3 ms·

Not true for everyone though, is it? There are people that get the privilege of existing without working anything. Besides, I say that the term you mentioned fo

Not true for everyone though, is it? There are people that get the privilege of existing without working anything. Besides, I say that the term you mentioned for solving this issue, "until we invent replicators" makes it sound like we are bound this way and could not solve this problem were that we wanted to. No, I think that is not true, we simply don't want to and some of us are rather concerned of the side effects of doing so. But I don't think that this issue would be insurmountable, if we would want to fix it.

throwaway2048 9y ago
The beliefs about replicators and transforming planets like mars are just a futurist fantasy about how our problems will all be magically solved in the wonderful future, its great escapism to avoid caring about real issues we really can solve right now, and a very convenient dismissal if issues we can address right now with "The future will fix it"!. Note, many of the people that don't need to work are extraordinarily wealthy, hundreds of thousands of times over what would be required to lead a reasonable life, their wealth bases usually built, directly or indirectly, from the efforts of the same people that have to work until they are 70. But yeah, in the future, somehow this arrangement will change into a magical utopia, not a situation where those same wealthy horde an even more absurd amount of power, while everyone else struggles to scrape by, or is just discarded entirely in the face of cheaper and better automation that is owned by the wealthier rentier class. You see this callous disregard on HN every time an article about Uber or Amazon treating their employees like shit, remarks to the effect of "they shouldn't be complaining, cant wait till they are replaced by robots", and I think its disgusting, but its a telling remark about how employees are going to be viewed increasingly in the future. If we don't even want to bother broaching the serious wide-cutting issues we have right now with poverty and inequality in our society, I fail to see how the hell technology that effectively massively magnifies the economic power of whoever can afford them the most will do anything but make the situation far, far more dire.
- woolvalley 9y ago
  I don't think the OP post was being serious about replicators. It was a geek version of 'until money grows on trees'. And then the next reply was saying we don't necessarily need replicators to solve this problem.
  - throwaway2048 9y ago
    not all replies are a refutation or dispute with what was being said.
- musage 9y ago
  You are correct, and in company of intelligent people. It's just that most of the HN crowd really really doesn't like being caught cheering on naked emperors. > If machines produce everything we need, the outcome will depend on how things are distributed. Everyone can enjoy a life of luxurious leisure if the machine-produced wealth is shared, or most people can end up miserably poor if the machine-owners successfully lobby against wealth redistribution. So far, the trend seems to be toward the second option, with technology driving ever-increasing inequality. -- Stephen Hawking And I'll add this, in light of how the comments that have value regularly get greyed out, while the gimmicks get discussed endlessly: > Of course, the terrible things I heard from the Nuremberg Trials, about the six million Jews and the people from other races who were killed, were facts that shocked me deeply. But I wasn't able to see the connection with my own past. I was satisfied that I wasn't personally to blame and that I hadn't known about those things. I wasn't aware of the extent. But one day I went past the memorial plaque which had been put up for Sophie Scholl in Franz Josef Strasse, and I saw that she was born the same year as me, and she was executed the same year I started working for Hitler. And at that moment I actually sensed that it was no excuse to be young, and that it would have been possible to find things out. -- Traudl Junge Any bright teenager can notice the rising inequality and extrapolate trends, and do quick thought experiments about throwing hi-tech into the mix. Any decent (and intellectually honest) adult would have to concede it when pointed out to them even if they didn't already see it themselves. Continue to chose quality over quantity. Continue to "weep with the wise rather than laugh with fools". You may not be able to save the world, but you can prove with every breath what cowardly traitors to themselves and life so many people are, and that in contrast to them at least some people would deserve living in a better world. I salute you.
rayiner 9y ago
We cannot solve this issue with existing technology. People have to work to feed and shelter everyone. Not everyone has to work, but a lot of people do. Let’s say you wanted to eliminate all the “work to live” jobs (the bottom 75% of all taxpayers, those making less than $67,000). To replace their income, the top 25% would have to pay half their income in additional taxes (for a total tax burden of about 85%). Then you’d have to figure out how to replace all the Uber drivers, cashiers, bank tellers, etc.
- RealityVoid 9y ago
  You don't have to replace them, you just assure a minimum standard of living available to all individuals. That should be enough for basic necessities but who wants to work will still work.
  - rayiner 9y ago
    I’m not talking about safety nets. I’m talking about this assertion by the author: > Of course, if you saw it in your own country, you’d recognize it for what it was—people working their asses off, even well into old age, not out of some perverse industriousness, but simply because they’ve gotta eat. Even if Japan had a more robust safety net, people would still need to work to eat (and they have welfare). Not necessarily any given person, but people generally. Indeed, we would be counting on exactly the opposite point from what the author makes: that most people would be industrious enough to work these jobs notwithstanding the fact that they could eat if they didn’t. Particular in Japan, which is facing an unprecedented imbalance between working age and non-working age people.

throwaway2048 9y ago

The beliefs about replicators and transforming planets like mars are just a futurist fantasy about how our problems will all be magically solved in the wonderful future, its great escapism to avoid caring about real issues we really can solve right now, and a very convenient dismissal if issues we can address right now with "The future will fix it"!. Note, many of the people that don't need to work are extraordinarily wealthy, hundreds of thousands of times over what would be required to lead a reasonable life, their wealth bases usually built, directly or indirectly, from the efforts of the same people that have to work until they are 70. But yeah, in the future, somehow this arrangement will change into a magical utopia, not a situation where those same wealthy horde an even more absurd amount of power, while everyone else struggles to scrape by, or is just discarded entirely in the face of cheaper and better automation that is owned by the wealthier rentier class. You see this callous disregard on HN every time an article about Uber or Amazon treating their employees like shit, remarks to the effect of "they shouldn't be complaining, cant wait till they are replaced by robots", and I think its disgusting, but its a telling remark about how employees are going to be viewed increasingly in the future. If we don't even want to bother broaching the serious wide-cutting issues we have right now with poverty and inequality in our society, I fail to see how the hell technology that effectively massively magnifies the economic power of whoever can afford them the most will do anything but make the situation far, far more dire.

woolvalley 9y ago
I don't think the OP post was being serious about replicators. It was a geek version of 'until money grows on trees'. And then the next reply was saying we don't necessarily need replicators to solve this problem.
- throwaway2048 9y ago
  not all replies are a refutation or dispute with what was being said.
musage 9y ago
You are correct, and in company of intelligent people. It's just that most of the HN crowd really really doesn't like being caught cheering on naked emperors. > If machines produce everything we need, the outcome will depend on how things are distributed. Everyone can enjoy a life of luxurious leisure if the machine-produced wealth is shared, or most people can end up miserably poor if the machine-owners successfully lobby against wealth redistribution. So far, the trend seems to be toward the second option, with technology driving ever-increasing inequality. -- Stephen Hawking And I'll add this, in light of how the comments that have value regularly get greyed out, while the gimmicks get discussed endlessly: > Of course, the terrible things I heard from the Nuremberg Trials, about the six million Jews and the people from other races who were killed, were facts that shocked me deeply. But I wasn't able to see the connection with my own past. I was satisfied that I wasn't personally to blame and that I hadn't known about those things. I wasn't aware of the extent. But one day I went past the memorial plaque which had been put up for Sophie Scholl in Franz Josef Strasse, and I saw that she was born the same year as me, and she was executed the same year I started working for Hitler. And at that moment I actually sensed that it was no excuse to be young, and that it would have been possible to find things out. -- Traudl Junge Any bright teenager can notice the rising inequality and extrapolate trends, and do quick thought experiments about throwing hi-tech into the mix. Any decent (and intellectually honest) adult would have to concede it when pointed out to them even if they didn't already see it themselves. Continue to chose quality over quantity. Continue to "weep with the wise rather than laugh with fools". You may not be able to save the world, but you can prove with every breath what cowardly traitors to themselves and life so many people are, and that in contrast to them at least some people would deserve living in a better world. I salute you.

rayiner 9y ago

We cannot solve this issue with existing technology. People have to work to feed and shelter everyone. Not everyone has to work, but a lot of people do. Let’s say you wanted to eliminate all the “work to live” jobs (the bottom 75% of all taxpayers, those making less than $67,000). To replace their income, the top 25% would have to pay half their income in additional taxes (for a total tax burden of about 85%). Then you’d have to figure out how to replace all the Uber drivers, cashiers, bank tellers, etc.

RealityVoid 9y ago
You don't have to replace them, you just assure a minimum standard of living available to all individuals. That should be enough for basic necessities but who wants to work will still work.
- rayiner 9y ago
  I’m not talking about safety nets. I’m talking about this assertion by the author: > Of course, if you saw it in your own country, you’d recognize it for what it was—people working their asses off, even well into old age, not out of some perverse industriousness, but simply because they’ve gotta eat. Even if Japan had a more robust safety net, people would still need to work to eat (and they have welfare). Not necessarily any given person, but people generally. Indeed, we would be counting on exactly the opposite point from what the author makes: that most people would be industrious enough to work these jobs notwithstanding the fact that they could eat if they didn’t. Particular in Japan, which is facing an unprecedented imbalance between working age and non-working age people.