Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan • Hacker News Board

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#31

Post by K0SM0S » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 4:47 PM UTC

yters wrote: post #22

Why the space colonization focus of techies? So much of earth vastly underpopulated and much easier to colonize. What if an asteroid strikes earth? What if the space colonies all fail?

The best advocate of that I could find is Isaac Arthur on YouTube[1]. He explains it so well, including why a technology-advanced civilization (not much more than us) would see an asteroid coming straight to earth as a great economic opportunity to mine lots of stuff. Nowhere near a problem.

[1]: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZFipeZtQM5CKUjx6grh54g

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#32

Post by cerealbad » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 4:53 PM UTC

Allegedly Rent seeking billionaires are hypothetically positioning themselves in the supposed space race because the theoretical American -Chinese cold war will be potentially fought in low earth orbit, "smart money gets in quick to suckle at the trillion dollar defense budget." some people might say. Edit: opinion duly corrected in line with moderation standards

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#33

Post by ArchLinuxBtw » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:06 PM UTC

> Bill Gates created a program that was considered a prerequisite for turning on a computer.

Stopped reading right there! I turn on my Arch Linux computer without any help from Bill Gates Micro$oft WinBlows, thankyouverymuch

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#34

Post by m0zg » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:10 PM UTC

pmoriarty wrote: post #24

morningseagulls wrote: post #2

I like this detour into economics: > Bezos’s enterprise upends long-held precepts about the fundamental nature of capitalism—especially an idea enshrined by the great Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek[, who] argued that no bureaucracy could ever match the miracle of markets, which spontaneously and efficiently aggregate the knowledge of a society. > Amazon, however, has acquired the God’s-eye view of the economy tha…

Alienation is a critical and central part of Marxist critique. To miss it is to misunderstand Marxism. Marxists could not call it a day after nationalizing Amazon because the people who make the goods that Amazon sells would still be alienated from the goods they produce, and Amazon's workers would still be alienated from the products of their own labor.

[flagged]

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#35

Post by dang » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:11 PM UTC

cerealbad wrote: post #32

Allegedly Rent seeking billionaires are hypothetically positioning themselves in the supposed space race because the theoretical American -Chinese cold war will be potentially fought in low earth orbit, "smart money gets in quick to suckle at the trillion dollar defense budget." some people might say. Edit: opinion duly corrected in line with moderation standards

Please don't post in the flamewar style to HN, regardless of how provocative or annoying such things are. You may not owe rent-seeking billionaires better, but you owe this community better if you're participating here.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#36

Post by dredmorbius » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:16 PM UTC

roenxi wrote: post #6

morningseagulls wrote: post #2

I like this detour into economics: > Bezos’s enterprise upends long-held precepts about the fundamental nature of capitalism—especially an idea enshrined by the great Austrian economist Friedrich Hayek[, who] argued that no bureaucracy could ever match the miracle of markets, which spontaneously and efficiently aggregate the knowledge of a society. > Amazon, however, has acquired the God’s-eye view of the economy tha…

Maybe this is what you were drawing attention to, but that part of the article misinterprets centralised planning. What it describes is the logistics of getting something from one place to another. Centralised planning is when a government planner decides the source, the destination and the good without giving final power to a consumer. Amazon doesn't have the final word on what people buy (or the destination of good…

Regardless, Amazon picks the suppliers, owns the information channel, and both informs and transacts with the consumer. It operates on a greater scale than many national economies, falling at about 38th on a current listing based on 2018 revenues. Amazon is the market.

Hayek's basic premise was that national-scale central management was impossible. Amazon and other megacorps put paid to this.

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#37

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:16 PM UTC

sverige wrote: post #3

Interesting article. I thought Bezos was just another greedy, power-mad megalomaniac. That he's also a dewy-eyed Trekkie who rationalizes his greed with dreams of space colonization makes it even sillier. Who knew Gene Roddenberry was more dangerous than any economic theorist?

[deleted]

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#38

Post by dredmorbius » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:20 PM UTC

yters wrote: post #22

Why the space colonization focus of techies? So much of earth vastly underpopulated and much easier to colonize. What if an asteroid strikes earth? What if the space colonies all fail?

It's an appealing fantasy which enables denial of limits to economic and technological growth.

It's an appealing fantasy to which I was very strongly drawn in my youth, through O'Neill torii, T.A. Heppenheimer, von Braun, Clark, Asimov, and Heinlein.

I believe I've matured slightly.

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#39

Post by dpau » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:24 PM UTC

andreilys wrote: post #26

sunasra wrote: post #12

Move to space to save the earth is useless statement. Human isn’t able save natural resources on earth, how come he can build enough resources to survive human being in space or mars or whatever. I would say Focus on earth, invest on the broken things

Think of it as a hedge against possible extinction. Being a multi-planterary species means that an existential threat on earth (I.e. asteroid, super bug, etc.) doesn’t wipe out all of humanity.

Agreed. But it's a bit like your house has caught fire and, rather than try to put it out, you call a realtor and go shopping for a new home. Why not try to save your current home, first?

Re: Jeff Bezos’s Master Plan

#40

Post by pmoriarty » Sun, Oct 20, 2019, 5:33 PM UTC

m0zg wrote: post #34

pmoriarty wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alienation is a critical and central part of Marxist critique. To miss it is to misunderstand Marxism. Marxists could not call it a day after nationalizing Amazon because the people who make the goods that Amazon sells would still be alienated from the goods they produce, and Amazon's workers would still be alienated from the products of their own labor.

[flagged]

How does mass murder help to reduce alienation again?

Also, it's widely disputed that the USSR was actually a Marxist society. I've heard it described as "State Capitalism".

Regardless, it's pretty clear that the mass murder in places like the USSR, China, and Cambodia was due to small groups of people getting massive amounts of power, abusing that power, and being completely insensitive to the suffering they cause, and not as a consequence of their economic systems.

Bloodthirsty despots come in all stripes and are happy to wear any mask as long as it helps them to gain and maintain power. A prime example is Hitler paying lip service to socialism while undermining worker's rights in favor of corporations, murdering socialists, using slave labor, and most of all strengthening his own grip on power.

Just for the record, I'm not a Marxist nor a Communist, nor do I advocate for either. But I do think you have to understand Marxism to adequately critique it, and it's pretty clear that the author of the article this HN post links to does not.