4 ms·

You can make your own electricity and natural gas, or form a co-op with your neighbors. And I never said it would be an instant transition to an interplanetary

by mkr-hn 14y ago

You can make your own electricity and natural gas, or form a co-op with your neighbors. And I never said it would be an instant transition to an interplanetary utopia of self-sustaining, currency-free communities. 2140 is a long way away. We're going to live through the transition, and it's not going to be pleasant.

dfc 14y ago
How are my neighbors and I going to make enough natural gas to heat our houses in the winter? Most importantly if automation and efficient manufacturing are so widely dispersed why would someone else accept goods they can just as easily make themselves? You forgot to answer how I will save for retirement. EDIT: I just saw your revision. You seem to assume that society will decide to give up currency go back to a barter based system. Why will we go back?
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
  - dfc 14y ago
    "We'll either move toward this or have a living hell where most people have no jobs and nothing to occupy their time. We seem to survive these transitions well enough, so I like to think someone will come up with the answers." Look, I understand that you think the transition will be tough. I'm curious why you think we will make the transition. EDIT: You have edited your post again. "You seem adamant that currency will still have value when most people don't need it" Why will people not need to store wealth in order to take care of their needs later in life?
- mkr-hn 14y ago
  You're coming off as combative. I don't want to continue this discussion with you.
  - dfc 14y ago
    I apologize for coming off as combative. I am genuinely interested in the discussion.
- Jach 14y ago
  I'll join the discussion by saying that mkr-hn might be trying to fit a Star Trek:TNG society onto today's world. (Though I add the caveat that this is just speculation on my part.) I certainly see a Trekkie answer to your concerns, anyway, you just have to swallow the sci-fi for a moment. ;) That hypothetical 24th century isn't such a bad place to live, at least compared to 21st century Earth. (My major beef with it is that people still die. Death isn't that hard of a problem, especially when you have teleporters!) In the 24th century, many humans still do purposeful work to better themselves and better humanity. Those that don't work live unexciting lives on some unknown colony planet, but so long as the Borg et al. don't attack, they can live their longer lives in peace and comfort, free of charge. Energy isn't free even in the Star Trek universe, but the society has moved beyond requiring people to toil for money in order to live. Such non-toiling has its costs, of course. Not every slacker can have their own galaxy class ship. In essence, with such technology, and with such a culture of "it's okay for people to be useless and their marginal cost for the Federation to support is close to 0 so why not", it's not that hard to see how they can get rid of money. They still have de-facto currency and capital, though. e.g. natural dilithium is a common source of conflict among the space-faring races. But such sources of capital typically have instrumental value apart from being able to get other stuff with it. This is all sci-fi speculation, though it can be useful to postulate various technologies existing and try and guess how humanity might be changed. I'll leave you with a simplified form of a particularly hairy one that some very smart people are spending their lives on right now. Will they succeed by 2100? 2500? Via I.J. Good: "Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an "intelligence explosion," and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make."
  - mkr-hn 14y ago
    You said what I would have said if I hadn't been rendered near-incoherent by needing to go have lunch. :)
  - dfc 14y ago

by mkr-hn 14y ago

dfc 14y ago

How are my neighbors and I going to make enough natural gas to heat our houses in the winter? Most importantly if automation and efficient manufacturing are so widely dispersed why would someone else accept goods they can just as easily make themselves? You forgot to answer how I will save for retirement. EDIT: I just saw your revision. You seem to assume that society will decide to give up currency go back to a barter based system. Why will we go back?

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
- dfc 14y ago
  "We'll either move toward this or have a living hell where most people have no jobs and nothing to occupy their time. We seem to survive these transitions well enough, so I like to think someone will come up with the answers." Look, I understand that you think the transition will be tough. I'm curious why you think we will make the transition. EDIT: You have edited your post again. "You seem adamant that currency will still have value when most people don't need it" Why will people not need to store wealth in order to take care of their needs later in life?
mkr-hn 14y ago
You're coming off as combative. I don't want to continue this discussion with you.
- dfc 14y ago
  I apologize for coming off as combative. I am genuinely interested in the discussion.
Jach 14y ago
I'll join the discussion by saying that mkr-hn might be trying to fit a Star Trek:TNG society onto today's world. (Though I add the caveat that this is just speculation on my part.) I certainly see a Trekkie answer to your concerns, anyway, you just have to swallow the sci-fi for a moment. ;) That hypothetical 24th century isn't such a bad place to live, at least compared to 21st century Earth. (My major beef with it is that people still die. Death isn't that hard of a problem, especially when you have teleporters!) In the 24th century, many humans still do purposeful work to better themselves and better humanity. Those that don't work live unexciting lives on some unknown colony planet, but so long as the Borg et al. don't attack, they can live their longer lives in peace and comfort, free of charge. Energy isn't free even in the Star Trek universe, but the society has moved beyond requiring people to toil for money in order to live. Such non-toiling has its costs, of course. Not every slacker can have their own galaxy class ship. In essence, with such technology, and with such a culture of "it's okay for people to be useless and their marginal cost for the Federation to support is close to 0 so why not", it's not that hard to see how they can get rid of money. They still have de-facto currency and capital, though. e.g. natural dilithium is a common source of conflict among the space-faring races. But such sources of capital typically have instrumental value apart from being able to get other stuff with it. This is all sci-fi speculation, though it can be useful to postulate various technologies existing and try and guess how humanity might be changed. I'll leave you with a simplified form of a particularly hairy one that some very smart people are spending their lives on right now. Will they succeed by 2100? 2500? Via I.J. Good: "Let an ultraintelligent machine be defined as a machine that can far surpass all the intellectual activities of any man however clever. Since the design of machines is one of these intellectual activities, an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines; there would then unquestionably be an "intelligence explosion," and the intelligence of man would be left far behind. Thus the first ultraintelligent machine is the last invention that man need ever make."
- mkr-hn 14y ago
  You said what I would have said if I hadn't been rendered near-incoherent by needing to go have lunch. :)
- dfc 14y ago