5 ms·

Agree, but doing so requires changing our economy to not be based on capitalism. How do you see that happening?

philipkglass 10y ago
Competition between producers already incentivizes eliminating labor whenever you can do a job cheaper without human labor. That provides enduring pressure for more automation without any basic changes to the incentive structure of markets. How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? Several possibilities here: - Open source imitations of commercial robot systems - "Pirate" clones of commercial systems (de facto illegal, but de jure as common as copying movies) - Poorer nations rejecting rich nations' IP regimes and legalizing all sorts of imitations, even building national programs to copy the rich, if the previous two factors are not sufficient by themselves You might think that it's in the long term interest of producers to require some skilled human labor to make the makerbots, so the bots don't become effectively reducible to bits and copied as easily as bits. But there is a collective action problem that works against producers and in the long term favor of the general public: a "defecting" producer can always gain a temporary advantage by eliminating a bit more human labor, even if in the long term it means the decline of their own position and the position of all large capital owners.
- ue_ 10y ago
  Eliminating labour on the whole in society does not bode well for the capitalists; there will be no money that can be used to buy the goods that are being produced, or there will be very little money, which is held by those who must work in some capacity or another. Total or very-nearly-total automation is not compatible with capitalism unless there's someone there to hand out money to keep the economy functioning, which seems quite silly, because how is it decided who gets how much money? >How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? By socialising the means of production. By passing the returns on to the people who ought to be happy that a job requires less labour, rather than forcing them into "unemployment", something which is only really problematic when unemployment means you depend on welfare programs or die.
  - philipkglass 10y ago
    People who become unable to participate in the market economy no longer matter to it; their preferences don't matter for the logic of market supply or market demand. The shareholders of General Electric don't care what North Koreans or the beggars of Dhaka want, because those people are effectively outside the market economy. Large numbers of working age Americans could join the beggars of Dhaka in market irrelevance, if their labor becomes obsolete and there's no progress on UBI or other waged-labor-replacement schemes. It's true that ever-increasing ownership concentration and the decline of mass-participation market exchange wouldn't much resemble capitalism as pictured by economists circa 1950. If the richest gradually morph into neo-feudal lords rather than successful capitalists in the 20th century mold, I don't think they'll worry too much about the fine distinctions as long as they still control the best and the most of real estate and other natural resources. I totally agree that socializing the means of production (and for real, not the hatchet job of 20th century "communist" states) is the right way to ensure that the gains of automation benefit humanity in general. But the process that ultimately leads to socializing those benefits may resemble stealing fire from the gods more than it resembles ordinary electoral politics.
    - ue_ 10y ago
      >People who become unable to participate in the market economy no longer matter to it I don't think goods would continue to be produced if so few people (in this society in which almost all human labour has been eliminated) can pay for them. Forget market participation, the market almost ceases to exist as a whole. And what are these beggars and North Koreans to do? All they can do is sit and watch products drop off the production line and wallowing in their needs. But actually, if the market is so small, no capitalist will be producing much of anything at all; the costs of production would not justify catering to such a small group of people. I don't think it is good for things to be in this state of extreme automation in capitalism, because it would be the biggest failure of the capitalist system. The only reason I could see for ever wanting such a thing would be to accelerate the arrival of what comes next (according to Marx, socialism and Communism).
      - 10y ago
- gnaritas 10y ago
  > Competition between producers already incentivizes eliminating labor whenever you can do a job cheaper without human labor. That provides enduring pressure for more automation without any basic changes to the incentive structure of markets. That was not the question. > How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? Several possibilities here: None of your answers address how to allocate goods to the masses when their labor is no longer necessary. When robots created by capitalists can do everything, but few people work and have no money to buy anything, capitalism fails; it would fail long before that. Unless the government steps in and runs the automation itself to distribute the goods to the masses, something big has to give.
TaylorAlexander 10y ago
The the story of The Machine, I took a Marxist view that if the people own The Machine they can share the outputs of the machine without capitalism.
- ue_ 10y ago
  I have to say that I really like your idea, I've been reading leftist literature recently (Marx, Proudhon, Harvey, I.I Rubin..) and your idea really made me think. Thanks.
  - TaylorAlexander 10y ago
    That feels so encouraging to hear! Thank you. I've been trying to figure it all out too. I just launched a community site to talk more about these ideas. I'd love it if you joined! http://reboot.love/ http://reboot.love/

Competition between producers already incentivizes eliminating labor whenever you can do a job cheaper without human labor. That provides enduring pressure for more automation without any basic changes to the incentive structure of markets. How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? Several possibilities here: - Open source imitations of commercial robot systems - "Pirate" clones of commercial systems (de facto illegal, but de jure as common as copying movies) - Poorer nations rejecting rich nations' IP regimes and legalizing all sorts of imitations, even building national programs to copy the rich, if the previous two factors are not sufficient by themselves You might think that it's in the long term interest of producers to require some skilled human labor to make the makerbots, so the bots don't become effectively reducible to bits and copied as easily as bits. But there is a collective action problem that works against producers and in the long term favor of the general public: a "defecting" producer can always gain a temporary advantage by eliminating a bit more human labor, even if in the long term it means the decline of their own position and the position of all large capital owners.

ue_ 10y ago
Eliminating labour on the whole in society does not bode well for the capitalists; there will be no money that can be used to buy the goods that are being produced, or there will be very little money, which is held by those who must work in some capacity or another. Total or very-nearly-total automation is not compatible with capitalism unless there's someone there to hand out money to keep the economy functioning, which seems quite silly, because how is it decided who gets how much money? >How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? By socialising the means of production. By passing the returns on to the people who ought to be happy that a job requires less labour, rather than forcing them into "unemployment", something which is only really problematic when unemployment means you depend on welfare programs or die.
- philipkglass 10y ago
  People who become unable to participate in the market economy no longer matter to it; their preferences don't matter for the logic of market supply or market demand. The shareholders of General Electric don't care what North Koreans or the beggars of Dhaka want, because those people are effectively outside the market economy. Large numbers of working age Americans could join the beggars of Dhaka in market irrelevance, if their labor becomes obsolete and there's no progress on UBI or other waged-labor-replacement schemes. It's true that ever-increasing ownership concentration and the decline of mass-participation market exchange wouldn't much resemble capitalism as pictured by economists circa 1950. If the richest gradually morph into neo-feudal lords rather than successful capitalists in the 20th century mold, I don't think they'll worry too much about the fine distinctions as long as they still control the best and the most of real estate and other natural resources. I totally agree that socializing the means of production (and for real, not the hatchet job of 20th century "communist" states) is the right way to ensure that the gains of automation benefit humanity in general. But the process that ultimately leads to socializing those benefits may resemble stealing fire from the gods more than it resembles ordinary electoral politics.
  - ue_ 10y ago
    >People who become unable to participate in the market economy no longer matter to it I don't think goods would continue to be produced if so few people (in this society in which almost all human labour has been eliminated) can pay for them. Forget market participation, the market almost ceases to exist as a whole. And what are these beggars and North Koreans to do? All they can do is sit and watch products drop off the production line and wallowing in their needs. But actually, if the market is so small, no capitalist will be producing much of anything at all; the costs of production would not justify catering to such a small group of people. I don't think it is good for things to be in this state of extreme automation in capitalism, because it would be the biggest failure of the capitalist system. The only reason I could see for ever wanting such a thing would be to accelerate the arrival of what comes next (according to Marx, socialism and Communism).
    - 10y ago
gnaritas 10y ago
> Competition between producers already incentivizes eliminating labor whenever you can do a job cheaper without human labor. That provides enduring pressure for more automation without any basic changes to the incentive structure of markets. That was not the question. > How do you get human liberation instead of IP-holders-and-landlords-own-everything after human labor is 90% obsolete? Several possibilities here: None of your answers address how to allocate goods to the masses when their labor is no longer necessary. When robots created by capitalists can do everything, but few people work and have no money to buy anything, capitalism fails; it would fail long before that. Unless the government steps in and runs the automation itself to distribute the goods to the masses, something big has to give.

TaylorAlexander 10y ago

The the story of The Machine, I took a Marxist view that if the people own The Machine they can share the outputs of the machine without capitalism.

ue_ 10y ago
I have to say that I really like your idea, I've been reading leftist literature recently (Marx, Proudhon, Harvey, I.I Rubin..) and your idea really made me think. Thanks.
- TaylorAlexander 10y ago
  That feels so encouraging to hear! Thank you. I've been trying to figure it all out too. I just launched a community site to talk more about these ideas. I'd love it if you joined! http://reboot.love/ http://reboot.love/