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We don't live in a post-scarcity society and AI isn't going to change that. We are constrained by natural resources and energy in numerous ways. AI replacing h

We don't live in a post-scarcity society and AI isn't going to change that. We are constrained by natural resources and energy in numerous ways. AI replacing human workers isn't going to make UBI possible. It's just going to put people out of work. The core problem with UBI remains: it's not affordable without a magical infinite wealth generator.

kranke155 4y ago
We’re constrained in what way? Are you saying we can’t produce enough food and shelter for virtually all of the human population? The USSR provided food and shelter using maybe 20-30% of its economy to do so. What is there a scarcity of? iPhones? Even middle income countries have more problems with obesity and diabetes than hunger. What is there a scarcity of exactly ?
- AlecSchueler 4y ago
  Clean energy. We've got avocados year round but the world is choking to provide it. I think you're ignoring a lie of externalisef costs.
  - kranke155 4y ago
    But that’s the point isn’t it. If ChatGPT designed robots tomorrow that we could build for 99$ that could automate most farming and most construction, we could have food and shelter built at something like a few percent of our economies. On clean energy, same thing. Ask AI to work up a plan in 10 years. Ask AI to improve solar panel construction. In 10-20-40 years what is there a scarcity of, exactly ? I’m not promising avocados, but there’s certainly no shortage of food when obesity is this prevalent.
    - AlecSchueler 4y ago
      Was that the point? You were postulating that we already lived in a post scarcity society. Now the goalposts have moved to require another breakthrough in AI that will have them solving the energy crisis across a period of decades or more. If you can ask it to design these things tomorrow then why don't you? 10 years from now could be well too late to begin with any of this. 40 years is hard to even imagine with the current rate of climate change.
      - kranke155 4y ago
        I described what I meant by post scarcity here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35351936 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35351936 In order to be able to engage I’d have to ask you what do you mean by energy crisis? The next 40 years, if they are of unimpeded climate change, sound shitty indeed.
- pxue 4y ago
  Energy is the obvious problem. Some 2B people live in constant hot humid weather, if we provide every single one of those people with north american level cooling facility, we'd probably have to increase the world's energy generation by at least 40%. That's no small feat.
agentultra 4y ago
Except it doesn’t require magic and late stage capitalism demands infinite growth. An economic system is merely a system, not a fundamental law of nature like current capitalism wants us to believe.
- _skel 4y ago
  You can't just engineer whatever the heck you want out of an economic system, or a government, or an entire society. There are at least some fundamental laws of nature, including human nature, at play. After a century of failed communist experiments all over the world, it's disappointing that people still believe that utopian economic systems are possible.
  - kranke155 4y ago
    No one’s defending communism. UBI is not communism. It’s socialism at the bottom, capitalism on top.
    - _skel 4y ago
      I'm not calling UBI communism. That's not the point. My point is that if we could simply invent any economic system we wanted, communism would have worked. Communism failed because it's not possible to do that, because there really are some things about human nature and the way economies and societies work that we can't ignore or change, and those factors prevent utopian schemes from working.
      - kranke155 4y ago
        I think universal food and shelter based off an AI tax seems pretty workable. Communism failed, but having capitalism without poverty is doable. On some scale some European countries have virtually eliminated poverty. They still have working economies. Could we do that for a lot of the world using AI and automation? If we reduce the cost of food and shelter from 10-20% to 3-5% of the economy, why not?
      - 4y ago

kranke155 4y ago

We’re constrained in what way? Are you saying we can’t produce enough food and shelter for virtually all of the human population? The USSR provided food and shelter using maybe 20-30% of its economy to do so. What is there a scarcity of? iPhones? Even middle income countries have more problems with obesity and diabetes than hunger. What is there a scarcity of exactly ?

AlecSchueler 4y ago
Clean energy. We've got avocados year round but the world is choking to provide it. I think you're ignoring a lie of externalisef costs.
- kranke155 4y ago
  But that’s the point isn’t it. If ChatGPT designed robots tomorrow that we could build for 99$ that could automate most farming and most construction, we could have food and shelter built at something like a few percent of our economies. On clean energy, same thing. Ask AI to work up a plan in 10 years. Ask AI to improve solar panel construction. In 10-20-40 years what is there a scarcity of, exactly ? I’m not promising avocados, but there’s certainly no shortage of food when obesity is this prevalent.
  - AlecSchueler 4y ago
    Was that the point? You were postulating that we already lived in a post scarcity society. Now the goalposts have moved to require another breakthrough in AI that will have them solving the energy crisis across a period of decades or more. If you can ask it to design these things tomorrow then why don't you? 10 years from now could be well too late to begin with any of this. 40 years is hard to even imagine with the current rate of climate change.
    - kranke155 4y ago
      I described what I meant by post scarcity here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35351936 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35351936 In order to be able to engage I’d have to ask you what do you mean by energy crisis? The next 40 years, if they are of unimpeded climate change, sound shitty indeed.
pxue 4y ago
Energy is the obvious problem. Some 2B people live in constant hot humid weather, if we provide every single one of those people with north american level cooling facility, we'd probably have to increase the world's energy generation by at least 40%. That's no small feat.

agentultra 4y ago

Except it doesn’t require magic and late stage capitalism demands infinite growth. An economic system is merely a system, not a fundamental law of nature like current capitalism wants us to believe.

_skel 4y ago
You can't just engineer whatever the heck you want out of an economic system, or a government, or an entire society. There are at least some fundamental laws of nature, including human nature, at play. After a century of failed communist experiments all over the world, it's disappointing that people still believe that utopian economic systems are possible.
- kranke155 4y ago
  No one’s defending communism. UBI is not communism. It’s socialism at the bottom, capitalism on top.
  - _skel 4y ago
    I'm not calling UBI communism. That's not the point. My point is that if we could simply invent any economic system we wanted, communism would have worked. Communism failed because it's not possible to do that, because there really are some things about human nature and the way economies and societies work that we can't ignore or change, and those factors prevent utopian schemes from working.
    - kranke155 4y ago
      I think universal food and shelter based off an AI tax seems pretty workable. Communism failed, but having capitalism without poverty is doable. On some scale some European countries have virtually eliminated poverty. They still have working economies. Could we do that for a lot of the world using AI and automation? If we reduce the cost of food and shelter from 10-20% to 3-5% of the economy, why not?
    - 4y ago