In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, the six fabled Infinity Stones have been the center of a 10 year narrative. Each Stone is imbued with cosmic magic that grants them ultimate dominion over Power, Space, Reality, Soul, Time, and Mind. Conflicts and plots revolve around them as heroes and villains have tried to secure them for their perceived ‘greater goods’. After rewatching a favorite video of mine on a former professor’s YouTube channel, Market Power, I was struck with some ideas as to how the Infinity Stones could be best utilized to shape a better universe. The characters in the MCU were right in believing that proper utilization of the Stones could provide “a warm light for all mankind to share”, and I aim to address each Stone and how it should be used.
Power
The Power Stone offers users access to what seems to be unlimited power. On screen, we have seen it used to obliterate planets, people, and spacecrafts. The amount of energy that it must be outputting to perform these incredible feats could be harnessed to fuel a world. This idea was proposed by Market Power and I wholeheartedly agree that this would be a better use for the Power Stone. By gaining access to unlimited power, we would see a sudden plummet in prices to produce electricity and the world could switch over to a clean, sustainable energy source, inevitably freeing up resources to invest back into other, high-priority endeavors like education, technological advances, and conservation.
Space
With unlimited, clean energy available to the world, the Space Stone would be able to redistribute this out to all worlds across the MCU. It could also move goods and people instantaneously, as argued by Market Power, to reduce barriers for trade and increase productivity across the board. If you’ve read my post about the benefits of trade in Pokemon Go (or you already understand that trade is a good thing), you know that by engaging in trade, parties can produce more than what was before possible without trade. If Earth could only produce so much vibranium, for example, and Xandar could only produce so many spaceships, they would still have to worry about the costs of transporting their goods to one another and would therefore have to spend some of their resources trying to figure out that problem instead of using them to produce more vibranium and spaceships respectively. But with teleportation possible through the Space Stone, transportation costs fall and both parties can produce even more.
Reality
What if Abraham Lincoln never became president? What if George McFly never stood up to Biff? These are examples of questions that could never be answered without counterfactuals. Economists are always on the lookout for counterfactuals to prove theories. In Back to the Future, we see exactly what would have happened whether or not George socked Biff during the Enchantment Under the Sea Dance. We get to see both realities. That is what the Reality Stone brings to the table. By utilizing the Reality Stone, we could look at all outcomes of a given decision and predict with 100% certainty which policies would have what effects on a global or galactic economy. In fact, if we had the Reality Stone, we could put this whole paper to the test as we run scenarios to see just how each Stone could be best used instead of just theorizing about them.
Soul
Market Power and I both ran into similar problems with the Soul Stone. That is, its power set isn’t as concretely defined on screen. However, the idea I keep coming back to would be to use the Soul Stone to reduce infant mortality rates. By saving the next generation, we bring the next bright minds into the world and open the doors for better and better advances. The next question pertaining to the Soul Stone is who wants to go get it?
Time
If you’re a fan of the MCU, you may have identified the explanation I gave of the Reality Stone as the exact thing Doctor Strange used the Time Stone for in Avengers: Infinity War. Granted, exploring counterfactuals are indeed possible through the Time Stone, but I argue to use the Time Stone for a purpose that is unique to it. We see it used multiple times on screen to rewind or advance time on specific objects - our most informative case being the scene in Doctor Strange where Strange makes an apple mold and decay before reversing time and restoring it back to a healthy, edible fruit. With the Time Stone, we could produce food and goods in an instant. If this unrealistic method of food production had dust bowl effects like we saw in the 1930s, we could simply reverse time on the land and continue making food to feed all the hungry mouths out there.
Mind
For the Mind Stone, I’ll defer to the idea presented on Market Power of creating Artificial Intelligence. Using the Mind Stone to create AI was the whole plot of Avengers: Age of Ultron, and rightly so. Tony Stark believed that if he could automate the protection of the Earth, the Avengers could disband and pursue greater, better interests than being international peacekeepers. The idea of mechanization is an important one in world history. The printing press was a crucial invention that cut costs for getting books and information out to a wider audience which in turn spurred great thinkers and more inventions. If the Mind Stone could be used to create beneficial AI like Vision, imagine the effects of having a new “printing press” to further human development and technology!
Ultimately, Thanos’s plan to eradicate half of all life was only a temporary solution. Eventually, the universe’s population would surge to once again overtake available resources and we would be in the same situation we were in before. But by using a little economics, we come to a better solution that will benefit all instead of half of us. If Thanos had thought it out just a little more, he could have been the hero in everyone’s eyes that he believed himself to be.
Thanks for reading a relatively longer post of mine. Go watch the Market Power video to get another perspective on the Infinity Stone conversation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jCZgzFbePFQ
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