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I agree. In the Star Trek economy (afaik), the inwention of the replicator was key to the end of money and the end of a scarcity based economy. Well, we alrea
by jerrya 15y ago
I agree.
In the Star Trek economy (afaik), the inwention of the replicator was key to the end of money and the end of a scarcity based economy.
Well, we already have a replicator for much of the economy
$ cp
And it looks as though soon we'll have some very advanced robots that will be able to automate most mundane jobs.
So maybe this is good and we can all become Platos, relaxing, philosophizing, self-actualizing at the top of Maslow's pyramid. If so, it should be reasonable to convince everyone to go the Star Trek way and jettison money.
What will be dangerous, is dangerous, is the transition periods like now, where jobs that are lost, never come back, not just because they have been automated away, but also because the owners would rather pay more for automation and less human involvement because they find humans to be a big pain. At that point (which is sort of like now) it is hard to convince others that it is reasonable to distribute resources to the masses.
I would certainly like to see a single payer, universal health care system implemented that separates health care from monolithic employers. That, and I'd love to see actual real encouragement and incentivization of small business entrepreneurship.
Remove the barriers that big companies have on us. Make it easy and rewarding for people to create their own jobs, form their own companies, on a semi-permanent or even ad-hoc way.
Oh well, pie in the sky.
- hpvic03 15y agoYou make a good point about the transition period. I'm a fan of Kurzweil and am convinced that many of his predictions will come true. However, he paints a rosy picture of the future and glosses over any potential conflict in the transition between between now and when he predicts that humans will merge with machines, which he pegs at 2099. There is definitely going to be conflict as we move to a post-scarcity world.
- loup-vaillant 15y agoOh, but there already is conflict. While information basically got out of scarcity, the copyright overlords are still clinging to their old ways.
- itmag 15y agoI would certainly like to see a single payer, universal health care system implemented that separates health care from monolithic employers. That, and I'd love to see actual real encouragement and incentivization of small business entrepreneurship. Yes! Society as the kernel/API, entrepreneurs as userland tools / third-party services, with free reins to innovate and build on top of the base. I'm neither right- or left-wing. I'm up-wing. I want the best of all alternatives. Too bad that the mainstream is stuck in the XOR mentality...
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- ctdonath 15y agoMake it easy and rewarding for people to create their own jobs, form their own companies, on a semi-permanent or even ad-hoc way. This is Hacker News at Y-Combinator. The whole idea is there's nothing stopping you. Open a browser & text editor and write your own paycheck. Advocate compulsory redistribution, however, and you build those barriers yourself.