7 ms·

> That the foundational discipline of humanity - nutrition via hunting, gathering, or growing - is no longer a "profitable enterprise"? I don't understand this

> That the foundational discipline of humanity - nutrition via hunting, gathering, or growing - is no longer a "profitable enterprise"? I don't understand this statement. These things aren't unprofitable. Doing these things a specific way is unprofitable. Growing food is most certainly profitable; but only at scale. Is it sad that a small, family farm isn't really a great way to make a living nowadays? Sure. But that's not a foundational discipline of humanity; "creating food" is, but there's lots of ways to do that. And, honestly, if we _ever_ get to the point where we can fabricate food from raw elements (a la Star Trek), then that will be a little sad, too... but still "creating food".

Freak_NL 1y ago
The replicator in Star Trek doesn't seem plausible to me any more. Flawlessly outputting a cup of Earl Grey? The computer-based drinks machine onboard the Heart of Gold on the other hand… Trying to order tea there now sounds suspiciously like a bout of futile prompt-engineering; trying to goad an LLM into giving you tea, but ending up with something which is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.
- wizzwizz4 1y ago
  And if you phrase your question wrong, you have a chance of triggering a Chain of Thought process that gets stuck in a loop "analysing" some utterly irrelevant part of the problem (here, "why would anyone want to order tea?"), locking up important subsystems of other systems on the network in the process.
bevr1337 1y ago
> Growing food is most certainly profitable; but only at scale The agricultural practices you hint at only make sense in a boardroom. I'm sure it seems rational or logical, but it's not based in experience or ethics. > But that's not a foundational discipline of humanity; It is probably the foundational discipline of humanity. Cultivating and cooking food is what allowed us to do everything since.
- RHSeeger 1y ago
  > Cultivating and cooking food is what allowed us to do everything since. To repeat what I said before, more clearly - Growing and cooking food is currently profitable. - Growing and cooking food _a certain way_ is not profitable - Growing and cooking food is a foundational discipline of humanity - Growing and cooking food _a certain way_ is _not_ a foundational discipline of humanity You specifically quoted a subset of what I said and called it out as wrong. Which is true, but also irrelevant; because it's not what I said.

Freak_NL 1y ago

The replicator in Star Trek doesn't seem plausible to me any more. Flawlessly outputting a cup of Earl Grey? The computer-based drinks machine onboard the Heart of Gold on the other hand… Trying to order tea there now sounds suspiciously like a bout of futile prompt-engineering; trying to goad an LLM into giving you tea, but ending up with something which is almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea.

wizzwizz4 1y ago
And if you phrase your question wrong, you have a chance of triggering a Chain of Thought process that gets stuck in a loop "analysing" some utterly irrelevant part of the problem (here, "why would anyone want to order tea?"), locking up important subsystems of other systems on the network in the process.

bevr1337 1y ago

> Growing food is most certainly profitable; but only at scale The agricultural practices you hint at only make sense in a boardroom. I'm sure it seems rational or logical, but it's not based in experience or ethics. > But that's not a foundational discipline of humanity; It is probably the foundational discipline of humanity. Cultivating and cooking food is what allowed us to do everything since.

RHSeeger 1y ago
> Cultivating and cooking food is what allowed us to do everything since. To repeat what I said before, more clearly - Growing and cooking food is currently profitable. - Growing and cooking food _a certain way_ is not profitable - Growing and cooking food is a foundational discipline of humanity - Growing and cooking food _a certain way_ is _not_ a foundational discipline of humanity You specifically quoted a subset of what I said and called it out as wrong. Which is true, but also irrelevant; because it's not what I said.