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More automation isn't always better, full stop. I'm not saying that I want people to plant seeds by hand still, but I'm not sure that a completely automated fa

More automation isn't always better, full stop. I'm not saying that I want people to plant seeds by hand still, but I'm not sure that a completely automated factory farm where no people work is something to strive for either. I'd like animals to be raised by people, not machines, I think.

ghshephard 11y ago
More automation is almost always better - because once you automate something, you can use technological improvement to increase the efficiency, which reduces the total cost of what you just automated, which results in more of whatever was just automated being available at a lower cost. Net gain to humanity. I've never worked on a farm, but I have to believe that 99% of the work is something that most farm workers would probably be more than happy to see automated, such that they could manage the machines, rather than the actual mechanical effort. Move up the food chain, if you will. Also, from the videos I've seen from PETA, it's pretty clear that humans can act pretty horribly around farm animals, so it's not clear to me that the animals are coming off any better either. Long term, though - I say automate the creation of food such that animals are not involved. All of the things we love, meat, eggs, etc.. should be technologically generated so that no animal is harmed in it's creation. Get over the uncanny valley, and even things that would appear to be sacrosanct, such as a waiter/waitress at a restaurant, admitting nurse/doctor in an ER Ward, or teacher in a kindergarden - all of these seem to be things that automation would be a net-win.
- api 11y ago
  Where is this efficiency and net gain of which you speak? Real estate, food, energy, health care, education, and other necessities are getting more expensive, often dramatically so and sometimes at rates far beyond inflation. If this is an age of rapidly improving efficiency then most things should be getting cheaper. The amount of free time and disposable income we have should be increasing. We should be getting wealthier. Instead the opposite is happening for almost everyone save a tiny class of professionals and capitalists. One could be forgiven for thinking we're living in an age of inefficiency and technological decline, since that's what the price signals are indicating. I'm not sure this is SV or PG's "fault," but PG's rant is smug and non-productive and amounts to a whole lot of "why do they not eat cake?" It makes him sound clueless and out of touch.
  - boryas 11y ago
    What about the fact that tons of people can afford super nice things today by the standards of even 20 years ago? Imagine going back in time 20 years and showing somebody the iphone 4. Or going back 100 years and showing them the beat up junkers people drive in India. Both of those would be miracles, and yet today are very affordable.
    - api 11y ago
      Super nice, yes, but not essential. Everything essential is more expensive, often by quite a margin. Housing is insane.
      - prostoalex 11y ago
        You have to be very specific about housing. Some is very cheap http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Detroit,MI/10000p_price/price;a_sort/ http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Detroit,MI/10000p_price/price... And some is very expensive http://homesoftherich.net/2013/05/30000-square-foot-tudor-mansion-in-los-altos-hills-ca-re-listed/ http://homesoftherich.net/2013/05/30000-square-foot-tudor-ma... If price is the factor, deals can be found.
  - ghshephard 11y ago
    All of the things that you are describing, housing, food, energy, health care and education are significantly less expensive in terms of "hours worked to afford X" continue to drop in price, in some cases dramatically, than they were 50 years ago. What throws things off, is that new, more desirable, and more expensive items have appeared, that make things look more expensive. That's one of the concerns regarding inequality; is it okay for some members of society to have nicer things than the lower percentile income earners, as long as that group of lower percentile incomer earners have nicer things than they did 50 years ago? Or should we desire that everyone have (roughly) the same quality of thing, even if it now means that the lower percentile would be worse off objectively if inequality wasn't reduced? PG just assumes that the goal is to reduce poverty (as in, amount of food, health care, education) for the lower percentile - but I expect there is a not insignificant group of people who are more interested in reducing inequality, even if that means an (objective) increase in poverty. There is, of course, a third path that he doesn't even mention - and that's reducing inequality by bringing up the lower percentile. As an American, I sometimes wonder if it doesn't even occur to him (he certainly didn't discuss it in any detail in his essay) that you can develop universal health care, education, etc... that provides the same level of service regardless of wealth - which means if the top percentile want (for example) better health care, they end up increasing the level of service for everyone, including themselves. The essay on inequality seemed to have blinders on with regards to that possibility, though I think he gave it passing mention in a sentence regarding bring the bottom up, but didn't discuss it in any great detail.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
cellularmitosis 11y ago
Just to play devil's advocate, the problem here is that you simply haven't taken your notion automation far enough. I don't want cows to be domesticated en masse at all. I want there to be a factory full of sterile stainless steel tubes in the shape of a t-bone where steak cells endlessly reproduce in a bath of ideal nutrient soup...
- dinkumthinkum 11y ago
  To play normal human advocate, nobody that has not gone into a Sci-Fi reading induced coma wants that.
fleitz 11y ago
No one laments the lack of cow milking jobs, a world where humans don't have to work and instead can pursue creative goals is ideal, I want to see a world where food is just replicated from raw energy.
- throwaway2048 11y ago
  what if in such a world all production is owned by a tiny (say 100/1000) hypercapitalistic elite, and everything else is automated. Those people would wield more economic and thus political power than anyone else in history. Humans would not have to work, but its a huge mistake to assume the elite will willingly share that prosperity.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- Spooky23 11y ago
  You don't. I grew up in a town where the dairy farms employed lots of people, as did the businesses that supported them. Most of those farms are gone or scaled back as dairy became an industrialized operation. The guys who would be working as farm hands year round are now left with seasonal construction jobs and long winters of unemployment in nasty trailer parks. They lose their professional options and their dignity. I think that we're wired to have a purpose, and not everyone identifies creative pursuits as fulfilling.
- dinkumthinkum 11y ago
  You say no one ... Actually, I see a lot of you all saying this about farming .... Do you all live under rocks? You realize there are whole bustling industries of people wanting to go back to eating food produced in the exact opposite way than this frothy breathless Sci-Fi viewpoint. I mean, I wonder if those who hold such views actually realize human beings aren't actually robots or aren't actually the "extras" in the Sci-Fi stories ...

ghshephard 11y ago

More automation is almost always better - because once you automate something, you can use technological improvement to increase the efficiency, which reduces the total cost of what you just automated, which results in more of whatever was just automated being available at a lower cost. Net gain to humanity. I've never worked on a farm, but I have to believe that 99% of the work is something that most farm workers would probably be more than happy to see automated, such that they could manage the machines, rather than the actual mechanical effort. Move up the food chain, if you will. Also, from the videos I've seen from PETA, it's pretty clear that humans can act pretty horribly around farm animals, so it's not clear to me that the animals are coming off any better either. Long term, though - I say automate the creation of food such that animals are not involved. All of the things we love, meat, eggs, etc.. should be technologically generated so that no animal is harmed in it's creation. Get over the uncanny valley, and even things that would appear to be sacrosanct, such as a waiter/waitress at a restaurant, admitting nurse/doctor in an ER Ward, or teacher in a kindergarden - all of these seem to be things that automation would be a net-win.

api 11y ago
Where is this efficiency and net gain of which you speak? Real estate, food, energy, health care, education, and other necessities are getting more expensive, often dramatically so and sometimes at rates far beyond inflation. If this is an age of rapidly improving efficiency then most things should be getting cheaper. The amount of free time and disposable income we have should be increasing. We should be getting wealthier. Instead the opposite is happening for almost everyone save a tiny class of professionals and capitalists. One could be forgiven for thinking we're living in an age of inefficiency and technological decline, since that's what the price signals are indicating. I'm not sure this is SV or PG's "fault," but PG's rant is smug and non-productive and amounts to a whole lot of "why do they not eat cake?" It makes him sound clueless and out of touch.
- boryas 11y ago
  What about the fact that tons of people can afford super nice things today by the standards of even 20 years ago? Imagine going back in time 20 years and showing somebody the iphone 4. Or going back 100 years and showing them the beat up junkers people drive in India. Both of those would be miracles, and yet today are very affordable.
  - api 11y ago
    Super nice, yes, but not essential. Everything essential is more expensive, often by quite a margin. Housing is insane.
    - prostoalex 11y ago
      You have to be very specific about housing. Some is very cheap http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Detroit,MI/10000p_price/price;a_sort/ http://www.trulia.com/for_sale/Detroit,MI/10000p_price/price... And some is very expensive http://homesoftherich.net/2013/05/30000-square-foot-tudor-mansion-in-los-altos-hills-ca-re-listed/ http://homesoftherich.net/2013/05/30000-square-foot-tudor-ma... If price is the factor, deals can be found.
- ghshephard 11y ago
  All of the things that you are describing, housing, food, energy, health care and education are significantly less expensive in terms of "hours worked to afford X" continue to drop in price, in some cases dramatically, than they were 50 years ago. What throws things off, is that new, more desirable, and more expensive items have appeared, that make things look more expensive. That's one of the concerns regarding inequality; is it okay for some members of society to have nicer things than the lower percentile income earners, as long as that group of lower percentile incomer earners have nicer things than they did 50 years ago? Or should we desire that everyone have (roughly) the same quality of thing, even if it now means that the lower percentile would be worse off objectively if inequality wasn't reduced? PG just assumes that the goal is to reduce poverty (as in, amount of food, health care, education) for the lower percentile - but I expect there is a not insignificant group of people who are more interested in reducing inequality, even if that means an (objective) increase in poverty. There is, of course, a third path that he doesn't even mention - and that's reducing inequality by bringing up the lower percentile. As an American, I sometimes wonder if it doesn't even occur to him (he certainly didn't discuss it in any detail in his essay) that you can develop universal health care, education, etc... that provides the same level of service regardless of wealth - which means if the top percentile want (for example) better health care, they end up increasing the level of service for everyone, including themselves. The essay on inequality seemed to have blinders on with regards to that possibility, though I think he gave it passing mention in a sentence regarding bring the bottom up, but didn't discuss it in any great detail.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

cellularmitosis 11y ago

Just to play devil's advocate, the problem here is that you simply haven't taken your notion automation far enough. I don't want cows to be domesticated en masse at all. I want there to be a factory full of sterile stainless steel tubes in the shape of a t-bone where steak cells endlessly reproduce in a bath of ideal nutrient soup...

dinkumthinkum 11y ago
To play normal human advocate, nobody that has not gone into a Sci-Fi reading induced coma wants that.

fleitz 11y ago

No one laments the lack of cow milking jobs, a world where humans don't have to work and instead can pursue creative goals is ideal, I want to see a world where food is just replicated from raw energy.

throwaway2048 11y ago
what if in such a world all production is owned by a tiny (say 100/1000) hypercapitalistic elite, and everything else is automated. Those people would wield more economic and thus political power than anyone else in history. Humans would not have to work, but its a huge mistake to assume the elite will willingly share that prosperity.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
Spooky23 11y ago
You don't. I grew up in a town where the dairy farms employed lots of people, as did the businesses that supported them. Most of those farms are gone or scaled back as dairy became an industrialized operation. The guys who would be working as farm hands year round are now left with seasonal construction jobs and long winters of unemployment in nasty trailer parks. They lose their professional options and their dignity. I think that we're wired to have a purpose, and not everyone identifies creative pursuits as fulfilling.
dinkumthinkum 11y ago
You say no one ... Actually, I see a lot of you all saying this about farming .... Do you all live under rocks? You realize there are whole bustling industries of people wanting to go back to eating food produced in the exact opposite way than this frothy breathless Sci-Fi viewpoint. I mean, I wonder if those who hold such views actually realize human beings aren't actually robots or aren't actually the "extras" in the Sci-Fi stories ...