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I think the bigger relief is that I know humans won’t put up with a two tiered system of haves and have nots forever and eventually we will get wealth redistrib

I think the bigger relief is that I know humans won’t put up with a two tiered system of haves and have nots forever and eventually we will get wealth redistribution. Government is the ultimate source of all wealth and organization, corporations are built on top of it and thus are subservient.

kortilla 1y ago
Governments are not the source of wealth. They are just a requisite component to allow people to create it and maintain it.
- azemetre 1y ago
  This doesn't pass the sniff test, governments generate wealth all the time. Public education, public healthcare, public research, public housing. These are all programs that generate an enormous amount of wealth and allow citizens to flourish.
  - m4nu3l 1y ago
    In economics, you aren't necessarily creating wealth just because your final output has value. The value of the final good or service has to be higher than the inputs for you to be creating wealth. I could take a functioning boat and scrap it, sell the scrap metal that has value. However, I destroyed wealth because the boat was worth more. Even if you are creating wealth, but the inputs have better uses and can create more wealth for the same cost, you're still paying in opportunity cost. So things are more complicated than that.
    - azemetre 1y ago
      This isn't related to what I was commenting on where the other poster came across as not seeing government by the governed as having economic worth.
      - andsoitis 1y ago
        Synthesizing between you two’s thoughts, extrapolating somewhat: - human individuals create wealths - groups of humans can create kinds of wealth that isn’t possible for a single indovidual. This can be a wide variety of associations: companies, project teams, governments, etc. - governments (formal or less formal) create the playing field for individuals and groups of individuals to create wealth
        azemetre 1y ago
        Thanks for this comment. You definitely crystalized the two thoughts well and succinctly. Definitely a skill I wish I had. :D
      - kortilla 1y ago
        No, I said it was a requisite to generate wealth, but it does not generate it directly.
        azemetre 1y ago
        Gotcha. Definitely felt like I made that comment a little too rush, especially in the context of all the others as well.
  - m4nu3l 1y ago
    >governments generate wealth all the time. Public education, public healthcare, public research, public housing. > These are all programs that generate an enormous amount of wealth and allow citizens to flourish. I thought you meant that governments generate wealth because the things you listed have value. If so, that doesn't prove they generate wealth by my argument, unless you can prove those things are more valuable than alternative ways to use the resources the government used to produce them and that the government is more efficient in producing those. You can argue that those are good because you think redistribution is good. But you can have redistribution without the government directly providing goods and services.
    - iwontberude 1y ago
      The value of a dollar and how it can be invested and created is literally the job of the government. It’s the baseline for all wealth in the world.
    - azemetre 1y ago
      I think I'm more confused. Was trying to convey the idea that wealth doesn't have to limited to the idea of money and value. Many intangible things can provide wealth too. I should probably read more books before commenting on things I half understand, my bad.
  - AlexandrB 1y ago
    None of these are unique to the government and can also be created privately. The fact that government can create wealth =/= the government is the source of all wealth.
  - kortilla 1y ago
    Those programs consume a bunch of money and they don’t generate wealth directly. They are critical to let people flourish and go out to generate wealth. A bunch of well educated citizens living on government housing who don’t go out and become productive members of society will quickly lead to collapse.
m4nu3l 1y ago
Having your life dependent on a government that controls all AIs would be much worse. The government could end up controlling something more intelligent than the entire rest of the population. I have no doubt it will use it in a bad way. I hope that AIs will end up distributed enough. Having a government controlling it is the opposite of that.
- azemetre 1y ago
  Why would this be worse than the current situation of private actors accountable to no one controlling this technology? It's not like I can convince Zuckerberg to change his ways. At least with a democratic government I have means to try and build a coalition then enact change. The alternative requires having money and that seems like an inherently undemocratic system. Why can't AIs be controlled with democratic institutions? Why are democratic institutions worse? This doesn't seem to be the case to me. Private institutions shouldn't be allowed to control such systems, they should be compelled to give them to the public.
  - m4nu3l 1y ago
    >Why would this be worse than the current situation of private actors accountable to no one controlling this technology? It's not like I can convince Zuckerberg to change his ways. As long as Zuckerberg has no army forcing me, I'm fine with that. The issue would be whether he could breach contracts or get away with fraud. But if AI is sufficiently distributed, this is less likely to happen. >At least with a democratic government I have means to try and build a coalition then enact change. The alternative requires having money and that seems like an inherently undemocratic system. I don't think of democracy as a goal to be achieved. I'm OK with democracy in so far it leads to what I value. The big problem with democracy is that most of the time it doesn't lead to rational choices, even when voters are rational. In markets, for instance, you have an incentive to be rational, and if you aren't, the market will tend to transfer resources from you to someone more rational. No such mechanism exists in a democracy; I have no incentive to do research and think hard about my vote. It's going to be worth the same as the vote of someone who believes the Earth is flat anyway.
thatfrenchguy 1y ago
I mean, you can imagine a public bureaucracy being bad at redistributing too, that’s a lot of governments in the world

kortilla 1y ago

Governments are not the source of wealth. They are just a requisite component to allow people to create it and maintain it.

azemetre 1y ago
This doesn't pass the sniff test, governments generate wealth all the time. Public education, public healthcare, public research, public housing. These are all programs that generate an enormous amount of wealth and allow citizens to flourish.
- m4nu3l 1y ago
  In economics, you aren't necessarily creating wealth just because your final output has value. The value of the final good or service has to be higher than the inputs for you to be creating wealth. I could take a functioning boat and scrap it, sell the scrap metal that has value. However, I destroyed wealth because the boat was worth more. Even if you are creating wealth, but the inputs have better uses and can create more wealth for the same cost, you're still paying in opportunity cost. So things are more complicated than that.
  - azemetre 1y ago
    This isn't related to what I was commenting on where the other poster came across as not seeing government by the governed as having economic worth.
    - andsoitis 1y ago
      Synthesizing between you two’s thoughts, extrapolating somewhat: - human individuals create wealths - groups of humans can create kinds of wealth that isn’t possible for a single indovidual. This can be a wide variety of associations: companies, project teams, governments, etc. - governments (formal or less formal) create the playing field for individuals and groups of individuals to create wealth
      - azemetre 1y ago
        Thanks for this comment. You definitely crystalized the two thoughts well and succinctly. Definitely a skill I wish I had. :D
    - kortilla 1y ago
      No, I said it was a requisite to generate wealth, but it does not generate it directly.
      - azemetre 1y ago
        Gotcha. Definitely felt like I made that comment a little too rush, especially in the context of all the others as well.
- m4nu3l 1y ago
  >governments generate wealth all the time. Public education, public healthcare, public research, public housing. > These are all programs that generate an enormous amount of wealth and allow citizens to flourish. I thought you meant that governments generate wealth because the things you listed have value. If so, that doesn't prove they generate wealth by my argument, unless you can prove those things are more valuable than alternative ways to use the resources the government used to produce them and that the government is more efficient in producing those. You can argue that those are good because you think redistribution is good. But you can have redistribution without the government directly providing goods and services.
  - iwontberude 1y ago
    The value of a dollar and how it can be invested and created is literally the job of the government. It’s the baseline for all wealth in the world.
  - azemetre 1y ago
    I think I'm more confused. Was trying to convey the idea that wealth doesn't have to limited to the idea of money and value. Many intangible things can provide wealth too. I should probably read more books before commenting on things I half understand, my bad.
- AlexandrB 1y ago
  None of these are unique to the government and can also be created privately. The fact that government can create wealth =/= the government is the source of all wealth.
- kortilla 1y ago
  Those programs consume a bunch of money and they don’t generate wealth directly. They are critical to let people flourish and go out to generate wealth. A bunch of well educated citizens living on government housing who don’t go out and become productive members of society will quickly lead to collapse.

m4nu3l 1y ago

Having your life dependent on a government that controls all AIs would be much worse. The government could end up controlling something more intelligent than the entire rest of the population. I have no doubt it will use it in a bad way. I hope that AIs will end up distributed enough. Having a government controlling it is the opposite of that.

azemetre 1y ago
Why would this be worse than the current situation of private actors accountable to no one controlling this technology? It's not like I can convince Zuckerberg to change his ways. At least with a democratic government I have means to try and build a coalition then enact change. The alternative requires having money and that seems like an inherently undemocratic system. Why can't AIs be controlled with democratic institutions? Why are democratic institutions worse? This doesn't seem to be the case to me. Private institutions shouldn't be allowed to control such systems, they should be compelled to give them to the public.
- m4nu3l 1y ago
  >Why would this be worse than the current situation of private actors accountable to no one controlling this technology? It's not like I can convince Zuckerberg to change his ways. As long as Zuckerberg has no army forcing me, I'm fine with that. The issue would be whether he could breach contracts or get away with fraud. But if AI is sufficiently distributed, this is less likely to happen. >At least with a democratic government I have means to try and build a coalition then enact change. The alternative requires having money and that seems like an inherently undemocratic system. I don't think of democracy as a goal to be achieved. I'm OK with democracy in so far it leads to what I value. The big problem with democracy is that most of the time it doesn't lead to rational choices, even when voters are rational. In markets, for instance, you have an incentive to be rational, and if you aren't, the market will tend to transfer resources from you to someone more rational. No such mechanism exists in a democracy; I have no incentive to do research and think hard about my vote. It's going to be worth the same as the vote of someone who believes the Earth is flat anyway.

thatfrenchguy 1y ago

I mean, you can imagine a public bureaucracy being bad at redistributing too, that’s a lot of governments in the world