6 ms·

We've created a society where there are such things as 'jobs' and unless you're rich, you need a job to support yourself and maybe a family. I think this model

by tlocke 4y ago

We've created a society where there are such things as 'jobs' and unless you're rich, you need a job to support yourself and maybe a family. I think this model of society worked reasonably well for a while, but with AI we're coming to the end of that era. In the next era we'll probably live like aristocrats, but instead of the work being done by servants, it'll be done by AI. Back to the case of the 3D artist, in this new era she won't need to have a job to support herself, and she will have the freedom to create her art as she wishes.

lvoudour 4y ago
This next era may take 100s of years though, AI taking up physical labor is still science fiction (and I'm not fully sold on the utopia angle). She'll need to support herself much sooner than that, let's be realistic
throwawaylinux 4y ago
We've needed "jobs" to support ourselves since we descended from the trees. Actually before that too. "Society" came about because we invented tools and techniques to make our jobs easier so people could spend more time on different things. "AI" is some more steps down that same path. > In the next era we'll probably live like aristocrats, but instead of the work being done by servants, it'll be done by AI. Not in the way you imagine. We live like aristocrats today. We live in vast mansions that have hot running water, electricity, refrigeration, heating and cooling, lighting, we have servants bring us gluttonous feasts whenever we like, we careen around in our horseless carriages and flying machines. We laze around many hours of the day wasting time on frivolities like watching TV, playing computer games, reading books, drinking and taking drugs, etc. We have armies of doctors and security at our disposal if we should break a leg or even get a sniffle. So we live better than kings did 200 years ago. Life might get better for the average commoner in another 200 years. There will still be the haves and have nots though. People with a lot of wealth won't want to share it with others, and people with less will be envious of those with more, that's the constant in the human condition. Nobody with the robots is going to give money to a bunch of hippies to laze around. If they want a piece of it they'll have to either work to create it themselves or to take it by force. Either way it won't come for free.
- tlocke 4y ago
  I agree with a lot of what you write, but in my experience in the UK there can be instances where money from the the wealthy has been used for the common good. For example, until 1945 only the rich could afford to educate their children, but the government decided to use taxpayers' money to provide free education for every child up to the age of 16. It was a utopian idea, and when it was first suggested most people said, 'yeah right, nice idea but of course it'll never happen'.
  - jvidalv 4y ago
    Are you aware that is not the rich people who sustain the state and thus 99% of its income, but the middle class right? That's why politicians who campaign with ideas like "taxing the rich to fix X problem" are pure populist bullshit. You are the one who is gonna end up paying more. First there are not enough rich people compared to commoners, and second, they can and will hide their money if possible and worth it. So in the UK as in any other state, what did and is providing "free" education is your money and the money of the ones like you in the middle and upper-middle class.
    - tlocke 4y ago
      Surely it's true to say that in the UK some people simply couldn't afford to send their children to school, but now every child can attend school regardless of their parents' wealth?
  - throwawaylinux 4y ago
    > I agree with a lot of what you write, but in my experience in the UK there can be instances where money from the the wealthy has been used for the common good. For example, until 1945 only the rich could afford to educate their children, but the government decided to use taxpayers' money to provide free education for every child up to the age of 16. It was a utopian idea, and when it was first suggested most people said, 'yeah right, nice idea but of course it'll never happen'. And yet you ask people today and they'll moan about never having had it worse, boomers this and billionaires that (or tories I guess, I don't know what the equivalent go-to brainless insult is over there). Not that there aren't valid reasons for complaint, but as I said envy (and greed) is a fundamental part of the human condition. I don't know why people think some utopia is just around the corner -- we've had thousand-fold multipliers in production. Fossil fuels, internal combustion, farming and construction machinery, factories, chemicals, computers, industrial robots, electricity. From pre-historic farmers and hunter gatherers to now production has increased unimaginably. The utopia never comes because that was never what was preventing it. People who want there to be a utopia where nobody works and everybody is happy sharing everything fundamentally want to extinguish humanity. Because that's not what humanity is.
jerojero 4y ago
I don't think so. I think in the future we will be living pretty similarly but instead of just doing the work manually we'll be using AI to be more efficient. Just like what the original post on reddit was referring to. He was not fired or anything, his bosses just told him "now you need to do 10 times the work you were doing before because you got the AI". Although in the past it was okay for him to do 1/10th of the work, now with the AI, that has become unacceptable. Why would the socio-economic system change? We've been automating work for a while now and people don't really get fired over it; they are just tasked with producing more. Remember that the computer itself was a huge productivity enhancer. When excel came out suddenly one accountant could do the work of 10 but most people weren't liberated from their tedious manual algebraic works, instead, we simply started to produce significantly more than before. Of course, I would love to live in the world that you dream of, I'm pretty sure that's what post-scarcity communism looks like. I just don't really see any indicators in terms of public policy or business attitude that indicates that will be the case. Seems to me like our societies are more geared towards growth rather than improving quality of life.
- steveshurley44 4y ago
  The one word answer for why you are wrong to not be concerned is entropy.
  - tlocke 4y ago
    Can you elaborate on that?
- tlocke 4y ago
  > Of course, I would love to live in the world that you dream of, I'm pretty sure that's what post-scarcity communism looks like. I just don't really see any indicators in terms of public policy or business attitude that indicates that will be the case. That's true, but let me give an example of something I've experienced in my own lifetime. In about 1996 I heard about Open Source software and after wrestling with the idea for a bit I became a convert and threw out Windows and installed a Linux distribution on my home machine. At the time, when I talked to people about Open Source software, there was a near universal reaction of, 'nice idea, but it'll never catch on' and they would go on to give me many reasons why this utopian idea would fail. Now, 25 years later, Open Source is a great success. As a postscript, I got into making contributions to Open Source and I still do. Maybe one day my mind will be too addled to code, or perhaps an AI will do it better than me, but until that day I fully intend to carry on with Open Source contributions.

by tlocke 4y ago

lvoudour 4y ago

This next era may take 100s of years though, AI taking up physical labor is still science fiction (and I'm not fully sold on the utopia angle). She'll need to support herself much sooner than that, let's be realistic

throwawaylinux 4y ago

We've needed "jobs" to support ourselves since we descended from the trees. Actually before that too. "Society" came about because we invented tools and techniques to make our jobs easier so people could spend more time on different things. "AI" is some more steps down that same path. > In the next era we'll probably live like aristocrats, but instead of the work being done by servants, it'll be done by AI. Not in the way you imagine. We live like aristocrats today. We live in vast mansions that have hot running water, electricity, refrigeration, heating and cooling, lighting, we have servants bring us gluttonous feasts whenever we like, we careen around in our horseless carriages and flying machines. We laze around many hours of the day wasting time on frivolities like watching TV, playing computer games, reading books, drinking and taking drugs, etc. We have armies of doctors and security at our disposal if we should break a leg or even get a sniffle. So we live better than kings did 200 years ago. Life might get better for the average commoner in another 200 years. There will still be the haves and have nots though. People with a lot of wealth won't want to share it with others, and people with less will be envious of those with more, that's the constant in the human condition. Nobody with the robots is going to give money to a bunch of hippies to laze around. If they want a piece of it they'll have to either work to create it themselves or to take it by force. Either way it won't come for free.

tlocke 4y ago
I agree with a lot of what you write, but in my experience in the UK there can be instances where money from the the wealthy has been used for the common good. For example, until 1945 only the rich could afford to educate their children, but the government decided to use taxpayers' money to provide free education for every child up to the age of 16. It was a utopian idea, and when it was first suggested most people said, 'yeah right, nice idea but of course it'll never happen'.
- jvidalv 4y ago
  Are you aware that is not the rich people who sustain the state and thus 99% of its income, but the middle class right? That's why politicians who campaign with ideas like "taxing the rich to fix X problem" are pure populist bullshit. You are the one who is gonna end up paying more. First there are not enough rich people compared to commoners, and second, they can and will hide their money if possible and worth it. So in the UK as in any other state, what did and is providing "free" education is your money and the money of the ones like you in the middle and upper-middle class.
  - tlocke 4y ago
    Surely it's true to say that in the UK some people simply couldn't afford to send their children to school, but now every child can attend school regardless of their parents' wealth?
- throwawaylinux 4y ago
  > I agree with a lot of what you write, but in my experience in the UK there can be instances where money from the the wealthy has been used for the common good. For example, until 1945 only the rich could afford to educate their children, but the government decided to use taxpayers' money to provide free education for every child up to the age of 16. It was a utopian idea, and when it was first suggested most people said, 'yeah right, nice idea but of course it'll never happen'. And yet you ask people today and they'll moan about never having had it worse, boomers this and billionaires that (or tories I guess, I don't know what the equivalent go-to brainless insult is over there). Not that there aren't valid reasons for complaint, but as I said envy (and greed) is a fundamental part of the human condition. I don't know why people think some utopia is just around the corner -- we've had thousand-fold multipliers in production. Fossil fuels, internal combustion, farming and construction machinery, factories, chemicals, computers, industrial robots, electricity. From pre-historic farmers and hunter gatherers to now production has increased unimaginably. The utopia never comes because that was never what was preventing it. People who want there to be a utopia where nobody works and everybody is happy sharing everything fundamentally want to extinguish humanity. Because that's not what humanity is.

jerojero 4y ago

I don't think so. I think in the future we will be living pretty similarly but instead of just doing the work manually we'll be using AI to be more efficient. Just like what the original post on reddit was referring to. He was not fired or anything, his bosses just told him "now you need to do 10 times the work you were doing before because you got the AI". Although in the past it was okay for him to do 1/10th of the work, now with the AI, that has become unacceptable. Why would the socio-economic system change? We've been automating work for a while now and people don't really get fired over it; they are just tasked with producing more. Remember that the computer itself was a huge productivity enhancer. When excel came out suddenly one accountant could do the work of 10 but most people weren't liberated from their tedious manual algebraic works, instead, we simply started to produce significantly more than before. Of course, I would love to live in the world that you dream of, I'm pretty sure that's what post-scarcity communism looks like. I just don't really see any indicators in terms of public policy or business attitude that indicates that will be the case. Seems to me like our societies are more geared towards growth rather than improving quality of life.

steveshurley44 4y ago
The one word answer for why you are wrong to not be concerned is entropy.
- tlocke 4y ago
  Can you elaborate on that?
tlocke 4y ago
> Of course, I would love to live in the world that you dream of, I'm pretty sure that's what post-scarcity communism looks like. I just don't really see any indicators in terms of public policy or business attitude that indicates that will be the case. That's true, but let me give an example of something I've experienced in my own lifetime. In about 1996 I heard about Open Source software and after wrestling with the idea for a bit I became a convert and threw out Windows and installed a Linux distribution on my home machine. At the time, when I talked to people about Open Source software, there was a near universal reaction of, 'nice idea, but it'll never catch on' and they would go on to give me many reasons why this utopian idea would fail. Now, 25 years later, Open Source is a great success. As a postscript, I got into making contributions to Open Source and I still do. Maybe one day my mind will be too addled to code, or perhaps an AI will do it better than me, but until that day I fully intend to carry on with Open Source contributions.