Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’ • Hacker News Board

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#121

Post by fwip » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:33 PM UTC

Spooky23 wrote: post #86

discoball wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google was enabling the DoD to be more efficient at killing people and China to be more oppressive until its workers protested. So he's right about humanity having to solve its problems but he's forgetting that Google, the corporation, is opting to make it harder for humanity to solve its problems by enabling those who do not have humanity's best interest in their heart.

That's reductive argument. Who decides who is worthy enough to hold "humanity's best interests" at heart? That's a subjective judgement that depends on who, where and when you are. Kipling's vision of "humanity" and its interest is very different that Mao's, which is in turn very different from yours. Technology makes things more efficient, but doesn't change the act. Getting your head bashed in by a caveman, cut off…

The company making bombs is the same as the company making software to deliver those bombs via drone.

Both are working in service of making it easier for the government to kill people.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#122

Post by andrepd » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:34 PM UTC

dumbfoundded wrote: post #101

patrickaljord wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Our society has been set up so that orders of magnitude of more money is spent on advertising technology than clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production. Technology is not the problem. The problem is that in order to invest in "clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production" you need a huge amount of capital. A good way to build capital is to invest into technologie…

That's not true at all. Your thinking is dangerously wrong. If you feel that these companies like Google are in it to make humanity better, you really need a better understanding of people. Google, Exon Mobile, Phillip Morris, and every other public company work in virtually the same way. They maximize profit. If you work at one of these companies and you don't help the company make more money, see how long you keep…

An extremely lucid and concise comment. You are spot on, especially when it comes to how corporations have pushed to erode and corrupt the allegedly "democratic" government institutions.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#123

Post by PhasmaFelis » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:34 PM UTC

darawk wrote: post #67

ameister14 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Would you consider drones and smart bombs bad when the alternative is carpet bombing? That's not the alternative, though. Drones are used in hundreds of situations where without them, the US simply wouldn't have taken action.

And it's your belief that not taking action would be better?

I mean, yeah? I know there have been cases where drone strikes were justified, but it really only takes one instance of "We think there's some terrorists at this wedding, so let's fire a fragmentation missile into the middle of it, and then another one a few minutes later to make sure we kill the paramedics and firemen too" to decide that the US military is not responsible enough to be allowed to make these decisions.

Edit: Actually I'll go further than that. You lose all moral authority to wage war the moment you start deliberately targeting civilian medics, and that's standard policy with US drone strikes. See "double-tap."

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#124

Post by SquishyPanda23 » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:34 PM UTC

yourbandsucks wrote: post #29

SquishyPanda23 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Part of me can't help but read this a little cynically. They're starting to articulate a shift away from Larry Page's idealistic view of making information universally accessible and useful and toward tempering expectations about what technology can do. After that they'll pivot increasingly toward a position that lets them justify the drone and censorship programs without the baggage of Page's original naivety. Again…

I see it differently. Achieving broad, idealistic goals requires careful and strategic thinking and that's what he's expressing here. I'd argue you're being overly naive rather than overly cynical -- real-world trade offs have downsides, and require deliberation. They're not solvable with sloganeering or absolute purity.

I'm not sure. He's specifically saying technology can't achieve idealistic goals, even with careful and strategic thinking.

It requires "humanity" to achieve those goals. So if idealistic goals aren't achieved, it's not because Google did the wrong thing, it's because Google's users didn't do the right thing.

So it's a diversion of responsibility away from Google, which frees them to take a less vision-directed and more financially-directed approach.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#125

Post by transpy » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:34 PM UTC

viach wrote: post #5

Well, but at least technology makes these problems less annoying.

Specially when your bedroom light fail because of bad wifi or when your roomba's AI doesn't recognize your cute dog's poop.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#126

Post by fwip » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:35 PM UTC

dumbfoundded wrote: post #40

Technology absolutely solves humanity's problems. There's pretty much no problem that given a large thoughtful effort, technology has not solved. The problem is that humanity is bad at choosing where to invest in technology. Our society has been set up so that orders of magnitude of more money is spent on advertising technology than clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production. Technology is…

You've entirely missed the point of the quote, and in fact, you're agreeing with him.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#127

Post by marricks » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:36 PM UTC

ucaetano wrote: post #47

discoball wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Google was enabling the DoD to be more efficient at killing people and China to be more oppressive until its workers protested. So he's right about humanity having to solve its problems but he's forgetting that Google, the corporation, is opting to make it harder for humanity to solve its problems by enabling those who do not have humanity's best interest in their heart.

> Google was enabling the DoD to be more efficient at killing people The world is complicated, and things are never as simple as that. Would you consider drones and smart bombs bad when the alternative is carpet bombing? It is always too easy to ignore the world as it is and focus on a utopian case. War will happen, with whatever tools are available.

That is such a false dichotomy.

Consider arming police officers with tasers. We were promised it would be an alternative to guns and help protect civilians but instead police officers use tasers a ton and still shoot people a ton as well.[1]

There’s always the excuse new smarter technologies will save lives but it ends up the “safer” they are the lower the threshold to use.

1. Da_chicken’s reply below has a good source!

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#128

Post by tomatotomato37 » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:36 PM UTC

craftyguy wrote: post #74

dumbfoundded wrote: post #40

Technology absolutely solves humanity's problems. There's pretty much no problem that given a large thoughtful effort, technology has not solved. The problem is that humanity is bad at choosing where to invest in technology. Our society has been set up so that orders of magnitude of more money is spent on advertising technology than clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production. Technology is…

> There's pretty much no problem that given a large thoughtful effort, technology has not solved. Technology has failed over and over to provide an accountable, verifiable, and secure election process.

Technology != Computers

Mass producable pens and paper, decent locks, and nationwide logistic networks have made elections accountable, verifiable, and secure decades ago.

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#129

Post by abledon » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

davebryand wrote: post #52

He's right. Humanity's problems are solved by humans solving themselves. Each one of us is a puzzle that gets solved in the same way--doing the inner work to quiet our mind and open our hearts. When enough of us are solved, humanity's problems will automatically solve themselves. Sundar seems to have done the inner work and understands this Truth. His "Cockroach Theory" is enlightening: I realized that, it is not the…

This! So much. Was skimming comments for someone to get to the Deeper issue

Re: Sundar Pichai: ‘Technology Doesn’t Solve Humanity’s Problems’

#130

Post by dumbfoundded » Thu, Nov 08, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

andrepd wrote: post #116

dumbfoundded wrote: post #40

Technology absolutely solves humanity's problems. There's pretty much no problem that given a large thoughtful effort, technology has not solved. The problem is that humanity is bad at choosing where to invest in technology. Our society has been set up so that orders of magnitude of more money is spent on advertising technology than clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production. Technology is…

>Our society has been set up so that orders of magnitude of more money is spent on advertising technology than clean energy, sanitation, sustainability, and ethical food production. >It's part of the same system to maximize short-term profit and the whimsical wants of billionaires. Maybe we should organise our production, decision-making, control and incentives structures differently then, rather than sticking to an…

Theoretically yes, but I think it's difficult to achieve in practice. We probably don't need massive systemic changes. These are the changes I think would massively improve the US:

1. Campaign finance reform. Money != free speech. Citizens United is a disaster.

2. Ranked voting in federal elections. A two-party system isn't that great.

3. Get rid of the Electoral college & make Gerrymandering illegal.

4. Shut the revolving door. I'm not sure about the best way to solve it so this is one proposal. Make appointed government officials sign a non-compete for the industry they work in. You shouldn't be able to go from Verizon Exec to FCC Chairman to Verizon Exec.

5. Increase regulation for large companies. Reduce it for small companies. Facebook/Google should have similar regulatory standards compared traditional media companies.