challenge of limited resources. Could it be possible that soon, within a few decades, at least one species could overcome that limitation?

This paradigm change is the product of the inventiveness of our collective minds. Scientific research, technological improvements, design, engineering, business acumen, aesthetics and many other improvements, brought to reality by our talents, have immensely increased productivity.

Since 2010, I have been hearing that there is enough food in the world to keep all the inhabitants of Earth well fed. That the problem is distribution. Food distribution and income distribution. Even if this information is not correct, there is no doubt in my mind that agricultural productivity could be improved ( fairly easily) in other parts of the world, to the levels of the developed world, and even of most of the not so developed countries, which currently have no lack of food. Considering the trends, without any doubt food will not be a problem in the future.

Let us not confuse lack of food with lack of money to buy the food that is amply available. That there are children that are hungry in the US is not because there is no food. It is because their parents are negated the money to buy the food (many reasons – but there is no reason to let a child go hungry – or a grownup).

In the same way, and against the wish of the Luddites, industrial goods and services will soon be so easy to fabricate that their cost will become negligible and they could be available in numbers far exceeding demand – even if all the inhabitants on Earth have the money to pay for these goods and services. Of course, the problem of how the unemployed are going to pay for them, when jobs are not available and AI and robots can do all the work, is a different one.

Thus, finally, the economy is going to be an economy of abundance, where greed will not be an issue. (Greed: 1. Inordinate desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it for one’s self, far beyond the dictates of basic survival and comfort. 2. It is applied to a markedly high desire for and pursuit of wealth, status and power.) I am inclined to believe in the latter definition.

Power, that is what wealth means today. Will wealth be the same when it does not confer the ability to have more than the others? Or maybe the wealthy can have more, but who cares. Not everybody is a hoarder. Not everybody has an inordinate desire to possess many useless copies of things. Like you can have one car, two cars, a thousand cars. Does that make you better, or makes your life better, than the guy who uses a self-driven taxicab?

Maybe the question is: Can I buy other people with my wealth? The answer is simple, under the current system, yes. That is what we do, we sell our time to the wealthy. Our time, which is our life.

Will the system where the wealthy will be the bosses and the rest their lower class employees continue? Or could a different system, which distributes the overabundant goods exist?

It is up to us, it is up to the inventiveness of our collective minds to find a system which does not punish those who do not have the parents, luck or acumen to become rich. It is up to us to live in a better world.

The work has been done. By all of us and our ancestors. Workers, scientists, musicians, artisans, all of us have done something. Now our future is up to us! As always.

My solution to unemployment

That does not require jobs.

We are all are worried about jobs. Politicians are elected because they promise more jobs. As if it were possible for them to create jobs. But as our technological savvy increases, and thus the overall value of our civilization, there are less jobs. China has produced millions of jobs, but we need billions. I am talking globally, as the world is one. One economy, one civilization, one environment, one battlefield.

I have read about several issues:

• That the super-rich are amazing all the wealth. The added wealth created by improving technologies is being accumulated into the coffers of very few.
• That the driving of cars, supermarkets and fast-food will soon be automated.
• That in the present brutal capitalism, nobody can afford to be lenient or they will be out of business. That means, less employees, more hours of work per employee, less benefits, less pay and less humanity. And more profits.
• That many more will be unemployed or sub employed.

At the same time, there are more goods, more food and more productivity, maybe too many for the amount of money in circulation. That means:

• There is no interest in producing more, the only interest is in profits.
• There is no need for full employment for the rich to live quite well, and they are the ones that make the decisions about where to invest. Thus, they invest in financial investments.
• There is no interest in anybody who is not rich. Governments, Politicians, Financial Systems, Corporations and the Economists are not looking after the poor. They only want to attract the rich investors.
• There seems to be no need to have full (worldwide) employment to produce enough so that all the people on earth have a decent standard of living (and not just by giving them charitable contributions). And everyday technology improves and this is more obvious.

In the United States 2% of the population produce enough agricultural products for the rest of us, really they could produce too much, as the government pays many so that they don’t overproduce. The same could happen everywhere. In a similar way, factories, largely automated, produce an excessive amount of goods. Maybe 10% of the world’s population could produce all the food, goods and trinkets that we need. And another 10% provide all the services that we need.

What do we do with the 80% that is unemployed? Caveat – old people and children (below 10) are excluded.

I have an idea. WAR! Don’t laugh, I am not the first to think about this. In Iraq and Syria ISIS has no trouble finding unemployed. In Afghanistan, you can be a Taliban rebel or a member of the Army, I don’t think there are too many other jobs available. In Mexico you can make more pesos by fighting in the war against the War on Drugs of the United States. So many scenarios, so many poor and destitute people fighting because there is nothing better to do. Ahh! I remember that to be an Emperor in the Middle Ages you just had to promise loot and rape to the poor peasants to form an army.

All this battlefield misery in a world of abundant goods. In a world where the financiers are worried about profits and not about their future. In a world with atomic bombs and terrorism. In a world where the economy is only for the rich.

This world that can better if we institutionalize terrorism and war. Although, once again I am slow witted. Must be my old age. Suddenly I realize that we are already doing it. Sorry, I just remembered that the largest armies in the world have no enemies. Only terrorists, created by the terror that these great armies created in their soil. Thus we are fomenting terrorism, creating it from scratch and that is good.

It is very good, because it is the only way to employ the unemployed. Enlist all of them into a soup of conflicting groups of varying strengths and in a constant process of coalescing and dissolving. With no goal except to kill the unemployed and with little military interest or acumen.

That is the theme of my new novel, tentatively named, ‘The War that Saved the World.’

NOTE: This is my fourth ‘Near Future Dystopia’ novel.

The others are:

‘The War of the Classes’

‘A Criminal with Ethics’

‘Unendurable’

I like this Future

Our civilization is at a crossroad of unfathomable dimensions.

On one hand, it is the first time that productivity, and new technology just below the horizon, signal the opportunity of an economy of abundance. Until now, the economy has been known to be an economy of scarcity. That is what the economists study and Lionel Robbins, a British economist and head of the London School of Economics, in 1932 defined economics as ‘the science which studies human behavior as a relationship between ends and scarce means which have alternative uses.’
   Productivity is up now, when it is compared with 1932. It is so high that one of the main problems that factories and distributors have is to sell enough of their production. In advanced countries there are no shortages of day-to-day goods. Food, appliances, housing and transportation goods are available, or could be made available just by increasing the existing factories output to a higher level. If somebody is hungry in America, in Europe and in most countries, it is because that hungry person has no money. Not because there is no food. And the future points to enhanced productivity.
   Productivity is raising, and it will increase even more when smarter computers and robots take over more and more jobs and they will produce more per employee. The era of scarcity is being replaced by an era of abundance. Soon it will be possible for everybody to have all they need, and after that it could very well be all they want. On the other hand, our economy is shifting into a no-holds barred capitalism. Capitalism is good, but just as water, too much is dangerous. Too much of anything is dangerous.
   Capitalism intrinsically acknowledges the value of capital over anything else. Under its principles, only profits and wealth accumulation are sensible. At the end, there will be only one. One person, or a group of persons will own everything. Oligarchies and monopolies will be the rule of the land. And it will be the rule of the land because politicians will also be bought. It could be a dictatorship where the person who has more is in charge.
   To make it worse, there could be fewer jobs, where only well-educated geniuses would find a job. Most people do not fall into that category. Most people would be unemployed or underemployed.
   We have seen pictures and sound where the ‘takers’ are belittled. We know that many successful people believe that they are superior, just because they are rich. Even though, many come from families who gave them better opportunities. And, even if they are better, the rest have a right to survive. The rest being 99.9% of the population if current trends continue unabated. The rest is you and I, all of us, our families and our friends.

Let’s recapitulate:
• Productivity is improving.
• Jobs will be seized by robots.
• The economy could switch from ‘scarcity’ to ‘abundance.’
• Capitalism is compacting wealth into a few.
What can be done?

People will survive, even if left out of the system, they will survive. The human race has survived for thousands of years under appalling conditions. It will not be the first time. However, there is this question of human rights. The question of justice and the question of who will win.
   A minority of cruel people can and have kept a majority under control. It could be even easier to do with robocops and surveillance drones. Thus the theater is set up for ten million living in utmost luxury and ten billion in utmost poverty. I kind of like this future, only that I am not a billionaire and I do not think that I will ever be. Therefore, I do not like this future.

Reconsidering, I like this future, for my books set in a ‘near future dystopia.’

Writing a Book in Two Languages

Even though English is my second language, I imagine and write my books in English. When I finish the book, I review the plot and edit it as best as I can.

Once I am satisfied with the plot and the book is readable, I translate it to Spanish using Google translate. The result is good but muddy. The end result is sometimes readable and sometimes it makes stupid mistakes, like confusing a negative with a positive. However, it helps immensely by translating very fast and providing a scaffolding, and it is better every time I use it. I edit the translation trying to replace literal translations with comparable meaning. I use Spanish from Mexico.

I edit the Spanish translation and then I do a paragraph by paragraph, side by side comparison between the English and the Spanish versions. Thus I find errors in both languages, polish discrepancies and correct the structure of the paragraphs.

I then read and edit the book in English, then I do the same in Spanish and then I do a second paragraph by paragraph comparison.

Thus I have written seven books:

The History of the 21^st Century                La Historia del Siglo 21

Practical Artificial Intelligence                   Inteligencia Artificial Práctica

The series: living dangerously in utopia   La serie: viviendo peligrosamente en la utopía

The War of the Classes                              La Guerra de las Clases

The Preponderant Factor                          El Factor Preponderante

It is all in the Mind                                      Todo seta en la Mente

The Restlessness                                         La Inquietud

Y:                                                                     And:

A Criminal with Ethics                                 Un Criminal con Ética

You can find more information at: http://www.alpha0books.com

The Meaning of Work

Time is Money

Work is measured in time. Salaries are paid every week or month, rent and interest are collected monthly. Therefore, a unit of work has a money value. Moreover, work is supposed to have another value, or ethical principle, whereby work has a moral benefit and enhances character. It seems that work is good for you.

On the other hand, why some people are paid thousands of dollars an hour and others make less than one? Is it possible that a person works five thousand times more than another one? Is the person that makes less than one dollar lazy? Then why this lazy person is working from sunshine to sunset, while the rich guy is playing golf almost every day, when he is not sitting down in a plush office? That is if the rich guy didn’t inherit his/her money, then he/she could be lying on a beach, drunk all day.

There has to be something more than brute work to make money!

Should we also consider social position? Education? Place where you were born? Climate? Your own personality and genetics?

Work Ethic

It has been said that workers who exhibit good work ethic are more likely to be promoted as they provide more value to their employer.

However, this is a subjective work ethic measurement, which is based on productivity or some other, sometimes occult, consideration. Moreover, you have to be a worker. What happens if you cannot find a job? Or if your work conditions are terrible and you still have to work there because there is nothing better available?

It can be argued that this is just propaganda to keep the “wage slaves” deluded into being loyal servants to the elite. Thereby creating more wealth for the people on top.

Work Aversion

This happens to people who have been employed and have found work to be: boring, depressive, stressful or just because they are lazy.

Laziness is one of the seven sins of Catholicism, and Protestant, Islāmic and Judean religions are also against it. It is stated that laziness could lead to poverty. Despite the fact that these same religions promise an eternal life of laziness in heaven.

Economists are divided. Many of them consider work painful and leisure time as a commodity to be sold.

People work hard to be able to take time for leisure or laziness, in the same way other animals do, foraging food until satiated and then spend time doing nothing.

There seems to be a fundamental tendency towards work aversion. At least after survival is assured.

Work and  the Economy

The need to work is associated with the economy of the time.

Agricultural Economy: In agricultural societies, work was necessary to avoid starvation. Up to 90% of the adult population worked hard on the fields, tilling, seeding, cultivating and reaping the harvest. Others were hunting or fishing. Most dedicated their lives to procure food.

Industrial Economy: At the time of the industrial revolution, “jobs” were invented and many people moved from agriculture to jobs. By the year 2000 less than 3% of the population of developed countries worked in agriculture.

Abundance Economy: Current trends point to a society of abundance. Even today, there is enough food capacity to feed all the people on earth. If somebody goes to bed hungry, it is because he/she has no money, not because there is no food available. In the near future, it is possible that “jobs” will be few and that most people will not find one.  As in agriculture, 3% of the people plus our intelligent machines could produce all we need and maybe even all we want.

No Work

There are no jobs. How can the system adapt to 97% unemployment plus a bounty of goods and food and luxury?

Ask the Romans, they had the same problem. Their Empire was rich and produced a plentiful bounty for the Citizens of Rome. In addition, slaves did all the work. Their solution was simple. Bread and Circus. Each Citizen had free everything, tickets to the Coliseum, bread and money to spend. Otherwise, who would buy the goods that the merchants exhibited in abundance?

Slaves, translate as intelligent machines. Empire’s bounty, translate as 3D printing, robotic factories and post-industrial productivity. Bread and Circus, translate as Universal Basic Income, a generous stipend paid to all Citizens equally without taking their wealth or income in consideration. Otherwise, who will buy the goods produced by this economy of abundance?

The Meaning of Work

The intrinsic meaning of work is not clear. Unless we consider work to be a means to enjoy life. Then work is neither moral nor ethical nor necessary, it is just a means to an end, and if that end is satisfied, then who worries about working!

In an Era of Abundance

What is the meaning of wealth? What is money for? Especially in an era of abundance. These questions are valid and certainly they must have answers. These answers will depend on a certain point of view, but they must definitely be answerable.

What is the meaning of wealth? In an economy of scarcity wealth is the capacity to get what you want by depriving others from getting something. Let’s consider an example where a billionaire wants a yacht and by doing so deprives somebody from having that yacht, or maybe from buying a lesser boat. Is this true? I would say it is not true. If another billionaire or any other person with money wants a yacht, the facilities to build it exist and the marinas are full of yachts on sale. Anybody with money can get a yacht, even more, not everybody wants a yacht. And most yacht are idle 99.99% of the time, why not share the yacht. I know that is communism, but it is also rent-a-boat. In that way the boats would be in use 1% of the time. So wealth is a means of depriving somebody of something. But why do it If there are enough goods? it doesn’t make sense. Why close factories because some of us don’t have the money to buy goods or worse food, food and goods that are there, they exists and they are even being thrown away. It can be said that wealth in a non-scarcity economy is the means to keep other people poor on purpose. To assert a penalty on those that are not rich by artificially restricting the availability of money, with the end result of restricting goods and food.

What is money for? Let’s imagine that I am wealthy, I have a trillion dollars in my overseas bank accounts. I wake up in the morning and I order 7000 omelets, 5000 cups of coffee and a million pastries. I can afford that and I have to do something with my money. That is absurd, there is a limit to what I can consume. Being a trillionaire does not mean that I can spend all the money on myself. People don’t need that much. As we walk around we use a smart phone and a tablet. We eat two or three times a day, sparingly, otherwise we get diabetes and may die soon. We have a car or take a taxi. We fly and go places, stay at a hotel and visit museums, we eat, same as always. We buy clothes, which sometimes are expensive, but normally are cheap when produced in huge numbers in automated factories. We get together with friends and enjoy a few dollars worth of alcohol. We can outspend our neighbors, but if they also have all they want it doesn’t make sense.

So, what is money for? It is supposedly to buy goods, food, a car or two or three, a refrigerator and a house or two or three. To live well! When used to cover personal needs there is a quite reduced limit to what anybody can spend. Even if you have five homes, on prime locations there is no need for all that money. And remember, building a house is simple and there are plenty of workers, or soon robots, that will be happy to do it.

So, what is the money for? To gain political power and make other people do what I want? To buy people and favors? Even that has a limit. Nobody can control so much, and those that have tried didn’t need all that money; like Hitler and Stalin. Maybe it is to invest in nebulous markets and by doing so accumulate a collection of bits in a database.

This decade food production has surpassed the amount needed to feed well all the people on this world. And fifty million Chinese are producing thirty percent of the goods being consumed by the wealthy nations; five hundred million would produce more than enough for all the world. Moreover, they are automating their factories to increase productivity per person.

Worldwide productivity is going up, automation and technological systems are making production cheaper and better. Instead of room sized computers we use tiny phones. Soon meta-materials and nano-technology will allow extracting carbon from CO₂ to build houses or cars or planes from ultralight materials reinforced with carbon nanotubes. Technology is making goods cheaper, smaller and lighter. Self-driven cars will discourage buying cars, because you cannot drive them, and they will not be expensive anymore.

What is really happening is that the super-rich are hoarding the money and that is keeping many of us out of the markets. We cannot buy a new TV because we have no money, TVs are available, in huge numbers, and even more if there is more demand. They will also be cheaper. Same with cars, thousands of cars, new and used are sitting idle at dealers; as most people have no money to buy them, their factories are working at 50% capacity and some factories even go broke. Why is money restricted to buy the goods that are there, available and ready to be used? In my opinion, it is because most of the money is in a cloud, a cloud of investments that are fictitious and that create the continuous danger of a new recession. A recession that will once again make the super-rich super-super-rich and the rest of us, the 99%, poorer. It is a condition of exploitation that we, the 99% (6.93 billion), should not tolerate.