4 ms·

You are under an illusion if you believe that you could improve life of humans on earth by a double-digit percentage. I cannot think of a single product/thing/

by WA 14y ago

You are under an illusion if you believe that you could improve life of humans on earth by a double-digit percentage. I cannot think of a single product/thing/whatever that accomplished the goal you mentioned. The "dent in the universe" bullshit is such hypocritical thinking that it makes me sick.

jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago
Google and Facebook. Like it or not those two are already in the double-digit percentage.
- digitalengineer 14y ago
  Google and Facebook made real dents in the universe? Well, I see your Google and FB and will raise you a humble washing machine and the invention of the pill. Both changed the world for half the population :-)
  - flyinRyan 14y ago
    Well, not literally half the population for either of those. Or do you mean half the US population?
- WA 14y ago
  And they do exactly what? Cleaner? No. More productive? In which terms? Safer? Nope. Happier? I have my doubts that people were less happy before Google + FB were invented.
  - sneak 14y ago
    Facebook has made hiring safer. And probably dating, too.
  - jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago
    I actually am suspicious if you are being serious or just trolling, but lets answer anyway. Lets talk about Google. Productive in absolutely all possible ways. Cleaner? Yes Safer? Yes. Happier? Happiness can't be a metric because its way too subjective. Cleaner? People don't need to go to a public library for any question they have; so yes. Also many people used to print before they know they could find anything anytime on the internet; so studying required a lot of printer ink and paper. More productive? In the term that you search absolutely anything related to your field and you find it instantly; sometimes you don't even have to click the page because the summary already answer your question. The pages saved in cache are awesome feature. Safer? People relies on their own gut much less than before; instead they do a quick search in Google about how to do something wish usually includes safety recommendations about the task. I know I am giving Google properties that are part of overall internet; but if a house doesn't have any entering door It is useless doesn't matter how full and complete is inside.
Jach 14y ago
> I cannot think of a single product/thing/whatever that accomplished the goal you mentioned. Really? Let's look at his goal again (my emphasis): > make a double-digit percentage of humans on Earth happier, cleaner, safer, healthier, or more efficient. Hey, a union! That makes his claim a lot weaker and far easier to justify. Now we'll be generous and ask for 10%, the lowest double-digit percent, of the population. What's a candidate technology that immediately comes to my mind in the past? The microcomputer. Let's suppose the microcomputer revolution didn't begin until 1975. The world population in 1975 was about 4 billion, ten percent of that is 400 million, which is a little more than the current US population. Do you think that over the last 40 years, the microcomputer has not achieved an improvement in any of happiness, cleanliness, safety, health, or efficiency for just 400 million people? What planet are you living on? I'd say the microcomputer even satisfies the intersection of those improvements as well, but that was not the parent's claim for a goal. Maybe it's hard to achieve the goal over a short timespan you say. Let's pick a more modern example, then. If you believe Facebook, they have over 800m active users worldwide, which satisfies the 10% barrier quite nicely for our bloated 7 billion world population, and they've been around for less than a decade. Are you going to say that Facebook doesn't improve any of happiness, cleanliness, safety, health, or efficiency for those active users? Come on. I don't particularly like Facebook myself but I wouldn't make such a negative claim. Ed: looks like I was beat to the punch on the obvious example of Facebook.
nkohari 14y ago
I don't understand, what's hypocritical about wanting to put a dent in the universe?
- WA 14y ago
  a) the universe is extremely large, b) nothing and no one ever lived made a dent in the universe so far. Human history is a bit too small for the overall history of the universe. I know, it is a saying, but take a look at "important people" that lived 2,000 years ago. How many do you know? 5? 10? What about the other millions of people? Thing is, this whole "dent in the universe" thing leads to discussions that are pretty close to comparing cock lengths. "My goal is so much more worthy than yours - I'm making a dent in the universe", which I find highly hypocritical. I believe there's no fundamental difference between the "dent-in-the-universe-webservice" that some people claim to develop and, say, lolcats. At least the latter made millions of people laugh for a moment.
  - jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago
    > a) the universe is extremely large" After seeing this answer there is only two possibilities; you are either trolling or have a psycological condition that makes you take any statement way too literal. When people talks about a "dent on the universe" they usually mean people in the same time and age in the planet earth.
sneak 14y ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug

by WA 14y ago

jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago

Google and Facebook. Like it or not those two are already in the double-digit percentage.

digitalengineer 14y ago
Google and Facebook made real dents in the universe? Well, I see your Google and FB and will raise you a humble washing machine and the invention of the pill. Both changed the world for half the population :-)
- flyinRyan 14y ago
  Well, not literally half the population for either of those. Or do you mean half the US population?
WA 14y ago
And they do exactly what? Cleaner? No. More productive? In which terms? Safer? Nope. Happier? I have my doubts that people were less happy before Google + FB were invented.
- sneak 14y ago
  Facebook has made hiring safer. And probably dating, too.
- jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago
  I actually am suspicious if you are being serious or just trolling, but lets answer anyway. Lets talk about Google. Productive in absolutely all possible ways. Cleaner? Yes Safer? Yes. Happier? Happiness can't be a metric because its way too subjective. Cleaner? People don't need to go to a public library for any question they have; so yes. Also many people used to print before they know they could find anything anytime on the internet; so studying required a lot of printer ink and paper. More productive? In the term that you search absolutely anything related to your field and you find it instantly; sometimes you don't even have to click the page because the summary already answer your question. The pages saved in cache are awesome feature. Safer? People relies on their own gut much less than before; instead they do a quick search in Google about how to do something wish usually includes safety recommendations about the task. I know I am giving Google properties that are part of overall internet; but if a house doesn't have any entering door It is useless doesn't matter how full and complete is inside.

Jach 14y ago

> I cannot think of a single product/thing/whatever that accomplished the goal you mentioned. Really? Let's look at his goal again (my emphasis): > make a double-digit percentage of humans on Earth happier, cleaner, safer, healthier, or more efficient. Hey, a union! That makes his claim a lot weaker and far easier to justify. Now we'll be generous and ask for 10%, the lowest double-digit percent, of the population. What's a candidate technology that immediately comes to my mind in the past? The microcomputer. Let's suppose the microcomputer revolution didn't begin until 1975. The world population in 1975 was about 4 billion, ten percent of that is 400 million, which is a little more than the current US population. Do you think that over the last 40 years, the microcomputer has not achieved an improvement in any of happiness, cleanliness, safety, health, or efficiency for just 400 million people? What planet are you living on? I'd say the microcomputer even satisfies the intersection of those improvements as well, but that was not the parent's claim for a goal. Maybe it's hard to achieve the goal over a short timespan you say. Let's pick a more modern example, then. If you believe Facebook, they have over 800m active users worldwide, which satisfies the 10% barrier quite nicely for our bloated 7 billion world population, and they've been around for less than a decade. Are you going to say that Facebook doesn't improve any of happiness, cleanliness, safety, health, or efficiency for those active users? Come on. I don't particularly like Facebook myself but I wouldn't make such a negative claim. Ed: looks like I was beat to the punch on the obvious example of Facebook.

nkohari 14y ago

I don't understand, what's hypocritical about wanting to put a dent in the universe?

WA 14y ago
a) the universe is extremely large, b) nothing and no one ever lived made a dent in the universe so far. Human history is a bit too small for the overall history of the universe. I know, it is a saying, but take a look at "important people" that lived 2,000 years ago. How many do you know? 5? 10? What about the other millions of people? Thing is, this whole "dent in the universe" thing leads to discussions that are pretty close to comparing cock lengths. "My goal is so much more worthy than yours - I'm making a dent in the universe", which I find highly hypocritical. I believe there's no fundamental difference between the "dent-in-the-universe-webservice" that some people claim to develop and, say, lolcats. At least the latter made millions of people laugh for a moment.
- jQueryIsAwesome 14y ago
  > a) the universe is extremely large" After seeing this answer there is only two possibilities; you are either trolling or have a psycological condition that makes you take any statement way too literal. When people talks about a "dent on the universe" they usually mean people in the same time and age in the planet earth.

sneak 14y ago

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Borlaug