The issue of transition is an extraordinarily complex one - one that the world simply hasn't really engaged at all.
But I'd think the kind of behaviours that we'd want to incentivize in a post-scarcity world are things like learning... and creative expression. The things that most enliven us as human beings - even while providing us with an environment that 'rationally' shouldn't incentivize us to do anything but be pure hedonists.
There's a whole lot of very amusing misanthropy going on in this video. The overall point - that many people are going to be pushed out of jobs in the near future because of exponential leaps and jumps in technology is salient. Indeed, I'd go further and say that, as time moves along, more and more jobs will be replaced with automation - irrespective of how complex or creative they are.
The proposed solution is... interesting. But how is it that different from traditional welfare?
@Zaptruder I don't pretend to have the end-of-history solution to things; but what I'd say about the GMI, is that since you're receiving it regardless of whether or not you work, you're not being disincentivized to work.
Wireheading (pleasure electrodes in your brain) may become a problem, but if that's the case, well, maybe it's the next evolutionary step we need to take to evolve a better brain - one interested in more than base hedonism.
Hmmm. The mcdonalds anecdote you came up with seemed to contradict what you're saying here, and indeed the general point behind GMI as you mention? That is... at 10 cents an hour, who wants to work a job? Of course people still want to do decent jobs, but you mention the whole point is to get the dumb people off jobs, but provide them with money to live, instead of dying out in the streets.
Perhaps the better mechanism would be to incentivize them to learn if they're not working?
@Zaptruder The problem with stupid people, is that no ammount of education will cure stupid; they're increasingly not worth minimum wage, so what do we do with them? Prison and welfare are the present solutions.
Alternatively, they might be worth $0.10/hr - and if that's the only way they can afford a new pair of Nikes, they might go for it.
Right now, we let them wander the streets and hate the upperclass.
How much of a tragedy would it be if these masses of stupid people starved to death? I mean I know the immediate danger is chaos and instability caused by masses of low IQ people with too much time on their hands, but it seems like a program like this ought not to be instituted without some disincentive for people to breed. I think one of the very worsts things about statism at the moment is that subsidizes the reproduction of people with low IQs.
While I don't agree with everything you said, I agree with a big chunk of it. In particular I agree with the premise: we are headed for a post-scarcity world which will be wonderful to live in, but the transition for NOW to THEN is going be tumultuous.
Have you looked into "negative income tax?" It combines this basic income you talked about with a flat tax, supposedly solving the problem that flat taxes are regressive in effect. I haven't looked into it enough to..
At the apex of automation is the magical matter machine - something which is capable of reassembling matter and possibly even condensing energy into matter at a whim. Imagine taking a clump of dirt and converting it into raw prime rib - after all, presumably the dirt would contain plenty of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and the other trace elements necessary to replicate flesh. One could conceivably reprocess turds to the same end.
In essence what we'd see is nigh-infinite recycling. Waste then becomes a necessary fuel to keep a post-scarcity society truly post-scarcity. Of course this is much further off than, as you say, simply automating production generally and mining asteroids and satellites and so forth.
Although it seems like you kind of went into this already. haha
I think you're overestimating the potential of 3D printing technology. 3D printers are already here, but it will take years or decades of incremental improvement before they're anything more than a curiosity. eBooks first became possible back in the late 80's, and are only now beginning to displace regular printed books. Speculators are already hedging their bets, and they'll have plenty of time to adjust their conduct accordingly.
And even then, it's improbable in my opinion that 3D printing-
- technology will displace factory work. Printing services still exist today, despite the availability of home printers and copiers.
As for nano-assemblers.., I've yet to see the slightest trace of them. Their theoretical viability is still up for debate. And if they ever do get produced, then I expect that they will also have to go through decades of incremental improvement.
I would also like to make you aware that you are not the first person to make these kinds of predictions. John -
- Maynard Keynes based his policies on the assumption that post-scarcity was just around the corner, and three quarters of a century after slaving under those policies, all we have to show for it is broken windows.
Finally, I appreciate your attempt to vindicate the Luddites, but I feel your analysis is too vulgar. You must remember that their cause took place against the backdrop of one of the biggest, statist displacements of de-facto property rights in history, the Enclosure Movement.
@PanzerDivisionBOM Thank you for the thoughtful comment; I'll have to look into this Enclosure Movement, that's new for me.
You are entirely correct that this doesn't justify Keynesianism; at the end of the day, good ol' Austrian economics continues to poke holes in it. The question is, what model is the Establishment? What framework? I'm thinking something similar to phonebook - everybody's in for free, but you pay to be popular
By the enclosure movement, I mean the series of measures which brought about private property in Brittish land, and facilitated the agricultural and industrial revolutions. Specifically, it is the contention of some Left-Libertarians, which I happen to share, that the transfer of title from collective ownership to clouted aristocracy constituted a violation of de-facto property rights, as the people who had lived on that land and worked it for generations can be said to -
- have had a much, much stronger claim to it than the government.
Establishing private property in land was of course a brilliant move for which we all should be thankful. But this could have been achieved just as well by granting allodial title to the people who were using it, giving each family ownership free and clear of the land they had been using at the time. As such, the privatization must be considered separately from the redistribution, especially when we try -
- to achieve historical understanding of things like the Luddite movement or the horrifying working conditions of the early Industrial Revolution.
Still, this clarification is a tangent to the main claim I wanted to make. I think your attempt to complement Praxeology with other doctrines has, ironically, caused you to lose track of the element of time, and to vulgarize your analysis. Changes take time, and time is time to adapt. If this process of adaptation is too -
- slow, then that only makes it even more urgent to remove those obstacles which hamper it.
And of course, that's assuming fabbers even have the potential to supplant specialized mass production, which is far from a given. If this is the case, then the statist solution becomes even less desirable.
After watching a few RSAnimate videos about people's incentive to work or get things done and our school system, I really think in the next 20 years our schools systems wont push knowledge on people but instead support learning. And i think people will end up doing things they care about for free instead of free loading, well at least most people.
Didn't mean to sound so intense but am passionate, as are yourself. As you pointed out these are interesting times. With computers projected to gain consciousness in 20 years, these will be our new leaders everybody is getting comfortable with technology. But you where saying that nobody is planning for this transition. A little more research will show that a lot if not to many groups are vying for the title. And you can bet every big government is looking at this too.
ANY THOUGHTS ON EITHER ZEITGEIST---THE VENUS PROJECT---OATHKEEPERS OR ANY OTHER GROUPS THAT ARE ALREADY WORKING ON A TRANSITION TO A RESOURCE BASED ECONOMY----THIS DEBT BASED ECONOMY IS GOING TO COLLAPSE ---APOLOGISE FOR CAPS ON MY TABLET---THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION WILL BE JACKING INTO THE CLOUD---RAY KURZWEIL TRANSHUMANISM ETC---G---N---R
@riseingstardust Heh, I can forgive caps, though you still sound very intense.
Zeitgeist/VP - my impressions are not good. His economic astuteness is questionable, and he seems to favour a 1984 style society where I wouldn't be allowed to drive a motorcycle or eat bacon. But I've only taken a cursory glance (been thinking of going in depth). OathKeepers - for them, do they have economic views? R.K. Awesome dude, though I don't follow him closely, Eliezer Yudkowsky is my favourite T-Humanist.
@QxTc9W Believe me, I'm no solar fanboy, but the stuff they've been doing lately is pretty damn interesting. That said, it won't *just* be solar - I just mentioned it because it's the only thing I've looked at in detail. So long as $/Watt keeps dropping we'll get there. singularity2050 com has a really interesting article titled the End of Petro Tyranny.
ok, so just give people who can't contribute anymore bare bones entitlement benefits completely by default just so they can live off of it. By what means would this be done and what's to prevent further entitlement programs from being lobbied for that distort the economy?
Second, why would someone in such a world of advanced tech be only paid around $1 an hour a McD's? Wouldn't their labor be worth more given the extra capital at hand? Or would they just have to undercut the robots and such?
@intercourseman69 Right now the US government spends $11 000 for each citizen; in Canada, it's $7800/person. So - let's ammend that $10 000 - put it at $2000. That can come directly from the taxes, or it can be a product of the inflation endemic to fractional reserve banking systems (this is what the social credit theorizers talked about, the idiot politicians who ran on the platforms couldn't do math, however).
Mind you, this is sounding just as fantastical as establishing an anarchist utopia
@intercourseman69 However, advance tech by about 10 years; food & clothing prices go down because of innovation. At this point, it might be possible to survive on $2000 a year - so long as one wasn't living in a major city. Instead of stupid people living in the urban ghetto, where social ills play off eachother, they'll be spread out through the countryside, lessening the damage that they do.
In a world with practically free energy, and practically free labour, the only value added by a having a real person serving you coffee is the interaction; with a basic income, working is only done for luxury spending; thus $1/hour would make sense. A lot of people might take up hobbies as part time jobs, as sell the results of that in the marketplace. The point is to keep them A) happy, and B) give them an incentive to participate in a positive way in society.
The issue of transition is an extraordinarily complex one - one that the world simply hasn't really engaged at all.
But I'd think the kind of behaviours that we'd want to incentivize in a post-scarcity world are things like learning... and creative expression. The things that most enliven us as human beings - even while providing us with an environment that 'rationally' shouldn't incentivize us to do anything but be pure hedonists.
Zaptruder 3 weeks ago
There's a whole lot of very amusing misanthropy going on in this video. The overall point - that many people are going to be pushed out of jobs in the near future because of exponential leaps and jumps in technology is salient. Indeed, I'd go further and say that, as time moves along, more and more jobs will be replaced with automation - irrespective of how complex or creative they are.
The proposed solution is... interesting. But how is it that different from traditional welfare?
Zaptruder 3 weeks ago
@Zaptruder I don't pretend to have the end-of-history solution to things; but what I'd say about the GMI, is that since you're receiving it regardless of whether or not you work, you're not being disincentivized to work.
Wireheading (pleasure electrodes in your brain) may become a problem, but if that's the case, well, maybe it's the next evolutionary step we need to take to evolve a better brain - one interested in more than base hedonism.
Aurini 3 weeks ago
Hmmm. The mcdonalds anecdote you came up with seemed to contradict what you're saying here, and indeed the general point behind GMI as you mention? That is... at 10 cents an hour, who wants to work a job? Of course people still want to do decent jobs, but you mention the whole point is to get the dumb people off jobs, but provide them with money to live, instead of dying out in the streets.
Perhaps the better mechanism would be to incentivize them to learn if they're not working?
Zaptruder 3 weeks ago
@Zaptruder The problem with stupid people, is that no ammount of education will cure stupid; they're increasingly not worth minimum wage, so what do we do with them? Prison and welfare are the present solutions.
Alternatively, they might be worth $0.10/hr - and if that's the only way they can afford a new pair of Nikes, they might go for it.
Right now, we let them wander the streets and hate the upperclass.
Aurini 3 weeks ago
How much of a tragedy would it be if these masses of stupid people starved to death? I mean I know the immediate danger is chaos and instability caused by masses of low IQ people with too much time on their hands, but it seems like a program like this ought not to be instituted without some disincentive for people to breed. I think one of the very worsts things about statism at the moment is that subsidizes the reproduction of people with low IQs.
Fetchdafish 1 month ago
@Fetchdafish Keep in mind that the "let them die" attitude will not win you many allies.
ShwangShwing 2 weeks ago
While I don't agree with everything you said, I agree with a big chunk of it. In particular I agree with the premise: we are headed for a post-scarcity world which will be wonderful to live in, but the transition for NOW to THEN is going be tumultuous.
Have you looked into "negative income tax?" It combines this basic income you talked about with a flat tax, supposedly solving the problem that flat taxes are regressive in effect. I haven't looked into it enough to..
durned character limit
SailorBarsoom 1 month ago
I haven't looked into it enough to have an opinion, other than to say that it sounds interesting.
SailorBarsoom 1 month ago
It seems like there are two possible directions we can go from this point. Post Apocalyptic Wasteland or Technological Paradise.
SuperBspb 1 month ago
At the apex of automation is the magical matter machine - something which is capable of reassembling matter and possibly even condensing energy into matter at a whim. Imagine taking a clump of dirt and converting it into raw prime rib - after all, presumably the dirt would contain plenty of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and the other trace elements necessary to replicate flesh. One could conceivably reprocess turds to the same end.
doucher337 1 month ago
@doucher337
In essence what we'd see is nigh-infinite recycling. Waste then becomes a necessary fuel to keep a post-scarcity society truly post-scarcity. Of course this is much further off than, as you say, simply automating production generally and mining asteroids and satellites and so forth.
Although it seems like you kind of went into this already. haha
doucher337 1 month ago
@doucher337
Also
GET YOUR ASS TO MARS
doucher337 1 month ago
controlled depopulation. eugenics. are you aware of it?
MrChimochay 1 month ago
@MrChimochay I can't say I've heard the term 'controlled depopulation' before.
Aurini 1 month ago
I think you're overestimating the potential of 3D printing technology. 3D printers are already here, but it will take years or decades of incremental improvement before they're anything more than a curiosity. eBooks first became possible back in the late 80's, and are only now beginning to displace regular printed books. Speculators are already hedging their bets, and they'll have plenty of time to adjust their conduct accordingly.
And even then, it's improbable in my opinion that 3D printing-
-
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
-
- technology will displace factory work. Printing services still exist today, despite the availability of home printers and copiers.
As for nano-assemblers.., I've yet to see the slightest trace of them. Their theoretical viability is still up for debate. And if they ever do get produced, then I expect that they will also have to go through decades of incremental improvement.
I would also like to make you aware that you are not the first person to make these kinds of predictions. John -
-
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
-
- Maynard Keynes based his policies on the assumption that post-scarcity was just around the corner, and three quarters of a century after slaving under those policies, all we have to show for it is broken windows.
Finally, I appreciate your attempt to vindicate the Luddites, but I feel your analysis is too vulgar. You must remember that their cause took place against the backdrop of one of the biggest, statist displacements of de-facto property rights in history, the Enclosure Movement.
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM Thank you for the thoughtful comment; I'll have to look into this Enclosure Movement, that's new for me.
You are entirely correct that this doesn't justify Keynesianism; at the end of the day, good ol' Austrian economics continues to poke holes in it. The question is, what model is the Establishment? What framework? I'm thinking something similar to phonebook - everybody's in for free, but you pay to be popular
I should do a video on this.
Aurini 2 months ago
@Aurini
By the enclosure movement, I mean the series of measures which brought about private property in Brittish land, and facilitated the agricultural and industrial revolutions. Specifically, it is the contention of some Left-Libertarians, which I happen to share, that the transfer of title from collective ownership to clouted aristocracy constituted a violation of de-facto property rights, as the people who had lived on that land and worked it for generations can be said to -
-
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
-
- have had a much, much stronger claim to it than the government.
Establishing private property in land was of course a brilliant move for which we all should be thankful. But this could have been achieved just as well by granting allodial title to the people who were using it, giving each family ownership free and clear of the land they had been using at the time. As such, the privatization must be considered separately from the redistribution, especially when we try -
-
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
-
- to achieve historical understanding of things like the Luddite movement or the horrifying working conditions of the early Industrial Revolution.
Still, this clarification is a tangent to the main claim I wanted to make. I think your attempt to complement Praxeology with other doctrines has, ironically, caused you to lose track of the element of time, and to vulgarize your analysis. Changes take time, and time is time to adapt. If this process of adaptation is too -
-
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
-
- slow, then that only makes it even more urgent to remove those obstacles which hamper it.
And of course, that's assuming fabbers even have the potential to supplant specialized mass production, which is far from a given. If this is the case, then the statist solution becomes even less desirable.
PanzerDivisionBOM 2 months ago
@QxTc9W kurzweilai. net/a-limitless-power-source-for-the-indefinite-future
silversobe 2 months ago
After watching a few RSAnimate videos about people's incentive to work or get things done and our school system, I really think in the next 20 years our schools systems wont push knowledge on people but instead support learning. And i think people will end up doing things they care about for free instead of free loading, well at least most people.
TayoTheT1000 3 months ago
We also need to worry about the robots replacing "smart people jobs." HAL could replace all doctors in the world, maybe idk. . .
paradoarify 3 months ago
basic income ftw!
strawprophet 3 months ago
Didn't mean to sound so intense but am passionate, as are yourself. As you pointed out these are interesting times. With computers projected to gain consciousness in 20 years, these will be our new leaders everybody is getting comfortable with technology. But you where saying that nobody is planning for this transition. A little more research will show that a lot if not to many groups are vying for the title. And you can bet every big government is looking at this too.
to all my relations
riseingstardust 3 months ago
ANY THOUGHTS ON EITHER ZEITGEIST---THE VENUS PROJECT---OATHKEEPERS OR ANY OTHER GROUPS THAT ARE ALREADY WORKING ON A TRANSITION TO A RESOURCE BASED ECONOMY----THIS DEBT BASED ECONOMY IS GOING TO COLLAPSE ---APOLOGISE FOR CAPS ON MY TABLET---THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION WILL BE JACKING INTO THE CLOUD---RAY KURZWEIL TRANSHUMANISM ETC---G---N---R
riseingstardust 3 months ago in playlist More videos from Aurini
@riseingstardust Heh, I can forgive caps, though you still sound very intense.
Zeitgeist/VP - my impressions are not good. His economic astuteness is questionable, and he seems to favour a 1984 style society where I wouldn't be allowed to drive a motorcycle or eat bacon. But I've only taken a cursory glance (been thinking of going in depth). OathKeepers - for them, do they have economic views? R.K. Awesome dude, though I don't follow him closely, Eliezer Yudkowsky is my favourite T-Humanist.
Aurini 3 months ago
@QxTc9W Caught the first couple minutes of that vid - bookmarked for later. Nuclear will definitely be part of the equation too.
Aurini 3 months ago
@QxTc9W Believe me, I'm no solar fanboy, but the stuff they've been doing lately is pretty damn interesting. That said, it won't *just* be solar - I just mentioned it because it's the only thing I've looked at in detail. So long as $/Watt keeps dropping we'll get there. singularity2050 com has a really interesting article titled the End of Petro Tyranny.
Aurini 3 months ago
Brilliant video :)
aiiiunluckykid 3 months ago
ok, so just give people who can't contribute anymore bare bones entitlement benefits completely by default just so they can live off of it. By what means would this be done and what's to prevent further entitlement programs from being lobbied for that distort the economy?
Second, why would someone in such a world of advanced tech be only paid around $1 an hour a McD's? Wouldn't their labor be worth more given the extra capital at hand? Or would they just have to undercut the robots and such?
intercourseman69 3 months ago
@intercourseman69 Right now the US government spends $11 000 for each citizen; in Canada, it's $7800/person. So - let's ammend that $10 000 - put it at $2000. That can come directly from the taxes, or it can be a product of the inflation endemic to fractional reserve banking systems (this is what the social credit theorizers talked about, the idiot politicians who ran on the platforms couldn't do math, however).
Mind you, this is sounding just as fantastical as establishing an anarchist utopia
Aurini 3 months ago
@intercourseman69 However, advance tech by about 10 years; food & clothing prices go down because of innovation. At this point, it might be possible to survive on $2000 a year - so long as one wasn't living in a major city. Instead of stupid people living in the urban ghetto, where social ills play off eachother, they'll be spread out through the countryside, lessening the damage that they do.
Aurini 3 months ago
In a world with practically free energy, and practically free labour, the only value added by a having a real person serving you coffee is the interaction; with a basic income, working is only done for luxury spending; thus $1/hour would make sense. A lot of people might take up hobbies as part time jobs, as sell the results of that in the marketplace. The point is to keep them A) happy, and B) give them an incentive to participate in a positive way in society.
Aurini 3 months ago