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Altered Carbon, and to a lesser extend Upload! touch on this dystopian part - the great leveller is that every billionaire will one day die - imagine if that wa

Altered Carbon, and to a lesser extend Upload! touch on this dystopian part - the great leveller is that every billionaire will one day die - imagine if that wasn't the case, and they could keep hoarding wealth and having undue political influence.

ALittleLight 4y ago
Would you really want your parents to die, your loved ones, your family, your children, and yourself, all so you could have the satisfaction that at least rich people, and their loved ones, would suffer and die too?
- ben_w 4y ago
  Many people are fundamentally motivated by fairness, and knowing someone else is getting more than they seem to deserve can violate that. Schadenfreude is a thing. Myself, I think that longevity treatments are unlikely to remain unaffordable to the poor for very long after they are invented — even in a cynical world where the rich are greedy enough to try and keep it for themselves, old-age healthcare is really expensive, so societies which cause this to be cheap will outperform those that keep it for just the powerful.
  - D-Coder 4y ago
    I suspect that in any society where this exists, the government will end up making it available for everyone... or will be voted out / overthrown for a government that will.
    - ben_w 4y ago
      In general I agree, but I wanted to cover even extreme cases such as North Korea.
- fleetwoodsnack 4y ago
  The individual rich are irrelevant, and this is a mischaracterization of the sentiment. Elite capture under the parameter of current human lifespans is extant and difficult to counteract. It stands to reason those negative consequences associated with elite capture would only be exacerbated under longer lifespans. It’s simply an acknowledgment of a likely negative consequence.
krageon 4y ago
If you take a step back you see that when they currently die, someone with roughly their money takes over. Good families keep generational wealth, so you will always be under the influence of some rich person. It is our modern royalty after all. Given that is the case and everything else being equal, I would prefer that exact scenario with an opportunity to live forever. Even if that means someone I don't like gets to try that too.
- philjohn 4y ago
  There's a chance, however, that their descendants aren't as ruthless, or as competent. Doesn't one of the Koch sons sell Hawaiian print t-shirts?
thelittleone 4y ago
What a pleasure to see Altered Carbon mentioned here. Amazing show.

ALittleLight 4y ago

Would you really want your parents to die, your loved ones, your family, your children, and yourself, all so you could have the satisfaction that at least rich people, and their loved ones, would suffer and die too?

ben_w 4y ago
Many people are fundamentally motivated by fairness, and knowing someone else is getting more than they seem to deserve can violate that. Schadenfreude is a thing. Myself, I think that longevity treatments are unlikely to remain unaffordable to the poor for very long after they are invented — even in a cynical world where the rich are greedy enough to try and keep it for themselves, old-age healthcare is really expensive, so societies which cause this to be cheap will outperform those that keep it for just the powerful.
- D-Coder 4y ago
  I suspect that in any society where this exists, the government will end up making it available for everyone... or will be voted out / overthrown for a government that will.
  - ben_w 4y ago
    In general I agree, but I wanted to cover even extreme cases such as North Korea.
fleetwoodsnack 4y ago
The individual rich are irrelevant, and this is a mischaracterization of the sentiment. Elite capture under the parameter of current human lifespans is extant and difficult to counteract. It stands to reason those negative consequences associated with elite capture would only be exacerbated under longer lifespans. It’s simply an acknowledgment of a likely negative consequence.

krageon 4y ago

If you take a step back you see that when they currently die, someone with roughly their money takes over. Good families keep generational wealth, so you will always be under the influence of some rich person. It is our modern royalty after all. Given that is the case and everything else being equal, I would prefer that exact scenario with an opportunity to live forever. Even if that means someone I don't like gets to try that too.

philjohn 4y ago
There's a chance, however, that their descendants aren't as ruthless, or as competent. Doesn't one of the Koch sons sell Hawaiian print t-shirts?

thelittleone 4y ago

What a pleasure to see Altered Carbon mentioned here. Amazing show.