Docs for Balance of the Planet
Released by NYC '90
Introduction:
What you you do if you suddenly had the power to tackle the
earth's environmental problems? Do you think that you could make
this Earth a better and happier place to live? This game gives
you that chance. You have been appointed High Commissioner of
the Envuronment by the United Nations, and you now weild vast
power to levy taxes on activities that impact the environment,
and to use the money so derived to grant subsidies to
environmentally beneficial activities. You are responsible for
many aspects of human life on earth, and your performance will be
measured a variety of standards. This may prove to be more
difficult than you had imagined.
Goal:
Your goal in this game is to get points. You gain points
for environmentally good things, such as preserving biodiversity.
You lose points for environmentally bad things, such as people
dying from air pollution. You try to influence the world so that
the good things are maximized and the bad things are minimized.
A Quick Walk Through the Game:
When you first start the game, you will se Planet Earth.
Click the mouse anywhere or hit any key. A new screen appears
with two lists of points. This is your RESULTS screen. Near the
top is your total score. On the left side are positive points
that you earn for environmental goodness. On the right side are
negative points that you lose for environmental crimes. Select
"Skin Cancer Points."
The computer takes you to a screen called SKIN CANCER
POINTS. You will see a picture and some text explaining that you
lose points for all the people who die of skin cancer. Along the
right edge of the screen are some other items. In the lower
right corner is a bar chart with just one bar. This bar chart
shows the number of skin cancer deaths that have occured during
the course of the game. Since you haven't played yet, it doesn't
show much. Don't worry, it'll get more interesting in future
turns.
Just above the bar chart is a number; it represents the
value of the LATEST bar on the bar chart, which in this case is
also the ONLY bar on the bar chart. An additional bar is added
to the bar chart at the end of each turn. Later on, when the bar
chart changes, you will be able to use this number to get a quick
impression of how much things have changed. If you select a bar
in the bar chart, this number will change to indicate the value
of the bar on which you clicked.
Above the bar chart are two lists: "CAUSES" and "EFFECTS."
The former lists all the factors that are causes of Skin Cancer
Points, while the latter lists all the consequences of Skin
Cancer Points. In this case, there are no effects, and only one
cause: Skin Cancer Deaths. Select that. The program will take
you to that screen, which has its own bar chart and lists of
causes and effects. Note that Skin Cancer Points is an effect of
Skin Cancer Deaths, and Ultraviolet Light is the cause of Skin
Cancer Deaths.
Now, you're losing lots of points because of skin cancer, so
you want to know why that's happening and what you can do about
it, so you had better explore this problem a little deeper.
Select "Ultraviolet Light."
You get a new screen explaining that ultraviolet light comes
from the sun, but is absorbed by ozone in the stratosphere. You
will note that there are several effects of ultraviolet light.
For now, leave them; you want to find out what's causing all this
ultraviolet light that's making the skin cancer that's killing
people and costing you points. So select the only cause of
ultraviolet light: "Ozone."
Here's a screen that explains ozone. And the only cause of
that is stratospheric CFC, so you had better select that. This
takes you to Stratospheric CFC, and more explanation. The cause
of that is tropospheric CFC, so you select that and go into the
Tropospheric CFC screen. This is a long trip, isn't it? You're
still not done, though, because the cause of Tropospheric CFC is
CFC production. Select that and you get a description of
chlorofluorocarbons - CFC's. At least now you know what CFC
means! And one of the causes of CFC production is CFC taxes.
Select that and you encounter a new and different screen.
This screen has a scroll bar that allows you to set the tax
rate on CFC production. If you raise the tax, it will discourage
production of CFC's and thereby result in less
chloroflourocarbons released into the atmosphere. With fewer
CFC's, there will be more ozone and less ultraviolet light,
therefore fewer deaths from skin cancer and fewer points assessed
against you. Sounds good, doesn't it? Well, there will be some
other effects that may not be so good, but you can learn about
these complications later. For now, go ahead and raise the tax
on CFC's.
Now examine the "Game" menu on the menubar. There are
numberous options here, but for now, select "Results." This
takes you right back to the RESULTS screen. Check out Skin
Cancer Points. Oh, no! It's the same - nothing happened! You
wonder what gives? Since you raised taxes on CFC's, shouldn't
that help? Well, of course nothing happened YET; you haven't
given the world any time to respond to your new tax. You'll see
how to do that in a minute, but let's look at something else
first.
Go to the "Game" menu and select "Policy Summary." You'll
see a screen rahter like the points screen, only it lists
monetary figures. On the left side are the taxes that you levy,
with the tax rate and the net reciepts that you get. On the
right side are the subsidies that you are allowed to grant. You
will note that the change in the tax on CFC's is reflected on
this screen. The numbers require some explanation.
The taxes are levied against activities on a per-unit basis.
For example, your tax on CFC's is levied against each ton of
CFC's manufactured. If CFC production falls to half its earlier
value, then your tax revenues will fall by half. Other taxes are
similarly levied on a per-unit-produced basis.
The subsidies are handled in a different fashion. You are
required by the United Nations to pay for all property damage due
to air pollution, and subsidize other efforts with the remainder
of your proceeds. Thus, the program takes your total income from
taxes and subtracts out the property damage claims against you.
What is left over is divvied out to the various subsidies on a
pro-rata basis. That is to say, each subsidy gets a percentage
of the remainder. At the beginning of the game, each subsidy
gets 8% of your remainder. You can change that.
Choose a deserving subsidy that you would like to increase.
Select its name, and you will be taken to its subsidy screen.
There is a scroll bar that allows you to change its percentage of
your excess budget. Experiment with the scroll bar; you will
note that the bar chart in the lower right corner changes to
reflect your action. The value above the scroll bar is the tax
or subsidy RATE, while the value in the bar chart reflects the
actual dollar REVENUE going in or out. When you are done, select
"Policy Summary" from the menu to go back to the "Policy Summary"
screen. You will see that your subsidy has indeed been changed.
There are restrictions on your taxes and subsidies that
prevent you from making overly rapid changes in the tax rates.
Part of the compromise that was reached in debate in the United
Nations was that the agreement that you would not be able to
raise taxes sky-high overnight. The fastest that you can raise
them is by 400% every five years. Faster rates of increase would
create too many economic dislocations. If you want to raise the
tax on a industry by more than 400%, you will have to raise part
of it in this turn and part of it in the next turn.
There are no such constraints on the speed with which you
can change the subsidies. However, you ARE required to balance
your budget. The program will not permit you to increase your
total subsidies to a level higher than 100% of your treasury. So
if you want to dramatically increase the subsidy to, say, Wood
Stoves, then you will first have to decrease the subsidy to
something else. The percentage points that you free up by taking
away from one subsidy can be given back to any other subsidy.
Your basic strategy, then, will be to levy taxes and grant
subsidies in an effort to increase your point score. What makes
this difficult - and interesting - is the complexity of the
environmental problems you face, and their interconnectedness.
The only way to appreciate this complexity is to move through the
system of cause and effect presented in the game. This will take
you some time; there are 150 different screens to explore. But
this is also part of the fun. You can navigate through this
network of cause and effect, seeing how environmental problems
are all intertwined. If you get lost, or want to get your
bearings, you can always select "Results" or "Policies" to get
back to familliar territory.
When you have explored the game to your satisfaction, and
set all your taxes and all your subsidies, go to the "Results"
screen and select "Execute Policies" from the menu. The computer
will go away for a few seconds while it calculates all the
environmental effects of your actions. When it comes back, you
will see how your score has changed. Oh no! It weent down! You
must have done something wrong!
No, you haven't. You inherited a seriously screwed-up
planet that is going steadily downhill. Your job is to turn
things around, but there is nothing you can do that will solve
all our environmental problems overnight. So, for the first few
turns, things will get worse and worse. If you do a good job,
things will start to improve after a few turns, and your score
will become positive.
There is one other screen that will help you figure out what
you're doing right and what you're doing wrong. While you're in
the "Results" screen, select the option labelled "Feedback." It
will take you to a screen that lists your biggest problems as
well as your successes. The lists apply to the current turn only
and should help you decide what you need to do next. This is an
information display only; when you're finished looking at it,
return to the "Results" screen.
Your goal, of course, is to get lots of points. You have
nine turns to play the game. After the ninth turn, in the year
2035, the game is over and your score becomes your measure of
success for that game. That's all there is to it!
How to Win:
At first, you will be frustrated by this game. Your score
will go down and down, and you won't be able to see exactly why
at first. Be patient - environmental problems are tricky, and
you are going to have to exert some effort to get on top of them.
After all, if environmental problems were so simple that anybody
could figure them out in a flash, we wouldn't bee in this mess,
would we?
Winning this game is easy once you come to understand the
cause-and-effect relationships at work. There are a lot of
interrelationships; and, if you fail to catch on to the
connections, you can lose the game. For example, earlier in this
manual I mentiones that you might want to increase the tax on
CFC's to save the ozone layer. There is a problem with this:
CFC's are also necessary for industrial production. If you cut
down on CFC production, industrial output will be reduced, which
will have damagine effects on other areas. Thus, you can't just
clamp down blindly on CFC's. And this general principle applies
throughout the game. Watch how the point scores change and
identify the most serious problems. You can't solve every
environmental problem, but you can put a lid on the worst ones.
Taxation is the key to success. You must not be timid about
quadrupling taxes on some of the activities. Remember, the
initial tax rate is only 1% of the value of the good, so even if
you quadruple it once, it will still only amount to only 4% of
the value, which is not by itself enough to discourage
production. Remember, too, that taxes are the source of your
income; they pay for all the good works you subsidize. So tax
some activies heavily...
...but not all activities. Remember, if you shut down all
industry, you will probably make matters worse in many areas. So
be selective!
I will give you one hint: you probably do want to tax the
behabbers out of CFC's. If you fail to shut down CFC prodution
quickly, the long-term damage to the ozone layer may be
catastrophic. Even if you do shut down CFC production
completely, the CFC's already released into the environment will
probably continue to do a lot of damage.
Level 2: Playing other Biases
You've played the game a few times, you've had some fun, and
you're ready to broaden the horizons of the game. You've come to
the right place, podner, because there's a feature that makes the
game much more interesting. To use it, simply start up a fresh
game and select the "Load Bias" menu item. You must load a bias
file at the very beginning of the game, when you see the title
screen with the words "Balance of the Planet."
Pro-Nuclear Bias:
This bias file presents the view of an advocate of nuclear
power. According to this bias, nuclear power is safe, clean,
cheap, and abundant. It paints a picture of nuclear power as the
only alternative to fossil fuels. In this bias, coal is
particularly dangerous and dirty, and solar energy is
impractical. To win, you must do everything possible to
encourage the growth of nuclear power, while discoraging other
forms of energy use.
Environmentalist Bias:
This bias file offers a view of the world that might be
embraced by an environmentalist. There are so many species of
environmentalises in the world as there are beetles in Amazonia,
so this bias file represents only a rough amalgam of a disparate
group. It sees all industrial activity as dangerous and
pollution; it places great value on the preservation of life on
earth. To win in this bias, you must move quickly to replace our
reliance on fossil fuels with reliance on solar energy, dams, and
energy conservation. Be warned, though, that the
environmentalist bias is rather pessimistic, so winning may be
difficult.
Industrialist Bias:
This bias is as optimistic as the environmentalist bias is
pessimistic. The industrialist thinks that the world is in great
shape, that environmental problems are overblown, and that what
we need in more of the same. Thus, all the predicted problems of
global warming, ozone-depletion, soil erosion, and so forth are
given short shrift, while that material values are emphasized.
If you do nothing in this bias, you'll still win. Technological
optimish is high, so money spent on research will yield big
results.
Third-World Bias:
This bias tackles the disparities between the North and the
South. It aserts that all human life is equally valuable, and
adjusts the point system accordingly. This dramatically shifts
the game towards the problem of starvation and away from such
"minor" matters as lung disease, which, after all, affects a
comparatively few Northerners. It is less concerned with
preserving nature, for the appreciation of nature's beauties, in
this bias, is a luxury that only well-fed prople can appreciate.
This one is difficult to win. Starvation is your top priority.
Quickie Math Refresher:
So you're a little intimidated by all the math stuff in the
game? Don't be - it's really just stuff you learned in high
school. So, to refresh your memory:
Strange Numbers (e.g., "3.65e-5"):
This is a variaton on scientific notation. It's a very
compact way of expressing almost any number. The example number
is read as "3.65 times ten to the negative fifth power." It is
the same as .0000365. That's 3.65 with four zeros in front of
it. 3.65e8 would be 365,000,000. It's not the number of zeros
that we count, but how manyplaces the decimal point has been
shifter.
Log:
This stands for "logarithm." Now, logs may seem really bad,
but you don't need to understand all the theory to use them in
this simulation. All you need to know is this: a log takes a big
number and squishes it down to a much smaller number. For
example, the log of 10 is 1; the log of 100 is 2; the log of
1,000 is 3, and the log of 1,000,000 is 6. I use logs to keep
dangerous numbers under control.
Sqrt:
This stands for "square root." This is another number-
squashing function, only it's not as strong as a log. For
example, the sqrt of 10 is 3.16; the sqrt of 100 is 10; the sqrt
of 1,000 is 31.6; and the sqrt of 1,000,000 is 1,000. I like to
use sqrt on less rambunctious numbers. It's like a kinder,
gentler rubber band.
Sqik:
This is what ducks do when you hold them in your lap.
Variables:
A variable is a number in an equation that could be almost
anything. For example, consider this sim,ple situation: you're
on a Wonder Diet that promises t lose 2 pounds a day. Then the
equation for your weight loss is as follows:
Total Weight Loss=(2 pounds per day) * Days on Diet
In this equation, "Days on Diet" is a variable. It could be
anything and the equation would still be true.
---The Mad Scientist
NYC '90s
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Another file downloaded from: The NIRVANAnet(tm) Seven
& the Temple of the Screaming Electron Taipan Enigma 510/935-5845
Burn This Flag Zardoz 408/363-9766
realitycheck Poindexter Fortran 510/527-1662
Lies Unlimited Mick Freen 801/278-2699
The New Dork Sublime Biffnix 415/864-DORK
The Shrine Rif Raf 206/794-6674
Planet Mirth Simon Jester 510/786-6560
"Raw Data for Raw Nerves"
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