5 ms·

The essence of this, and every news article I’ve read lately about a specific, tangible economic impact of AI, has the benefits accruing solely to capital (sha

by crmd 3y ago

The essence of this, and every news article I’ve read lately about a specific, tangible economic impact of AI, has the benefits accruing solely to capital (shareholders of a company). If this pattern continues unabated, we are in deep shit.

nine_zeros 3y ago
Exactly. What is lost in all these AI discussions is that owners of capital (often quasi-monopolies), can just reap all the profits of their legalized ownership. They can just use robots, AI and machines. Don't need to pay humans for anything. So what do humans do to survive in this society? I can only see either UBI or a revolution that ends capitalism.
- willcipriano 3y ago
  If Stalin or Mao didn't need people I'd wager the common man would be worse off. If they didn't have the labor camps they probably would've just directly executed anyone who would've gone.
- sp527 3y ago
  > or a revolution that ends capitalism Which is why companies like Anduril are flooring the accelerator on autonomous defense tech. I've wondered lately if Anduril is a product of Thiel once again playing 4D chess. It's not hard to see where this is all headed.
  - neerd 3y ago
    Yeah, my gut feeling is the rich see the writing on the wall. If they can keep a grip on things for a couple more decades then they can just replace all the poors with robots and either stick us all in UBI slums or find a more final solution.
    - mrguyorama 3y ago
      Most of the rich is 80. They don't have a plan to get out of this, because they expect to be dead.
      - aatd86 3y ago
        Some are trying to become immortals... :o)
- resuresu 3y ago
  They will try UBI with the new CBDC, if that fails then countries could see civil wars.
saurik 3y ago
FWIW, this is how computers have always been: every time we manage to make the world more efficient--and we have done a LOT of that over the past 50 years--that efficiency most directly accrues to capital. I like to think we make the world a better place with our efforts, but the improvements we pull off pretty much always seem to make inequality worse :(.
- crmd 3y ago
  Computers are the malignant exception. Up to 1975, the enormous value created by the agricultural and industrial revolutions, electrification era, transport and communications revolutions, etc were broadly shared by ordinary citizens and the owners of capital. Standards of living skyrocketed. It paid for things in the US like the TVA, social security, and the national highway system. Since the computer revolution in 1975, capital captured all of the value creation. Wages are flat. Standard of living declining. Inequality at its worst since the gilded age. The staggering wealth created by the computer revolution could have easily paid for universal healthcare and lowered the SS retirement age in the US, while leaving mountains of value intact for capitalists. Now we’re going to do the same thing with AI? This 50 year experiment in market fundamentalism has been bad for society and needs to come to an end.
iudqnolq 3y ago
These essence of this is loose intangible promises years in the future. It's incredibly easy to write down "we plan to be better in the future once I've retired". Doesn't mean much. > Mr Jansen said BT would become "a leaner business with a brighter future", with the firm planning to get rid of between 40,000 and 55,000 jobs by 2030. > The cuts break down as: > More than 15,000 cuts as BT completes building fibre networks in the UK > More than 10,000 as new UK networks require less maintenance > More than 10,000 from using new tech including AI > About 5,000 from restructuring
FridayoLeary 3y ago
I see no difference between this and any other game changer such as steam or electricity. I'll grant that the pace of innovation in ai is a singular phenomenon but labor saving in and of itself should not be a cause of fear
- bjacobt 3y ago
  What I’m wondering is, what happened to those people whose work were replaced by steam or electricity - Were they able to quickly up-skill? With AI it maybe good in macro terms but what about the folks impacted by it? Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education?
  - Pet_Ant 3y ago
    > Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education? This to me is the core problem. We give people in their lives really one chance to skill up. Basic skills through secondary education and then a period afterwards when you have no social responsibilities to go to college. If you need to retrain 15 years down the road, there is no support for supporting your family for you. If you try to pad your costs to sandbag for the eventuality of having to leave your industry for a couple of years to upskill, then some will take that as your margin and undercut you.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education? Or at all. If a large percentage of jobs go away, there's a very real chance that there won't be enough new jobs at any training/education level to make up for it.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > labor saving in and of itself should not be a cause of fear True, but the prospect of widespread loss of the ability of people to earn a living absolutely should be -- even if you're not one who will lose that ability. The problem isn't labor savings as such, it's the speed of the change. Losing too many jobs too quickly is a recipe for disaster.
hgsgm 3y ago
The theory is that the government should enforce competition, so savings go to the consumers. Or tax the monopolists to fund the democratic government.
- than3 3y ago
  Unfortunately, this kind of requires that the government actually be functionally democratic. Its not really democratic if the people with money decide who gets on the ballots. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opiiaLCBBok&ab_channel=GoodPersonToKnow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opiiaLCBBok&ab_channel=GoodP...
aatd86 3y ago
When no one has a job... Money will become worthless... Overtime, A(G)I will become the great equalizer by destroying the economy as we know it, removing work from the equation. It will require nuclear fusion or anything that makes the energy problem trivial though.
than3 3y ago
Yup, the problem with cascade failures is when it becomes obvious its often too late to do anything about it but watch. I've been talking about this for a long while now. It pretty much follows the AI economic doomsday scenario to a tee, where AI destroys factor markets replacing workers, people can't get food, unrest then happens as people die, and then its the end for a large portion of us. Won't happen overnight, but slow and full of suffering. It has happened this way every time the economic cycle stalls, and we currently have at least 5B people over-provisioned for the planet when certain food systems fail there's only one thing that can happen. Very predictable too if one were properly educated with a decent amount of economics and actual history and not the trite crap they teach these days in public education. Support systems are in place, but the only way to fund them is to print money from nothing, and anyone that knows anything knows this runs fiat straight into an economic calculation problem (non-market socialism) which doesn't work. Its just a matter of time before debasement reaches a critical threshold (which we are close to already).

by crmd 3y ago

nine_zeros 3y ago

Exactly. What is lost in all these AI discussions is that owners of capital (often quasi-monopolies), can just reap all the profits of their legalized ownership. They can just use robots, AI and machines. Don't need to pay humans for anything. So what do humans do to survive in this society? I can only see either UBI or a revolution that ends capitalism.

willcipriano 3y ago
If Stalin or Mao didn't need people I'd wager the common man would be worse off. If they didn't have the labor camps they probably would've just directly executed anyone who would've gone.
sp527 3y ago
> or a revolution that ends capitalism Which is why companies like Anduril are flooring the accelerator on autonomous defense tech. I've wondered lately if Anduril is a product of Thiel once again playing 4D chess. It's not hard to see where this is all headed.
- neerd 3y ago
  Yeah, my gut feeling is the rich see the writing on the wall. If they can keep a grip on things for a couple more decades then they can just replace all the poors with robots and either stick us all in UBI slums or find a more final solution.
  - mrguyorama 3y ago
    Most of the rich is 80. They don't have a plan to get out of this, because they expect to be dead.
    - aatd86 3y ago
      Some are trying to become immortals... :o)
resuresu 3y ago
They will try UBI with the new CBDC, if that fails then countries could see civil wars.

saurik 3y ago

FWIW, this is how computers have always been: every time we manage to make the world more efficient--and we have done a LOT of that over the past 50 years--that efficiency most directly accrues to capital. I like to think we make the world a better place with our efforts, but the improvements we pull off pretty much always seem to make inequality worse :(.

crmd 3y ago
Computers are the malignant exception. Up to 1975, the enormous value created by the agricultural and industrial revolutions, electrification era, transport and communications revolutions, etc were broadly shared by ordinary citizens and the owners of capital. Standards of living skyrocketed. It paid for things in the US like the TVA, social security, and the national highway system. Since the computer revolution in 1975, capital captured all of the value creation. Wages are flat. Standard of living declining. Inequality at its worst since the gilded age. The staggering wealth created by the computer revolution could have easily paid for universal healthcare and lowered the SS retirement age in the US, while leaving mountains of value intact for capitalists. Now we’re going to do the same thing with AI? This 50 year experiment in market fundamentalism has been bad for society and needs to come to an end.

iudqnolq 3y ago

These essence of this is loose intangible promises years in the future. It's incredibly easy to write down "we plan to be better in the future once I've retired". Doesn't mean much. > Mr Jansen said BT would become "a leaner business with a brighter future", with the firm planning to get rid of between 40,000 and 55,000 jobs by 2030. > The cuts break down as: > More than 15,000 cuts as BT completes building fibre networks in the UK > More than 10,000 as new UK networks require less maintenance > More than 10,000 from using new tech including AI > About 5,000 from restructuring

FridayoLeary 3y ago

I see no difference between this and any other game changer such as steam or electricity. I'll grant that the pace of innovation in ai is a singular phenomenon but labor saving in and of itself should not be a cause of fear

bjacobt 3y ago
What I’m wondering is, what happened to those people whose work were replaced by steam or electricity - Were they able to quickly up-skill? With AI it maybe good in macro terms but what about the folks impacted by it? Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education?
- Pet_Ant 3y ago
  > Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education? This to me is the core problem. We give people in their lives really one chance to skill up. Basic skills through secondary education and then a period afterwards when you have no social responsibilities to go to college. If you need to retrain 15 years down the road, there is no support for supporting your family for you. If you try to pad your costs to sandbag for the eventuality of having to leave your industry for a couple of years to upskill, then some will take that as your margin and undercut you.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > Will it be possible from them to find another job without significant training/education? Or at all. If a large percentage of jobs go away, there's a very real chance that there won't be enough new jobs at any training/education level to make up for it.
JohnFen 3y ago
> labor saving in and of itself should not be a cause of fear True, but the prospect of widespread loss of the ability of people to earn a living absolutely should be -- even if you're not one who will lose that ability. The problem isn't labor savings as such, it's the speed of the change. Losing too many jobs too quickly is a recipe for disaster.

hgsgm 3y ago

The theory is that the government should enforce competition, so savings go to the consumers. Or tax the monopolists to fund the democratic government.

than3 3y ago
Unfortunately, this kind of requires that the government actually be functionally democratic. Its not really democratic if the people with money decide who gets on the ballots. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opiiaLCBBok&ab_channel=GoodPersonToKnow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=opiiaLCBBok&ab_channel=GoodP...

aatd86 3y ago

When no one has a job... Money will become worthless... Overtime, A(G)I will become the great equalizer by destroying the economy as we know it, removing work from the equation. It will require nuclear fusion or anything that makes the energy problem trivial though.

than3 3y ago

Yup, the problem with cascade failures is when it becomes obvious its often too late to do anything about it but watch. I've been talking about this for a long while now. It pretty much follows the AI economic doomsday scenario to a tee, where AI destroys factor markets replacing workers, people can't get food, unrest then happens as people die, and then its the end for a large portion of us. Won't happen overnight, but slow and full of suffering. It has happened this way every time the economic cycle stalls, and we currently have at least 5B people over-provisioned for the planet when certain food systems fail there's only one thing that can happen. Very predictable too if one were properly educated with a decent amount of economics and actual history and not the trite crap they teach these days in public education. Support systems are in place, but the only way to fund them is to print money from nothing, and anyone that knows anything knows this runs fiat straight into an economic calculation problem (non-market socialism) which doesn't work. Its just a matter of time before debasement reaches a critical threshold (which we are close to already).