4 ms·

I don't think the solution is to try to anesthetize yourself for 50% of your waking hours. Maybe we ought to change the system.

ajmurmann 2y ago
What do we change the system to though? Unfulfilling work needs to get done by someone.
- int_19h 2y ago
  True, but how much of unfulfilling work that is being done worldwide is actually needed? We could also do a lot of things to make such work less uncomfortable. For example, why are cashiers in American supermarkets forced to stand?
  - ajmurmann 2y ago
    If the value created by doing that work wouldn't surpass the shittiness of doing it, the work wouldn't exist. Unless workers are slaves, they clearly prefer the work over other options or not working. Otherwise they'd leave. The employer is clearly getting enough value to pay them the compensation needed for the tediousness. If there is no upside for anyone, but only discomfort for the checkout clerks, someone might be able to disrupt the field by paying slightly less but allowing them to stand. Since that isn't happening, I assume that either a) workers are showing the difference between revealed and stated preference b) grocery stores are actually making more money of clerks stand c) paying less in exchange for sitting clerks isn't possible because minimum wage
    - int_19h 2y ago
      You are assuming that all economic activity is rational. One only needs to look at Bitcoin price to know otherwise. Employer isn't actually getting any value out of making cashiers stand, and in most other countries, it is a sitting job. So far as I can tell, the only reason why US does it is because "we have always done it this way", which is also the ultimate rationale for a lot of other similar bullshit. The workers, realistically, don't have any choice if every employer does this. They can take the work as it is, or they can starve, especially seeing how US doesn't have full-fledged welfare.
    - notevenreal 2y ago
      >If the value created by doing that work wouldn't surpass the shittiness of doing it, the work wouldn't exist. Ah yes, because nobody has rent to pay or food to buy. This Ayn Rand-level economic analysis is a joke, and is an insult to people with legitimate grievances. I hope You have the day you deserve.
      - ajmurmann 2y ago
        Yes, people have rent to pay. Destroying jobs because they are too tedious won't make that any easier
K0balt 2y ago
Perhaps robotics and artificial intelligence will propel us to star trek socialism. But we aren’t on that track. AI+robotics+energy is power. With real creative power you need money much less. The game changes from being a billionaire to having terawats of automation. Without guardrails, robotics and artificial intelligence will become the primary tools of capital. Capital won’t need workers to implement their designs, and they won’t need money in the sense that they need it today, mostly to pay people to do things. With factories to produce robots and ubiquitous artificial intelligence, there exists an opportunity for the capital class to separate itself entirely from the seething masses. With essentially unconstrained power to create, you don’t need to buy things you want, except very special or artisanal things perhaps. You want a yacht? You build a yacht. The promise of GPAR is that you don’t need a factory. You just need more general purpose arthropod robots and the right software. They build the warehouse, they build the ways, they lay the keel, they build the ship. The fact that it might not be the most efficient way to build a yacht is immaterial. Of course materials may need to be purchased so there will still be steelworks and other heavy industries that don’t lend themselves to small scales, but they too will be “manned” with GPAR labor, and the capital class will just be swapping tokens around among themselves. The true end to trickle down economies. Humans will still have work in some situations, but it will be work that for some reasons robots cannot do because it is too risky, or too expensive to use automation. So humans will be limited to work that robots cannot do without risking destruction of robotic capital, or that humans can do for around the same cost as 36kw of solar electricity and $10/day of depreciation. Maybe that will cover rice and beans? Either way, unfettered, untaxed access to effective hybrid cognitive/physical automation is not likely to be great for most humans in the long term. We need an entirely new approach where labor is not the basis of survival if we are to realise the humanitarian potential of universal automation.
- gryfft 2y ago
  > We need an entirely new approach where labor is not the basis of survival if we are to realise the humanitarian potential of universal automation. I think there might be a modest proposal or two floating around out there that would neatly resolve the problems as stated.

ajmurmann 2y ago

What do we change the system to though? Unfulfilling work needs to get done by someone.

int_19h 2y ago
True, but how much of unfulfilling work that is being done worldwide is actually needed? We could also do a lot of things to make such work less uncomfortable. For example, why are cashiers in American supermarkets forced to stand?
- ajmurmann 2y ago
  If the value created by doing that work wouldn't surpass the shittiness of doing it, the work wouldn't exist. Unless workers are slaves, they clearly prefer the work over other options or not working. Otherwise they'd leave. The employer is clearly getting enough value to pay them the compensation needed for the tediousness. If there is no upside for anyone, but only discomfort for the checkout clerks, someone might be able to disrupt the field by paying slightly less but allowing them to stand. Since that isn't happening, I assume that either a) workers are showing the difference between revealed and stated preference b) grocery stores are actually making more money of clerks stand c) paying less in exchange for sitting clerks isn't possible because minimum wage
  - int_19h 2y ago
    You are assuming that all economic activity is rational. One only needs to look at Bitcoin price to know otherwise. Employer isn't actually getting any value out of making cashiers stand, and in most other countries, it is a sitting job. So far as I can tell, the only reason why US does it is because "we have always done it this way", which is also the ultimate rationale for a lot of other similar bullshit. The workers, realistically, don't have any choice if every employer does this. They can take the work as it is, or they can starve, especially seeing how US doesn't have full-fledged welfare.
  - notevenreal 2y ago
    >If the value created by doing that work wouldn't surpass the shittiness of doing it, the work wouldn't exist. Ah yes, because nobody has rent to pay or food to buy. This Ayn Rand-level economic analysis is a joke, and is an insult to people with legitimate grievances. I hope You have the day you deserve.
    - ajmurmann 2y ago
      Yes, people have rent to pay. Destroying jobs because they are too tedious won't make that any easier

K0balt 2y ago

Perhaps robotics and artificial intelligence will propel us to star trek socialism. But we aren’t on that track. AI+robotics+energy is power. With real creative power you need money much less. The game changes from being a billionaire to having terawats of automation. Without guardrails, robotics and artificial intelligence will become the primary tools of capital. Capital won’t need workers to implement their designs, and they won’t need money in the sense that they need it today, mostly to pay people to do things. With factories to produce robots and ubiquitous artificial intelligence, there exists an opportunity for the capital class to separate itself entirely from the seething masses. With essentially unconstrained power to create, you don’t need to buy things you want, except very special or artisanal things perhaps. You want a yacht? You build a yacht. The promise of GPAR is that you don’t need a factory. You just need more general purpose arthropod robots and the right software. They build the warehouse, they build the ways, they lay the keel, they build the ship. The fact that it might not be the most efficient way to build a yacht is immaterial. Of course materials may need to be purchased so there will still be steelworks and other heavy industries that don’t lend themselves to small scales, but they too will be “manned” with GPAR labor, and the capital class will just be swapping tokens around among themselves. The true end to trickle down economies. Humans will still have work in some situations, but it will be work that for some reasons robots cannot do because it is too risky, or too expensive to use automation. So humans will be limited to work that robots cannot do without risking destruction of robotic capital, or that humans can do for around the same cost as 36kw of solar electricity and $10/day of depreciation. Maybe that will cover rice and beans? Either way, unfettered, untaxed access to effective hybrid cognitive/physical automation is not likely to be great for most humans in the long term. We need an entirely new approach where labor is not the basis of survival if we are to realise the humanitarian potential of universal automation.

gryfft 2y ago
> We need an entirely new approach where labor is not the basis of survival if we are to realise the humanitarian potential of universal automation. I think there might be a modest proposal or two floating around out there that would neatly resolve the problems as stated.