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> Why is everyone in such a rush? Because we live under an economic system that says you must produce value for capital or die. This is all very good advice.

> Why is everyone in such a rush? Because we live under an economic system that says you must produce value for capital or die. This is all very good advice. AND, I think we would have many fewer bad programmers and many more good ones if fewer Knuths were spending eight to ten hours a day mopping floors at fast food restaurants for $7.25 an hour, or writing garbage JavaScript for fly-by-night startups for $65,000 a year.

deleted 3y ago
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bsdpufferfish 3y ago
> you must produce value for capital or die. Can you name any social structure in which this is not true? Even medieval monks who are participating in a completely different society have to do the chores. > Knuths were spending eight to ten hours a day mopping floors I don't believe this happens and I know quite a few eccentric and unsocial smart people. Much more likely is them to spend the next 10 years at a relatives house speed running Mario.
- wizzwizz4 3y ago
  > and I know quite a few eccentric and unsocial smart people. Selection bias. People who have been able to distinguish themselves as “smart” are already a narrow sample, as the results of many UBI initiatives suggest. > I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. — Stephen Jay Gould
- NoraCodes 3y ago
  > Can you name any social structure in which this is not true? That's a rather disingenuous framing; I think we could probably do quite a lot to reduce the extent to which it's true without any particularly radical changes to our society. When we do start talking about radical changes, there are a lot that are not just likely to work but actually pretty well proven, like a UBI, improved labor rights, well-regulated and well-supported unions, wealth taxes, and so forth. The possible alternatives are not "if you don't have a job you starve on the street" and "fully automated luxury gay space communism". > Much more likely is them to spend the next 10 years at a relatives house speed running Mario. Despite the disdain which you seem to hold for speedrunners (why?), a lot of really interesting hacking comes out of the speedrunning community. Some very interesting applications of deep learning had their start in the TAS community. I'd rather ten people "waste" my tax dollars on speedrunning or art I don't like than one person be prevented from making art that's important to me (or doing some cool math, or whatever) because their boss's boss wanted a percent of a percent towards another yacht.

deleted 3y ago

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bsdpufferfish 3y ago

> you must produce value for capital or die. Can you name any social structure in which this is not true? Even medieval monks who are participating in a completely different society have to do the chores. > Knuths were spending eight to ten hours a day mopping floors I don't believe this happens and I know quite a few eccentric and unsocial smart people. Much more likely is them to spend the next 10 years at a relatives house speed running Mario.

wizzwizz4 3y ago
> and I know quite a few eccentric and unsocial smart people. Selection bias. People who have been able to distinguish themselves as “smart” are already a narrow sample, as the results of many UBI initiatives suggest. > I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops. — Stephen Jay Gould
NoraCodes 3y ago
> Can you name any social structure in which this is not true? That's a rather disingenuous framing; I think we could probably do quite a lot to reduce the extent to which it's true without any particularly radical changes to our society. When we do start talking about radical changes, there are a lot that are not just likely to work but actually pretty well proven, like a UBI, improved labor rights, well-regulated and well-supported unions, wealth taxes, and so forth. The possible alternatives are not "if you don't have a job you starve on the street" and "fully automated luxury gay space communism". > Much more likely is them to spend the next 10 years at a relatives house speed running Mario. Despite the disdain which you seem to hold for speedrunners (why?), a lot of really interesting hacking comes out of the speedrunning community. Some very interesting applications of deep learning had their start in the TAS community. I'd rather ten people "waste" my tax dollars on speedrunning or art I don't like than one person be prevented from making art that's important to me (or doing some cool math, or whatever) because their boss's boss wanted a percent of a percent towards another yacht.