5 ms·

It's almost like the problem's harder than it seems at first glance or something

jeffrallen 5y ago
The first job is buy-in. When a society collectively chooses to solve some difficult problem, it gets solved, no matter how hard it is. Apollo program or homelessness.
- orzig 5y ago
  Or cancer! Oh oops
  - jeffrallen 5y ago
    5-year survival rates have improved — for some cancers — in adolescents and young adults https://sph.unc.edu/sph-news/5-year-survival-rates-have-improved-for-some-cancers-in-adolescents-and-young-adults/ https://sph.unc.edu/sph-news/5-year-survival-rates-have-impr...
  - ben_w 5y ago
    Cancer is many things rather than one, and some of those things have been solved.
    - FeepingCreature 5y ago
      So's homelessness.
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    Cancer is a hugely complex problem. It is not a single attack vector like a virus. But we are still making great progress on it, just think that the best vaccines for Covid came as fruit of cancer research.
- bradleyjg 5y ago
  It depends on the kind of problem. An engineering challenge, even a really difficult one, is something that can be attacked with effort. Changing human beings is far far more difficult. Perhaps impossible on timescales less than generations. We’ve had societies that really wanted to stop people from using mind altering substances, agree with that goal or not it was something that multiple societies choose to try to solve and mostly they failed. The ones that partly succeeded were the ones that used heinously brutal methods.
- tedunangst 5y ago
  When was the last time somebody stepped on the moon? If that's success criteria, we just need to stick all the homeless in a hotel for a night, declare the problem solved, then kick them out in the morning.
- patrec 5y ago
  Back in reality, the majority of society was opposed to the Apollo program (even after the successful landing support was only lukewarm) and I have no difficulty thinking of difficult problems with enormous societal buy-in and vast funding that proved intractable. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/moondoggle-the-forgotten-opposition-to-the-apollo-program/262254/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/moond...
- umvi 5y ago
  I don't buy it. Apollo almost failed many times by administrative churn and lack of public support. Apollo was successful because of passionate engineers working on the problem not by public support
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    The engineers did not pay for the project or their salaries. And certainly they weren't working for free or even under market rate.
    - umvi 5y ago
      The salaried engineers worked way more hours than a 9-5 and were not paid overtime AFAIK
      - lmilcin 5y ago
        Which is almost every company I have worked for for the past 20 years. Listen, these guys were very good, dedicated engineers. But to say they did this without public support is stupid, because they were paid for from public money in the first place. The public support comes in many ways. Just because some people didn't like the idea doesn't mean there was no public support. The ultimate public support is the government, which is officials elected by... wait for it... THE PUBLIC.
        umvi 5y ago
        > The ultimate public support is the government, which is officials elected by... wait for it... THE PUBLIC. Well if that's your definition of "public support", Apollo just barely had enough to succeed. The Lyndon B. Johnson Administration that came after JFK was actively defunding Apollo and trying to dismantle the space program. Back to my original point, society didn't "collectively decide" to make moon landings happen. JFK made a few bold claims to boost his public image against Russia and his successors tried to dismantle said space program. If it weren't for the tenacious engineers and leaders at NASA, moon landings would not have happened. In other words, if the engineers/leaders at NASA were not passionate enough, LBJ would have succeeded at dismantling Apollo.
im_down_w_otp 5y ago
Certainly half of it is. Unfortunately, it's not the half of the problem that progress is helping with since we're not for a lack of productive output or a dearth of needless waste.
runarberg 5y ago
Nah, these are two separate problems. First is the technological problem of producing enough food, building material, medicine, etc. Then there is the problem of the political class not unwilling to fund infrastructure and projects to put this technology in use. Think of it like a software team that has excellent developers but terrible devops. The developers have long long since fixed many of the bugs and implemented most of the features, but the devops is slow, corrupt, and incompetent so very few of the features actually make it to production.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  > Nah, these are two separate problems. First is the technological problem of producing enough food, building material, medicine, etc. There is no technological problem. We are already wasting more food that would be necessary to feed people who are starving. Even USSR, at the height of its inefficiency, was able to build housing for most of its inhabitants. It wasn't palaces but it did its job. And when we need we can somehow find a way to crank out vaccine to vaccinate entire countries. And these are given out for free (of course, we pay for them in taxes, but still it can be done...) > Then there is the problem of the political class not unwilling I think you meant "willing". Here, this is the problem. When you say it is "political class", what you really say it is not your problem. And this is the cause of why this is not getting solved. Because the problem is really you and other people like you who think it is not their problem. If the people decided it is a problem worth solving and supported it with their votes, the "political class" would follow and solve the problem. The "political class" responds to what is on peoples minds and to what people want. If people decide to spend their focus quabbling over building big walls or election results or vaccine efficacy, guess what is not getting solved? Anything else isn't getting solved.
  - runarberg 5y ago
    Being an immigrant and not allowed to vote, it is not fair to claim I’m responsible for the political class. Also public opinion rarely results in policy. Most Americans for example favor spending on green infrastructure to tackle the climate crisis, most Americans favor a more universal health care system, etc. yet the political class is hesitant.
kiba 5y ago
The most difficult problems in life are sometime political, not physics or technical challenges.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  Not sure why you are getting downvoted, obviously you are right. Now, the political problem reflects us as people. If people wanted the problem solved, politicians would find a way to solve it for the sake of their own interest. The way I understand it is that most people are really selfish in that they only care about themselves and maybe family and friends. And it doesn't get any better because people are more and more focusing on themselves and getting cut off from community.

The first job is buy-in. When a society collectively chooses to solve some difficult problem, it gets solved, no matter how hard it is. Apollo program or homelessness.

orzig 5y ago
Or cancer! Oh oops
- jeffrallen 5y ago
  5-year survival rates have improved — for some cancers — in adolescents and young adults https://sph.unc.edu/sph-news/5-year-survival-rates-have-improved-for-some-cancers-in-adolescents-and-young-adults/ https://sph.unc.edu/sph-news/5-year-survival-rates-have-impr...
- ben_w 5y ago
  Cancer is many things rather than one, and some of those things have been solved.
  - FeepingCreature 5y ago
    So's homelessness.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  Cancer is a hugely complex problem. It is not a single attack vector like a virus. But we are still making great progress on it, just think that the best vaccines for Covid came as fruit of cancer research.
bradleyjg 5y ago
It depends on the kind of problem. An engineering challenge, even a really difficult one, is something that can be attacked with effort. Changing human beings is far far more difficult. Perhaps impossible on timescales less than generations. We’ve had societies that really wanted to stop people from using mind altering substances, agree with that goal or not it was something that multiple societies choose to try to solve and mostly they failed. The ones that partly succeeded were the ones that used heinously brutal methods.
tedunangst 5y ago
When was the last time somebody stepped on the moon? If that's success criteria, we just need to stick all the homeless in a hotel for a night, declare the problem solved, then kick them out in the morning.
patrec 5y ago
Back in reality, the majority of society was opposed to the Apollo program (even after the successful landing support was only lukewarm) and I have no difficulty thinking of difficult problems with enormous societal buy-in and vast funding that proved intractable. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/moondoggle-the-forgotten-opposition-to-the-apollo-program/262254/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2012/09/moond...
umvi 5y ago
I don't buy it. Apollo almost failed many times by administrative churn and lack of public support. Apollo was successful because of passionate engineers working on the problem not by public support
- lmilcin 5y ago
  The engineers did not pay for the project or their salaries. And certainly they weren't working for free or even under market rate.
  - umvi 5y ago
    The salaried engineers worked way more hours than a 9-5 and were not paid overtime AFAIK
    - lmilcin 5y ago
      Which is almost every company I have worked for for the past 20 years. Listen, these guys were very good, dedicated engineers. But to say they did this without public support is stupid, because they were paid for from public money in the first place. The public support comes in many ways. Just because some people didn't like the idea doesn't mean there was no public support. The ultimate public support is the government, which is officials elected by... wait for it... THE PUBLIC.
      - umvi 5y ago
        > The ultimate public support is the government, which is officials elected by... wait for it... THE PUBLIC. Well if that's your definition of "public support", Apollo just barely had enough to succeed. The Lyndon B. Johnson Administration that came after JFK was actively defunding Apollo and trying to dismantle the space program. Back to my original point, society didn't "collectively decide" to make moon landings happen. JFK made a few bold claims to boost his public image against Russia and his successors tried to dismantle said space program. If it weren't for the tenacious engineers and leaders at NASA, moon landings would not have happened. In other words, if the engineers/leaders at NASA were not passionate enough, LBJ would have succeeded at dismantling Apollo.

im_down_w_otp 5y ago

Certainly half of it is. Unfortunately, it's not the half of the problem that progress is helping with since we're not for a lack of productive output or a dearth of needless waste.

runarberg 5y ago

Nah, these are two separate problems. First is the technological problem of producing enough food, building material, medicine, etc. Then there is the problem of the political class not unwilling to fund infrastructure and projects to put this technology in use. Think of it like a software team that has excellent developers but terrible devops. The developers have long long since fixed many of the bugs and implemented most of the features, but the devops is slow, corrupt, and incompetent so very few of the features actually make it to production.

lmilcin 5y ago
> Nah, these are two separate problems. First is the technological problem of producing enough food, building material, medicine, etc. There is no technological problem. We are already wasting more food that would be necessary to feed people who are starving. Even USSR, at the height of its inefficiency, was able to build housing for most of its inhabitants. It wasn't palaces but it did its job. And when we need we can somehow find a way to crank out vaccine to vaccinate entire countries. And these are given out for free (of course, we pay for them in taxes, but still it can be done...) > Then there is the problem of the political class not unwilling I think you meant "willing". Here, this is the problem. When you say it is "political class", what you really say it is not your problem. And this is the cause of why this is not getting solved. Because the problem is really you and other people like you who think it is not their problem. If the people decided it is a problem worth solving and supported it with their votes, the "political class" would follow and solve the problem. The "political class" responds to what is on peoples minds and to what people want. If people decide to spend their focus quabbling over building big walls or election results or vaccine efficacy, guess what is not getting solved? Anything else isn't getting solved.
- runarberg 5y ago
  Being an immigrant and not allowed to vote, it is not fair to claim I’m responsible for the political class. Also public opinion rarely results in policy. Most Americans for example favor spending on green infrastructure to tackle the climate crisis, most Americans favor a more universal health care system, etc. yet the political class is hesitant.

kiba 5y ago

The most difficult problems in life are sometime political, not physics or technical challenges.

lmilcin 5y ago
Not sure why you are getting downvoted, obviously you are right. Now, the political problem reflects us as people. If people wanted the problem solved, politicians would find a way to solve it for the sake of their own interest. The way I understand it is that most people are really selfish in that they only care about themselves and maybe family and friends. And it doesn't get any better because people are more and more focusing on themselves and getting cut off from community.