4 ms·

Here's the scary part. As you said, technological innovation and progress are continuing, but 99.99% of humans play no part in it. If the world were post-scarc

Here's the scary part. As you said, technological innovation and progress are continuing, but 99.99% of humans play no part in it. If the world were post-scarcity and those "unneeded" people didn't have to work, that wouldn't necessarily be a problem. But what's happening is that, while industry and technology and innovation continue, the percentage of people who get to be a part of those things (and therefore have a chance at a decent income) is plummeting. Also, taking a standpoint that focuses on humanistic creativity and the arts, we see that that is dying off. The 0.01% with the talent to contribute to innovation's forefront are an elite and bright group of people, but there's not enough bulk creative energy to solve the problem in an artistic way. And having taught classes before and realized that most of what society needs is education (not of the formal kind) I will say that aesthetics really matter.

sp332 13y ago
Are you saying we need more people with humanities educations to imagine our way out of this mess?
- michaelochurch 13y ago
  I don't know. I think that formal schooling is only a small part of the equation, especially as college becomes a pre-professional finishing school for a lot of people. Our society's priorities and values are fucked up and no one in power really takes professors seriously anymore, so it probably wouldn't do much good. We need more people who actually care about the humanities and arts, yes. I'm not sure how much that has to do with the distribution of majors. The corporate system is pretty good, anyway, at undoing whatever good is done by college.
VLM 13y ago
One interesting side note is population growth, such that 0.01% means we still have about six times the population of ancient Athens working on it. If we were popping out Euripides, Arisophanes, and friends, at a rate six times higher than historical, that would be "ok". Not as great as could be imagined, but still "ok". The best part in the modern world is not having to visit Greece or wait for papyrii to be hand copied. The bad news is we don't seem to be achieving six times ancient Athenian cultural production so 0.01% might be a bit optimistic.

sp332 13y ago

Are you saying we need more people with humanities educations to imagine our way out of this mess?

michaelochurch 13y ago
I don't know. I think that formal schooling is only a small part of the equation, especially as college becomes a pre-professional finishing school for a lot of people. Our society's priorities and values are fucked up and no one in power really takes professors seriously anymore, so it probably wouldn't do much good. We need more people who actually care about the humanities and arts, yes. I'm not sure how much that has to do with the distribution of majors. The corporate system is pretty good, anyway, at undoing whatever good is done by college.

VLM 13y ago

One interesting side note is population growth, such that 0.01% means we still have about six times the population of ancient Athens working on it. If we were popping out Euripides, Arisophanes, and friends, at a rate six times higher than historical, that would be "ok". Not as great as could be imagined, but still "ok". The best part in the modern world is not having to visit Greece or wait for papyrii to be hand copied. The bad news is we don't seem to be achieving six times ancient Athenian cultural production so 0.01% might be a bit optimistic.