5 ms·

That's about to become a problem once a sufficiently large share of humanity is economically obsolete and not worth feeding by the industry. With an automated

by pygy_ 7y ago

That's about to become a problem once a sufficiently large share of humanity is economically obsolete and not worth feeding by the industry. With an automated agriculture and seed production in the hands of a few companies (among which Monsanto/Bayer), it becomes trivially easy to start producing GMO seeds that are toxic to humans in massive amounts.

whatshisface 7y ago
You could do that, but why? There's no motivation.
- pygy_ 7y ago
  Why divert food to machines? Growth, competitiveness. Why make inedible seeds? As a safeguard.
  - EGreg 7y ago
    That’s the problem. Horses and mules were necessary for plowing the fields. And no matter how they unionized, fields have been turned into parking lots for cars. But those were animals. Will we value humans?
    - pygy_ 7y ago
      We're animals too. Machines will not value humans, and they will be in power. Even before that, many among the very rich consider the poor as sub-human, but few do it in public. Do you remember the PG tweet where he equated unions with potential energy ripe for startups to tap into, rejoicing at the idea of burning down people's life to get richer (edit, here: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/663456748494127104 https://twitter.com/paulg/status/663456748494127104)?
narrator 7y ago
What if we could power people with electricity though? I am sure they would be far more energy efficient vs. machines. 1888 calories = 2.95kw hours per day. So less than $1/day of electricity. Someone just has to figure that one out. We could probably live indefinitely off of a big enough solar array.
- pygy_ 7y ago
  Now that's an interesting take :-) Distributing said energy to cells would be non-trivial, and you'd still need nutrients. Also humans need rest and unlike machines, the range of environmental conditions in which they can rest is narrower than their operational conditions (all of which are rather narrow and non-existent beyond the biosphere). Also, you can't suspend or reboot humans. Once they crash, they must be recycled.
- dthrown 7y ago
  This would of course put a much higher value on proximity to renewable hydroelectric power, e.g., “Florida Man Becomes the Sex Organs of the Machine World“.

by pygy_ 7y ago

whatshisface 7y ago

You could do that, but why? There's no motivation.

pygy_ 7y ago
Why divert food to machines? Growth, competitiveness. Why make inedible seeds? As a safeguard.
- EGreg 7y ago
  That’s the problem. Horses and mules were necessary for plowing the fields. And no matter how they unionized, fields have been turned into parking lots for cars. But those were animals. Will we value humans?
  - pygy_ 7y ago
    We're animals too. Machines will not value humans, and they will be in power. Even before that, many among the very rich consider the poor as sub-human, but few do it in public. Do you remember the PG tweet where he equated unions with potential energy ripe for startups to tap into, rejoicing at the idea of burning down people's life to get richer (edit, here: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/663456748494127104 https://twitter.com/paulg/status/663456748494127104)?

narrator 7y ago

What if we could power people with electricity though? I am sure they would be far more energy efficient vs. machines. 1888 calories = 2.95kw hours per day. So less than $1/day of electricity. Someone just has to figure that one out. We could probably live indefinitely off of a big enough solar array.

pygy_ 7y ago
Now that's an interesting take :-) Distributing said energy to cells would be non-trivial, and you'd still need nutrients. Also humans need rest and unlike machines, the range of environmental conditions in which they can rest is narrower than their operational conditions (all of which are rather narrow and non-existent beyond the biosphere). Also, you can't suspend or reboot humans. Once they crash, they must be recycled.
dthrown 7y ago
This would of course put a much higher value on proximity to renewable hydroelectric power, e.g., “Florida Man Becomes the Sex Organs of the Machine World“.