Quote:
Originally Posted by peter12
The economics of such a transfer are not insignificant, nor is the process inevitable. Instead of blindly believing in progress, one has to understand why things were the way they were, and give a good case for change.
People are so flip when they describe the massive changes of the past. The move from an agrarian rural economy to an urban industrial economy was arguably the most shocking thing that has ever happened to humanity. Ever. It still isn't over.
It amazes me that people are lackadaisical when it comes to the information age. Oh yeah, robots will take over. It will be great. No problems there. You would literally be supplanting yourself as the dominant species on the planet. Not to mention the problems that come with wealth transfer, and the subsequent socio-economic collapse that would come from basically disinheriting 99% of the world's population from ever being to contribute meaningfully to their own destiny ever again.
So yeah, it is a little more than "it sounds hard."
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I don't disagree with you at all. But that stuff is happening, and we need to take a measure of control over it. There's a big difference I think with something like urbanization vs a mass global-scale transportation system, or free energy generation, or environmental stabilization in that urbanization just happened, almost as an evolution over hundreds of years as our technology began to change the way we had to interact and work. The changes you talk about/fear also came about at this time. Joe Blow textile maker couldn't make a living selling his own stuff anymore, he had to go work for Levi's. Shoemakers couldn't just make a sell shoes to their community anymore, they had to work for Nike. The difference between something like this and the urbanization is we have to collectively make a choice whether or not do these things. Whether or not to say gufaw to how much it "costs" in dollars and worry about what it costs in real resources.
No doubt there will be changes. There already are. Fast food workers and clerks replaced by kiosks. Gas station attendants. Car washes. We are going to have find uses for ourselves beyond these things. I personally think that's a good thing, but I also understand the economic pitfalls of it, and that it will have to result in a complete overhaul of the way we create and trade goods, absolutely. That part of it, I look forward too. I hate hearing about how expensive something is makes it prohibitive, even if it's something we truly need. What should the monetary cost (something completely artificial that we made up) matter when compared to real cost of lives or habitat lost? If we continue to only care how much things cost in terms of dollars vs doing what we need to do, we can expect inefficiencies everywhere. If we want to (best, not saying we can completely) avoid the dangers of these transitions, we have to have some semblance of control over it outside of what the market wants. What the market wants and what humans need are too often very different things.