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> The word is directional, it needs a goalpost to move towards [...] How do you define that goal post, and if we got there would you be happy to stop there? I'

• _heimdall 2y ago
  > Might agree about, say, website redesigns or fast fashion, but I consider humanity's position as a whole (such as standard of living) to be on a significant upwards trend. Sure, and I'm not trying to say we haven't made significant impacts with technological advancements. We do still gave to define how we'd even measure humanity's position though, without that we don't have direction and can't know if we're getting closure or further away. Trends require a similar context. On a 30 year scale I'd say we may have moved upwards (though significantly is a stretch). On 100 years we have almost certainly made significamt movement upwards on some metrics but others would have a significant trend downward. On a 1,000 year scale I think it'd be harder to find areas where we haven't trended upward significantly (I'm sure there are some, but I'd be surprised if there are many). That still leaves the question though, do we always need to trend upward on a never ending treadmill of change and increased consumption?
  • Ukv 2y ago
    > We do still gave to define how we'd even measure humanity's position though, without that we don't have direction and can't know if we're getting closure or further away. What people fundamentally value will vary by their philosophy (increasing pleasure and decreasing suffering, searching for higher meaning in the Universe, etc.) but I'd claim the intermediary objectives tend to have a lot of overlap, with a shared set coalescing around (roughly) increasing humanity's knowledge and potential/capacity to act. For instance, gaining capability to deflect meteors puts us in a better position because getting wiped out by one would render accomplishing effectively anything else impossible - making it an intermediary objective common to pretty much all frameworks. > On a 30 year scale I'd say we may have moved upwards (though significantly is a stretch) As compared to 1995, the average life expectancy has increased from to 64.9 to 73.5 and the portion of population living in extrmee poverty has decreased from 32.5% to 8.5% - seems significant to me, even ignoring scientific/technological advancements beyond that. True that averaging over a longer time period smooths out the bumps. > do we always need to trend upward on a never ending treadmill To me, "treadmill" implies lack of progress. If we have the option to improve things (e.g: reduce cancer cases) and an option to not, I don't really understand the idea that we should default to the latter, only choosing the former if we "need" to. Only way I can really make sense of that policy is if at some level you actually think it's instead a downwards/net negative trend.
    • _heimdall 2y ago
      > For instance, gaining capability to deflect meteors puts us in a better position That would still have to be weighed with the cost of such an ability. What would it take to actually do that? What would it take to get there? And what destructive or dangerous uses are now unlocked along that path? In a vacuum I'd absolutely want to have that ability, in reality its just a lot harder to say whether that goal is worth chasing. > As compared to 1995, the average life expectancy has increased from to 64.9 to 73.5 and the portion of population living in extrmee poverty has decreased from 32.5% to 8.5% What's the scope for those stats, are they global of specific to one country? I'm always torn on life expectancy as a metric. Modern medicine has done a great job of extending lives but I've seen plenty of examples of the extra years being pretty miserable. I'd be very interested to see a life expectancy comparison taking into account quality if life. > To me, "treadmill" implies lack of progress. Totally fair, that may not be the best analogy. My point was just that its a goal with no end state. > If we have the option to improve things (e.g: reduce cancer cases) and an option to not, I don't really understand the idea that we should default to the latter The point with defaulting to the latter is "don't break a god thing." Considering only the potential upsides misses the potential downsides. We can't cure cancer in a vacuum, there are always costs, and frankly the idea of curing a disease seems more utopian than realistic. Disease is nothing more than a named collection of symptoms, you may be able to drastically reduce any one root cause but that doesn't eradicate the symptoms and most modern treatments are designed only to treat symptoms and ignore root cause.
      • Ukv 2y ago
        > That would still have to be weighed with [...] As always you'd have to determine whether some course of action would have disproportionate negative impact on other objectives, yep. Point there was to set out on what basis I'd decide and weigh those objectives - an orientation for what "progress" is. > And what destructive or dangerous uses are now unlocked along that path? I believe unanticipated novel applications skew positive on average, largely on account of most humans having mostly-positive intentions. > What's the scope for those stats, are they global of specific to one country? Global, e.g: * https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/life-expectancy * https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-population-living-in-extreme-poverty-cost-of-basic-needs https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/share-of-population-livin... > but I've seen plenty of examples of the extra years being pretty miserable. I'd be very interested to see a life expectancy comparison taking into account quality if life. You could consider a factor such as Quality-Adjusted Life Expectancy (QALE), which is also on the rise. > The point with defaulting to the latter is "don't break a god thing." If "break" means "make overall better", why not? > Considering only the potential upsides misses the potential downsides. To be clear, my stance is that you should consider whether it's a net positive/negative: * "Threshold for new advancements should not be whether we absolutely need it, but whether it does more good than harm" * "if we're at 500 malaria cases and can reduce it further (without equal/greater degradations in other areas) then I don't see why we should ever be "happy to stop there"" My understanding is that you believe there should be some point at which we just stop even if there are still more beneficial changes to be made (in addition to not making net-negative changes, which we both agree on - though perhaps disagree about what specifically works out to be net-negative). > We can't cure cancer in a vacuum, there are always costs, There are costs, but it's very easily possible for the benefits to outweigh them, and more becomes feasible as humanity's knowledge/capabilities increase. > and frankly the idea of curing a disease seems more utopian than realistic. There are already a couple of diseases (including smallpox) that we've completely eradicated, and more (like polio) that we've made very good progress on. Cancer is tougher by its nature, but we can certainly at least reduce the number of cases and improve life for those who have it.