Smaller Faster Lighter Denser Cheaper

March 24, 2014
Manhattan Institute senior fellow Bryce (Power Hungry) asserts that for centuries we have been making goods and services smaller, faster, lighter, denser, and cheaper, and that due to these innovations, we “never have so many lived so well.” But he poses the question: “Will we continue innovating, embracing technology, and getting richer, or will we listen to those who are advocating degrowth?” Though Bryce jumps from topic to topic—from the printing press, to rock n’ roll, to digital communications, to doping at the Tour de France—it becomes clear that these examples bolster his deeply held views that natural gas and nuclear energy are keys to future global prosperity. He expounds at length in the third section of the book, noting that, “In the wake of the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant… the prospects for nuclear energy have never been brighter.” He does not hide his disdain for the “Green Left,” repeatedly criticizing organizations like the Sierra Club and Green Peace. Bryce’s exploration of innovation and companies pursuing the titular creed may hold some interest for general business readers, but this provocative work is ultimately about energy policy, and as such, may suit a more specialized audience. Agent: Dan Green, POM Inc.

April 15, 2014
A celebration of innovations that have produced cheaper and more abundant energy, faster computing, lighter vehicles and other technological benefits. Manhattan Institute senior fellow Bryce (Power Hungry: The Myths of "Green" Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future, 2010, etc.) vehemently rejects the views of catastrophists (from Bill McKibben to Greenpeace and the Sierra Club) who cry out about scarcity and shortage and warn against technology and industrial development as threats to the planet. Instead, he argues that entrepreneurs and innovation are creating a world where "more people are living longer, healthier, freer, more peaceful lives than at any time in human history." Innovation is allowing us to do more with less, he writes: "We are continually making things and processes Smaller Faster Lighter Denser Cheaper." Bryce surveys innovations from the printing press and the jet turbine to digital communications and new medical technologies, examining each in terms of its smaller-faster-etc. attributes. Due to widespread innovation, for example, computers are smaller and faster; food packaging is lighter, farms are denser, and goods and services are cheaper. And so on. In time, cheaper computing, high-speed Internet connectivity, wireless communications and 3-D printing may foster yet more innovation. "[O]ur future depends on embracing technology," he writes. The author's huge compendium of innovations and his fresh way of looking at them will interest many readers. His topics include the Panama Canal, oil drilling bits, the density of cities and online learning, and he writes at length about the critical importance of cheap, abundant, reliable energy, emphasizing the need for more natural gas, oil, nuclear energy and coal. Though Bryce often sounds like an unabashed booster for business and technology, he makes many intriguing arguments in this "rejoinder to the doomsayers [and] rebuttal to the catastrophists who insist that disaster lurks just around the corner."

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