DEAR PROFESSOR EASBY, if you find this through Google, please note that I posted this only minutes before turning my journal in to you in class this morning. It was inspired by conversations here so I thought I'd share it. Thanks, you're the best! Love, K.
One of the things that I think about often is the future of humanity; despite the mounting evidence that we are, through overpopulation, climate change, and resource depletion, making the planet inhospitable to ourselves, there are those who argue that the Earth can sustain 20 billion human beings, and that as-yet-undeveloped technology will take care of our emerging problems. Many of these same people argue that we will take to the stars, and the population crisis will be taken care of through expanding to other frontiers.
For me, the question is not how many people Earth can sustain, or whether we will colonize space, but what happens when people have a high standard of living, and how many people can be realistically sustained at such a standard. What advantage is there to a planet with 20 billion people? As a species, none. There is certainly no advantage to other species, and the standard of living could not possibly be as high as I personally would want it to be, if we lacked forests, greenspaces and wilderness, species diversity and wildlife.
There's another factor, too, that is often overlooked; I believe that we, as a species, must choose between expansion and a high standard of living. We cannot have both, for reasons that seem as hard-wired into us as the desire to procreate in the first place. One thing we have learned from experience is that, over and over again, all over the world, women who are given a choice overwhelmingly choose not to be brood mares. Given a choice, most women who choose to have children choose to have only one or two children; rarely, three. Alternative families do not alter this fact; people in general, both men and women, who choose to be nurturers rarely feel called to nurture a large brood, and certainly not in enough numbers to offset the vast majority who find much of their fulfillment in life through other expressions of accomplishment.
This is not a limitation that technology can fix. Even if we could replicate gestation and lactation, there is no substitute for the crucial stable-nurturer connection that is necessary for the human child to grow up optimally healthy. This is not a factor that we can simply ignore or wish away in our science-fiction dreams of colonizing the stars, or even in our shorter-term goals of envisioning a better future for humanity; we can choose only one: a high standard of living, or an expanding population. Anything else is simple wishful thinking.
I've never bought the idea of alleviating overpopulation through planetary colonization. It would require moving enough people fast enough to offset population growth, which would in turn require a truly obnoxious amount of energy and resources. Even if we could do that, we'd just fill up the extra space again.
But that's the sci-fi, hopeful futurist stuff. In the shorter term, I agree that we do need ways to alleviate the growth of population. Technological advancements have succeeded in holding off a Malthusian catastrophe, but the fact that we've pulled back from the brink in the past is no guarantee that we will continue to in the future.
We are forced with a choice that I don't think we can actually make, in the sense of willfully choosing a course of action that we think is best.
I shouldn't try to think about these things before coffee. Trying to compose a meaningful, coherent thought is a little bit out of my grasp right now.
I'm inclined to just agree with you, until I have good reason not to from technology that exists in the real world instead of in TV shows and buried in science journals.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 05:47:51 PM
I'm inclined to just agree with you, until I have good reason not to from technology that exists in the real world instead of in TV shows and buried in science journals.
Yeah. We (the general "we" of people who think about this sort of shit through the ages) have been surprised before, and we may yet be surprised again, hopefully for the better. But I don't particularly like the idea of crossing our fingers for a genius to save us.
Here's the dilemma
Any restriction on population growth is an horrific infringement on the personal liberty of everyone to shit out enough screaming brats to wipe out all life on earth.
The choice is between mass sterilization (a fascist overfiend ripping the band aid off) or nature taking care of it for us (the way that makes option 1 look like an episode of the care bears)
The irony is, our complete resistance to the horrors of option one will lead us to option 2 as a default. :lulz:
that pretty much sums it up, imo.
Alternatively, we could go with option 3, where we do something on fucking purpose for a change, and stop allowing the top 0.05% of the world's population to hoard enough resources and wealth to raise the standard of living for all 7.3 billion of us to an average of somewhere between Brazil and China.
It occurs to me that a significant change in population expansion would be created just by the new "pope" saying that Condoms were OK and Aids is bad.
So, we're doomed.
With the quality of life front, it seems to me that the first major problem would be defining an acceptable level for humanity. The wall street banker would probably not be happy with the same standard of living as the vast population of the world. I doubt this would be a peaceful change.
In an odd way, perhaps a massive humanitarian crisis could encourage people to not be such scum. I have a feeling that something horrific on an colossal scale really needs to happen before anything really changes.
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 04:42:16 PM
One of the things that I think about often is the future of humanity; despite the mounting evidence that we are, through overpopulation, climate change, and resource depletion, making the planet inhospitable to ourselves, there are those who argue that the Earth can sustain 20 billion human beings, and that as-yet-undeveloped technology will take care of our emerging problems. Many of these same people argue that we will take to the stars, and the population crisis will be taken care of through expanding to other frontiers.
Thing is, we don't have a functional star drive of any kind. Extra-planetary habitats are a net drain. The Earth we have now is all we know for sure we'll have, so let's not fuck it up, shall we?
Also, 7.3 Bn people is too many for most people to have anything resembling a life. 20 Bn - even if possible - would be an abomination.
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 05:35:44 PM
I've never bought the idea of alleviating overpopulation through planetary colonization. It would require moving enough people fast enough to offset population growth, which would in turn require a truly obnoxious amount of energy and resources. Even if we could do that, we'd just fill up the extra space again.
This is an aspect that I supposed never really occurred to me, and I feel silly for not considering it.
Interstellar exodus wouldn't solve Earth's problems; they'd just over-breed,
again.
Intercontinental colonization backs the idea up certainly.
Humans are no different than any other mammal, or animal for that matter. We have a hard-wired imperative to breed, procreate, and maintain our broods' lineages. The only thing that will stop that is the end of the species itself. There is no feasible way to reduce the Earth's population through man-contrived methods, not without infringing upon the individual freedoms that are held to such high esteem.
Heh we come in peace. Wed also like to purchase your planet for some beads and these here blankets.
planetary colonization doesn't solve the terrestrial overpopulation problem directly, but it does allow for us to move some eggs to another basket. and if we crap out on earth without rendering it totally uninhabitable to humans (which would be impressive given that we colonized some unholy place like mars or the moon) then we could come back and reinhabit it.
so, while it doesn't solve the problem of limited space in our petri dish, it does make it a bit more robust.
of course, that assumes the reason a population is wiped out isn't due to interplanetary MAD warfare... :/
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 06:07:39 PM
Alternatively, we could go with option 3, where we do something on fucking purpose for a change, and stop allowing the top 0.05% of the world's population to hoard enough resources and wealth to raise the standard of living for all 7.3 billion of us to an average of somewhere between Brazil and China.
Based on my (admittedly limited and almost entirely speculative) understanding of things, the bolded may in fact be the only hope we have of preventing all of the dystopian sci-fi futures from becoming real all at once.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 06:07:39 PM
Alternatively, we could go with option 3, where we do something on fucking purpose for a change, and stop allowing the top 0.05% of the world's population to hoard enough resources and wealth to raise the standard of living for all 7.3 billion of us to an average of somewhere between Brazil and China.
Been thinking about this a lot. Still no idea how it'd work, tho. I'm pretty certain the greedy parasitic fucks who have all the shit are not going to give it up willingly. Legislating it off them is bullshit since they own all the legislators hell, most of the fucking laws we have are there to protect their interests.
So it comes down to taking it by force or stealing it and redistributing it a'la Robin Hood or (more likely to me) a mixture of both. Can this be done by hacking? I don't know enough about how this economy-farce works. Is there actual physical stuff, lying somewhere that you'd need to get your hands on or are all those billions of imaginary gobshite just ones and zeros floating about in cyberspace?
Do people need to be killed, like in a traditional revolutionary uprising or can it be done peacefully? What would happen if you could, somehow delete all the debt in the world, mortgages, loans, third world slavery-enablers?
What lines were you thinking along?
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 07:20:04 PM
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 06:07:39 PM
Alternatively, we could go with option 3, where we do something on fucking purpose for a change, and stop allowing the top 0.05% of the world's population to hoard enough resources and wealth to raise the standard of living for all 7.3 billion of us to an average of somewhere between Brazil and China.
Been thinking about this a lot. Still no idea how it'd work, tho. I'm pretty certain the greedy parasitic fucks who have all the shit are not going to give it up willingly. Legislating it off them is bullshit since they own all the legislators hell, most of the fucking laws we have are there to protect their interests.
So it comes down to taking it by force or stealing it and redistributing it a'la Robin Hood or (more likely to me) a mixture of both. Can this be done by hacking? I don't know enough about how this economy-farce works. Is there actual physical stuff, lying somewhere that you'd need to get your hands on or are all those billions of imaginary gobshite just ones and zeros floating about in cyberspace?
Do people need to be killed, like in a traditional revolutionary uprising or can it be done peacefully? What would happen if you could, somehow delete all the debt in the world, mortgages, loans, third world slavery-enablers?
What lines were you thinking along?
Well, what might get us from here to there is probably a drawn out thread unto itself. I just don't want to look at all of human history and the things we've managed to accomplish so far and be so absolutely pessimistic about the future. Rough times? Sure. Utopia? That sure as shit isn't going to happen. But complete species annihilation because of nothing but some genetic inability to exercise the right of self-determination? I can't really see that as a "most likely" scenario.
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
If you equalized wealth, you wouldn't have to organize investment in less developed areas. People there would invest their own wealth. Albeit, only after a bunch of killing each other to un-equalize wealth.
Also, the means to equalize production and infrastructure is already being developed with portable large-scale 3D printers and automated fabrication machines.
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 05:55:12 PM
Here's the dilemma
Any restriction on population growth is an horrific infringement on the personal liberty of everyone to shit out enough screaming brats to wipe out all life on earth.
The choice is between mass sterilization (a fascist overfiend ripping the band aid off) or nature taking care of it for us (the way that makes option 1 look like an episode of the care bears)
The irony is, our complete resistance to the horrors of option one will lead us to option 2 as a default. :lulz:
That's not the dilemma at all.
There is no need to try to restrict population growth; it restricts itself naturally when one condition is changed. That's what the OP is about.
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
That's what I'm thinking. As a doomsday scenario it's potentially a comic masterpiece. I wonder what it'd work out to? Anyone got any ideas what that could be? Global GDP 2012 was UDS 69,110 Trillion, approx population ?
I'm not good with Zero's.
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 08:14:52 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 05:55:12 PM
Here's the dilemma
Any restriction on population growth is an horrific infringement on the personal liberty of everyone to shit out enough screaming brats to wipe out all life on earth.
The choice is between mass sterilization (a fascist overfiend ripping the band aid off) or nature taking care of it for us (the way that makes option 1 look like an episode of the care bears)
The irony is, our complete resistance to the horrors of option one will lead us to option 2 as a default. :lulz:
That's not the dilemma at all.
There is no need to try to restrict population growth; it restricts itself naturally when one condition is changed. That's what the OP is about.
Truth, and thanks for steering back on course...
I don't think universal high living standards is impossible, but if it is achieved then population growth will decline. If population grown declines, there won't be enough humans to adequately populate other planets, unless you knock the colonists' standards of living down and defeat the whole proposition of universal high living standards.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 08:13:15 PM
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
If you equalized wealth, you wouldn't have to organize investment in less developed areas. People there would invest their own wealth. Albeit, only after a bunch of killing each other to un-equalize wealth.
Also, the means to equalize production and infrastructure is already being developed with portable large-scale 3D printers and automated fabrication machines.
That sounds like it would create a huge number of warlords that can create whatever they want on demand and destabilise a lot of shit.
I have no idea whether to endorse this. I kind of want to.
The main barrier to a high universal living standard is, and I feel obligated to point this out, obscenely rich fucks who like the power that comes from a large wealth gap.
It's easier and cheaper to extract wealth from a population than it is to create wealth via production. It has the added benefit of creating a zero-sum political and financial relationship between the extractors of wealth and everyone else. It's win-win for them.
I'm sure Nigel is aware of this, but I wanted to point it out for the benefit of everyone else.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 08:19:33 PM
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 08:14:52 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 05:55:12 PM
Here's the dilemma
Any restriction on population growth is an horrific infringement on the personal liberty of everyone to shit out enough screaming brats to wipe out all life on earth.
The choice is between mass sterilization (a fascist overfiend ripping the band aid off) or nature taking care of it for us (the way that makes option 1 look like an episode of the care bears)
The irony is, our complete resistance to the horrors of option one will lead us to option 2 as a default. :lulz:
That's not the dilemma at all.
There is no need to try to restrict population growth; it restricts itself naturally when one condition is changed. That's what the OP is about.
Truth, and thanks for steering back on course...
I don't think universal high living standards is impossible, but if it is achieved then population growth will decline. If population grown declines, there won't be enough humans to adequately populate other planets, unless you knock the colonists' standards of living down and defeat the whole proposition of universal high living standards.
I've always seen the other planets thing as an emergency measure to buffer overpopulation. if you've sorted overpopulation whay would you need to go to other planets? If you didn't need to then it'd be a case of the odd fanatic doing it for shits and giggles.
Quote from: Cain on February 14, 2013, 08:24:00 PM
The main barrier to a high universal living standard is, and I feel obligated to point this out, obscenely rich fucks who like the power that comes from a large wealth gap.
It's easier and cheaper to extract wealth from a population than it is to create wealth via production. It has the added benefit of creating a zero-sum political and financial relationship between the extractors of wealth and everyone else. It's win-win for them.
I'm sure Nigel is aware of this, but I wanted to point it out for the benefit of everyone else.
I was going on the assumption that this was pretty much the only real barrier. dunno about everyone else
I get the feeling that a few people posting ITT just sort of pre-assumed what the OP was about and then skimmed it, rather than actually reading it.
But yes, those of you talking about resource redistribution (such as minimum and maximum wage, socialized healthcare, guaranteed shelter, and education accessibility) are on the right track; it would be a crucial move toward establishing a minimum standard of living that would lead to population decrease and eventual stabilization.
When I say that we can't have BOTH population expansion AND a high standard of living, what I mean, what I spelled out in the OP... please read this carefully and don't assume I'm saying something I'm not... is that when you give people a high, modern standard of living with opportunities and choices, they stop having very many children.
People with a high standard of living, and opportunities and choices, typically don't need or want very many children. Some do. But not enough do to tip the balance.
So, you can pick one: expansion, or a global high standard of living. You cannot have both.
Quote from: Cain on February 14, 2013, 08:24:00 PM
The main barrier to a high universal living standard is, and I feel obligated to point this out, obscenely rich fucks who like the power that comes from a large wealth gap.
It's easier and cheaper to extract wealth from a population than it is to create wealth via production. It has the added benefit of creating a zero-sum political and financial relationship between the extractors of wealth and everyone else. It's win-win for them.
I'm sure Nigel is aware of this, but I wanted to point it out for the benefit of everyone else.
Yes, exactly... and it's one of the reasons they put so much money and effort into keeping us at each other's throats, so that it doesn't occur to us to go for theirs.
I might be having problems due to sleep deprivation so ill come back to this when im fresher
More on topic, Nigel/Cain what would you think is a possible achievable worldwide living standard? Education and basic literacy is key so I would guess that would be the main area to funnel resources to in the short/medium future.
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
It would be horrifically disruptive, and is also not necessary.
This might sound like a shitty thing to say, but unless our species changes radically, society will always need reward inequality in order to function. We are fundamentally hierarchical animals, and without an established hierarchy, things fall apart and there's sheer ugliness until someone comes out on top. It's just what we do.
The idea is not so much to eliminate stress from the animals on the bottom and eliminate reward from the animals on the top, but to relieve stress from the animals on the bottom, and to alleviate hoarding by the animals on the top.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 08:19:33 PM
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 08:14:52 PM
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 05:55:12 PM
Here's the dilemma
Any restriction on population growth is an horrific infringement on the personal liberty of everyone to shit out enough screaming brats to wipe out all life on earth.
The choice is between mass sterilization (a fascist overfiend ripping the band aid off) or nature taking care of it for us (the way that makes option 1 look like an episode of the care bears)
The irony is, our complete resistance to the horrors of option one will lead us to option 2 as a default. :lulz:
That's not the dilemma at all.
There is no need to try to restrict population growth; it restricts itself naturally when one condition is changed. That's what the OP is about.
Truth, and thanks for steering back on course...
I don't think universal high living standards is impossible, but if it is achieved then population growth will decline. If population grown declines, there won't be enough humans to adequately populate other planets, unless you knock the colonists' standards of living down and defeat the whole proposition of universal high living standards.
Yeah, exactly. Likewise, propositions that the planet can support 20 billion people inherently accept that humanity will have a collectively shitty standard of living for as long as it takes for us to reach 20 billion, because if the standard of living was high, we'd never get there.
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 08:37:09 PM
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
It would be horrifically disruptive, and is also not necessary.
This might sound like a shitty thing to say, but unless our species changes radically, society will always need reward inequality in order to function. We are fundamentally hierarchical animals, and without an established hierarchy, things fall apart and there's sheer ugliness until someone comes out on top. It's just what we do.
The idea is not so much to eliminate stress from the animals on the bottom and eliminate reward from the animals on the top, but to relieve stress from the animals on the bottom, and to alleviate hoarding by the animals on the top.
THIS!
Something seems to happen to the upwardly mobile ones as they accumulate power. They get addicted to it and this brings corruption and greed and most of the other deadly sins. Is it conceivable that this could ever change? The big guys are just are neurotic as the little guys. How the fuck does one even begin to imagine fixing this?
A cull and re-distribution of wealth of the top 0.05% say every 25 years?
Get super wealthy, enjoy the good life and get snuffed, OR work to raise everyone's quality of life for about the same as the guy next to you?
Quote from: Queef Erisson on February 14, 2013, 06:53:35 PM
Heh we come in peace. Wed also like to purchase your planet for some beads and these here blankets.
It's our MANIFEST DESTINY. :x
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:35:22 PM
More on topic, Nigel/Cain what would you think is a possible achievable worldwide living standard? Education and basic literacy is key so I would guess that would be the main area to funnel resources to in the short/medium future.
Access to adequate nutritious food, secure shelter with enough room for everyone to have comfortable sleeping space no more than 2 to a bedroom, clean running water, at least one sanitary bathroom in each household, refrigerators, telephones, internet access, access to medical care that is within a decade of state-of-the-art and includes birth control, access to transportation, access to education through the highest levels, the opportunity to improve upon basic necessities through work, and adequate leisure time to ensure socialization and family nurturing for reduced stress levels.
Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on February 14, 2013, 08:42:40 PM
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 08:37:09 PM
Quote from: Cainad on February 14, 2013, 08:09:11 PM
Quote from: Junkenstein on February 14, 2013, 08:06:33 PM
Say wealth distribution occurs tomorrow and we all have exactly the same cash, the problem remains that infrastructure in some areas in vastly superior to others. Displacing huge numbers of people is unlikely, as is the huge collective investment in the poorer regions to create comparable standards.
Nothing helpful, I've just never really thought the idea of a wealth distribution via hacking idea through. I'd guess it would end badly but I'm unsure why.
Straight-up equalizing everyone's wealth would probably cause a level of hilarious fuckery too great for mere mortals to comprehend.
It would be horrifically disruptive, and is also not necessary.
This might sound like a shitty thing to say, but unless our species changes radically, society will always need reward inequality in order to function. We are fundamentally hierarchical animals, and without an established hierarchy, things fall apart and there's sheer ugliness until someone comes out on top. It's just what we do.
The idea is not so much to eliminate stress from the animals on the bottom and eliminate reward from the animals on the top, but to relieve stress from the animals on the bottom, and to alleviate hoarding by the animals on the top.
THIS!
Something seems to happen to the upwardly mobile ones as they accumulate power. They get addicted to it and this brings corruption and greed and most of the other deadly sins. Is it conceivable that this could ever change? The big guys are just are neurotic as the little guys. How the fuck does one even begin to imagine fixing this?
Well, once again I'm thinking about Sapolky's babboons.
What we have right now is a society that places the highest status emphasis on the hoarding of wealth. This is the culture that we have developed. We know from history that this is not an inherent human state... some cultures have placed the highest status emphasis on giving away wealth. People who hoarded their wealth had lower power-status than those who gave it away. It seems to me, then, that it would be possible for us to make a social shift toward one where individuals gain power and status by having many well-paid employees, by showing that the regions in which they operate have high standards of living, or by paying a large amount of taxes, for example, rather than by having a high profit margin.
What I don't know is what would need to happen for that kind of cultural shift to take place.
There are a million good ideas for how to equalize living standards to a point where population growth is no longer explosive and dangerous to the species. The problem is that equal living standards violate the most powerful individuals' ideas of self-preservation. And, since they're the most powerful, those ideas never get implemented and population growth continues to expand. It almost lends credence to the conspiracy theories of the New World Order and violent population control. After all, if the powerful want to remain powerful, they have to find a balance between being offensively wealthy and avoiding a complete overpopulation crisis. One assumes that they have access to fairly decent science, and they realize that one way to avoid overpopulation is to quit letting so many people languish in poverty. On the other hand, there's no evidence that they're interested in trimming the wealth gap at all, or even in allowing it to persist at current levels. Killing off millions of people on a constant basis is probably the only mechanism available to them that doesn't require them to share their wealth and power with the unwashed masses.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7PZVYG57UQ
Capitalism will always exist as long as someone doesn't want to work, or just doesn't want to create something.
This guy is spot on Utopias being worthless, just leaving the best technology available for the next generation versus forcing the future children into a useless outdated box. I agree with him certain things should never be for profit: Medicine,Education, Food (crops),water.
Quote from: /b/earman on February 14, 2013, 09:48:58 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7PZVYG57UQ
Capitalism will always exist as long as someone doesn't want to work, or just doesn't want to create something.
This guy is spot on Utopias being worthless, just leaving the best technology available for the next generation versus forcing the future children into a useless outdated box. I agree with him certain things should never be for profit: Medicine,Education, Food (crops),water.
Dunno. I can see medicine and education being a tax-driven thing, but it's gonna be hard to get farmers and farm corporations to produce for no profit.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 14, 2013, 09:50:38 PM
Quote from: /b/earman on February 14, 2013, 09:48:58 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7PZVYG57UQ
Capitalism will always exist as long as someone doesn't want to work, or just doesn't want to create something.
This guy is spot on Utopias being worthless, just leaving the best technology available for the next generation versus forcing the future children into a useless outdated box. I agree with him certain things should never be for profit: Medicine,Education, Food (crops),water.
Dunno. I can see medicine and education being a tax-driven thing, but it's gonna be hard to get farmers and farm corporations to produce for no profit.
There are a couple ways to approach this. One is the way we already approach it, which is farm subsidies. The other way is the "State Farm", on which farmers are government employees producing food. I am not a huge fan of either approach, to be honest, although I think a mix of State and competing privately-owned farms would probably work. I think a standard-of-living stipend and food vouchers would work well.
We won't make any serious progress until there's a hell of a lot more automation. If there was equal pay and equal access to education, and everyone had an equal shot at escaping the lower classes, do you think we'd still have a million people breaking their backs 12 or 16 hours a day in manual labor, when they could more easily hitch a ride through free education and get a white collar job? A lot of people might choose to still work in construction or farming or maintenance out of a genuine love of the craft, but just as higher living standards tend to discourage population growth, they tend to discourage manual labor. It's a sad reality that many of the snags that keep people at the bottom end of the economic scale can't disappear, or we'd lose too much of the manual work force. Automation, robotics, and other future technologies might fix that (while also making it okay that our population growth is declining), but again that's all unknown at this point.
I don't know if I agree with that. I'll think about it for a while, but what I'm thinking about is that even in places where education is free, there are always people who would rather take those lower-end jobs, provided they pay enough to live on. There are people who like manual labor, or who are simply not cut out for school, or who don't feel passionate about it, or who would rather have the short-term reward of a paycheck now than go to school for years for a better paycheck later.
I think that if you make the lower classes livable, there will always be people willing to live in them. The problem is, the upper classes have no incentive to make the lower classes livable, so they spend all their time discouraging the lower classes from demanding higher wages or wealth redistribution.
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 10:21:34 PM
I don't know if I agree with that. I'll think about it for a while, but what I'm thinking about is that even in places where education is free, there are always people who would rather take those lower-end jobs, provided they pay enough to live on. There are people who like manual labor, or who are simply not cut out for school, or who don't feel passionate about it, or who would rather have the short-term reward of a paycheck now than go to school for years for a better paycheck later.
I think that if you make the lower classes livable, there will always be people willing to live in them. The problem is, the upper classes have no incentive to make the lower classes livable, so they spend all their time discouraging the lower classes from demanding higher wages or wealth redistribution.
Good points. There probably will always be people who choose the lower classes, especially if it's an honest choice (unlike what we have now), we can manage to eliminate the stigma of lower classes, and somehow make the lower classes' primary concern convenience instead of survival.
But most of the world's lower classes exist in undeveloped nations where demanding higher wages and wealth redistribution isn't even an option. They're even worse off than the poorest people in America. Not only do they struggle with the same decisions we do about risking what little they have to gain a little more, but they also lack the luxury of being the most important consumer base of the people profiting from their poverty. For an economy like Rwanda, for example, where there just isn't much wealth to redistribute in the first place, how would you make lower classes livable there? Obviously by redistributing wealth from developed nations - populated by people who would be risking their own sustainable living standards if they shared. Certainly the wealthy, who already begrudge the people of Europe and America for taking too much, aren't going to allow the rest of the world to get that close to them.
Quote from: V3X on February 14, 2013, 10:44:35 PM
Quote from: M. Nigel Salt on February 14, 2013, 10:21:34 PM
I don't know if I agree with that. I'll think about it for a while, but what I'm thinking about is that even in places where education is free, there are always people who would rather take those lower-end jobs, provided they pay enough to live on. There are people who like manual labor, or who are simply not cut out for school, or who don't feel passionate about it, or who would rather have the short-term reward of a paycheck now than go to school for years for a better paycheck later.
I think that if you make the lower classes livable, there will always be people willing to live in them. The problem is, the upper classes have no incentive to make the lower classes livable, so they spend all their time discouraging the lower classes from demanding higher wages or wealth redistribution.
Good points. There probably will always be people who choose the lower classes, especially if it's an honest choice (unlike what we have now), we can manage to eliminate the stigma of lower classes, and somehow make the lower classes' primary concern convenience instead of survival.
But most of the world's lower classes exist in undeveloped nations where demanding higher wages and wealth redistribution isn't even an option. They're even worse off than the poorest people in America. Not only do they struggle with the same decisions we do about risking what little they have to gain a little more, but they also lack the luxury of being the most important consumer base of the people profiting from their poverty. For an economy like Rwanda, for example, where there just isn't much wealth to redistribute in the first place, how would you make lower classes livable there? Obviously by redistributing wealth from developed nations - populated by people who would be risking their own sustainable living standards if they shared. Certainly the wealthy, who already begrudge the people of Europe and America for taking too much, aren't going to allow the rest of the world to get that close to them.
No, they won't do it voluntarily, that's true. They would have to do it under pressure from governments under the control of an informed populace, which is also unlikely.
Meaning that the most likely outcome of the path we're currently on is environmental and economic collapse.
Profit as in not letting people die. I have no problem using currency to buy worthless rubber dog shit. The point is to invest into automation. If a machine can do your job let them machine do it. Creative and technician jobs will always be in demand. I have no problem there being a working class. Maybe I'm just thrilled to see someone as old as this guy still passionate about technology.
Speaking as someone who's wicked smart and in a job that uses brainpower, I'd much rather be doing something hard and physical if I could make the same bread doing it. My body is for working and improves the harder I push it. I'd much rather be using my brain for daydreaming than thinking about boring shit :argh!:
I work in a job that uses a lot of automation. Every time we add automation, we have to add jobs to keep up with the increased production...AND to maintain the automation.
Just saying.
Theoretically, at some point there should be enough production.
If you avoid the destruction of productivity as mentioned in 1984.