What If Everything Was Made Of Marshmallows?

When I was six years old, I decided that the world would be infinitely better if everything was made of marshmallows. When I told my mother this, she didn’t seem to agree. Perhaps she thought I was annoyed at my limited sweet allowance and would throw a tantrum next time we visited the newsagents. Or maybe she’d watched Ghostbusters too many times and couldn’t think of anything more dreadful than everything turning giant and marshmallowy.

But, neither of those things had crossed my mind at all. I was actually thinking of ways to save the world, albeit from the perspective of a six-year-old. I was naive for believing that life would improve if things were constructed out of confectionery, but perhaps I was smarter than some adults whose dreams have revolutionised, and somewhat ruined, the world.

Many innovations come at a hefty cost — and I’m not talking about ludicrous price tags. While shiny new technology often has teething problems, some inventions require decades of remedial work to reverse their damage. And like a bizarre game of Jeopardy, many ‘solutions’ have been created which leave us oblivious as to what on Earth the question was — and why it ever mattered.

Civilisation as a whole seems to move backwards every time it moves forwards. And people don’t appreciate that they are part of the problem by misusing innovation to their own and others’ detriment.

We’ll get onto the rationale behind a marshmallow world later, but first, let’s look at the crazy…