Is Constant Innovation Dangerous? See Ancient Rome

[studentofsmith]

Decentralized decision making systems (i.e. the free market) are very flexible and can adapt rapidly to changes. Centralized, top-down systems (i.e. command and control economies) cannot adapt as quickly and have a harder time coping with change.

I'll lay odds Mr. van der Leeuw favors a high degree of government control over the economy. That's why he see innovation as a threat. It poses problems for his economic ideology.

[noobler9]

innovation means building on what already exists, a short period of time to figure out whether or not, and if not where not, you have the right idea, is essential, you can leap after you've looked to keep going just fine 5 year plans a la communism in russia and the great leap forward a la mao, 'nuff said

[oclandestin]

If constant innovation is a problem, then the USA is clearly in a worse position than China.

[funkalunatic]

2 stars because the migrants and immigrants numbers for China are seem astonishingly SMALL to me, and the speakers seem to have a very narrow, uninformed view of how peoples, countries, and cultures evolve.

[frankroto]

@funkalunatic: I think you misunderstood. He is talking about migration from the countryside to the cities _within_ China, immigrants to the cities who emigrate from the countryside, not international migration.

[freesk8]

Luddites.

[sugarpuddin88]

Bureaucracies & administrators stymie creativity and innovation in an effort to impose order & control

Creativity & innovation is only found in free societies with little bureaucratic interruption

[SpyroOrDie]

@sugarpuddin88 there you will also find slavery and environmental degredation

[Leobons]

How can you say there's suppression of technology? Give me an example please! -> Pls don't discredit yourself talking about Zero-Point Energy / things you just heard about on the Internet.

[Betillo555]

@Leobons watch "Who Killed The Electric Car"

It's here on youtube... watch?v=IPiLgBeiZ2M

[Leobons]

@Betillo555 I've seen that one a while ago, very cool!

Thank god Shai Agassi covered that one for us Earthlings right? ;)

[klard]

Leobons: Innovation has been totally stopped in the area of substances that alter consciousness for medical uses. Salvia Divinorum displays great potential for use in Allzheimers and other degenerative mental disease, and depression yet it is being outlawed with long prison terms attached. Cannabis also has great potential. MDMA displayed great potential. LSD established a 40% cure rate for alcoholics. Yet the governments seek to stop innovations with these things.

[Leobons]

@klard I can't take this comment seriously, stop trying to justify your mental confusion.

[TheDemonPazuzu]

Interesting!

[bigsteelguy]

What is dangerous is the suppression of inventions to keep the competition level at an equal level to make huge profits from similer technology.

We don't want to abuse technology but that is what we are doing today.

Technology can Free humanity or destroy humanity. When people in power believe they can hoard all the money and resources and not allow a civilization to flourish and grow then that is the problem we have.

Money is the root of all our problems

[bigsteelguy]

As well as super rich eltite people want to control and manage a civilization's growth and expansion.

Instead of letting it expand and Evolve.

Either we get rid of the entire capitalistic system, or we get rid of every peice of technology we own right down to the glasses we wear and the chairs and the houses we live in.

[thunderpants10]

bingo

[chessdawgz]

@bigsteelguy true, true

[Perserus]

@bigsteelguy

It's as you said about technology. Money is such a technology.

[OhNoItsGojira]

@Perserus Money is not technology. Technology will evolve and grown even when taken out of a capitalistic/political system. Society needs to embrace technology and knowledge and have that as the bag bone of the system.

[JonnieDarko69]

I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with you there. Technology will evolve and progress when there is a motivation for it. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs didn't start their companies for charity.

[OhNoItsGojira]

You're trying to tell me that people need a profit motive to contribute to technology? Humanity is surely doomed if we'll only get off our asses to create something for a profit. What a limited view of the world you must have. The desire for innovation and progress isn't limited to a monetary based society.

[JonnieDarko69]

You didn't read my post did you? People aren't going to do something unless there is motivation for doing it. Bill Gates and Steve Jobs used money as their motivation and the competition has given us remarkable technology. Its not a limited view of the world but an observation, but someone of your intelligence can't distinguish the two.

[OhNoItsGojira]

@JonnieDarko69 My intelligence? Give me a break.... lol. I know exactly what they did, and happily use both of their products everyday. I, on the other hand, have not let my mind be polluted with the notion that capitalism is the only viable system that society can function under. Also, Steve Jobs does what he does with Apple because he didn't like what Bill Gates was doing. Peoples motivations aren't simply driven my monetary gain, as differences of opinion lead to most innovations.

[halo3pro45]

the greatest innovations have been a result of a monetary system. Also. Capitalism is the prime Governmental structure that has created this merely because it provides opportunities for those who want to improve themselves. Henry Ford and Thomas Edison were motivated by money and improving themselves. In fact, Henry Ford did not even have adequate schooling however he had the correct resources and knew how to motivate them.

[OhNoItsGojira]

My point is simply that its foolish to assume the desire for innovation and progress is tied inextricably to a monetary/political system. In a service-based system, or any other social system, technological and scientific innovations would still occur regardless of the absence of monetary compensation.

[noobler9]

@OhNoItsGojira agreed, I still say you have to have the right idea to continue on, as with anything built off really bad assumptions, the product will be terrible, and to use them in the name of constant innovation is suicide, that's why "field experiments" in the military aren't done until laboratory ones are typically with military equipment for instance

it's stupid not to, which is a general statement about innovation

but yea, "lol monetary based innovation"

[asmodeus585]

@halo3pro45: Well, Edison wasn't an A-star student either...

[noobler9]

@halo3pro45 "TESLA" was motivated not by monetary goals completely, but rather to see his works credited to him among other things* not edison as for what happened, well, tesla was one story, and in fact while not to the same degree, it's happened quite a lot amongst those developers, they get screwed over when it comes time to "pay them their due"

[noobler9]

@JonnieDarko69 the collective information they relied on wasn't developed by profiteers, so much as a war effort leading to a boost in computation capabilities designed for artillery tracking of trajectories

[JonnieDarko69]

Has someone read Atlas Shrugged?

[jsmythib]

@bigsteelguy debt as money is the root of all our problems.

[pinky315]

yea