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Technology Without Industry

geohot.github.io

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Re: Technology Without Industry

#21

Post by astan »

catmanjan wrote: post #18

Although only a paragraph is dedicated to the topic, I think this essay is more about the wonders of biology. I've been thinking about this more lately, how cells are more or less the nanomachines we read about in sci-fi. Animals and plants are living machines, much more compatible with humans than the machines we have created - yet the investment in artificial machines dwarfs the natural ones... (I make this stateme…

And investment in preserving nature, learning from it, and investment into human beings and nurturing their capabilities dwarfs all the investment in technology.

And I don't mean nurturing capabilities to make them drones spending all their energy working for corporates, but for themselves and being able to pursue their own causes. And believe me, we won't need new shoes and new apps and perfect games every week if we are not being drained of our energy 50hrs/wk. We can and will happily do with much less if what we have is not cheap trash hurting our bodies and souls, manufactured by suffering working class people (please look up suicide rates in chinese factories and in working class communities in america).

Re: Technology Without Industry

#22

Post by WalterBright »

astan wrote: post #21
catmanjan wrote: post #18

Although only a paragraph is dedicated to the topic, I think this essay is more about the wonders of biology. I've been thinking about this more lately, how cells are more or less the nanomachines we read about in sci-fi. Animals and plants are living machines, much more compatible with humans than the machines we have created - yet the investment in artificial machines dwarfs the natural ones... (I make this stateme…

And investment in preserving nature, learning from it, and investment into human beings and nurturing their capabilities dwarfs all the investment in technology. And I don't mean nurturing capabilities to make them drones spending all their energy working for corporates, but for themselves and being able to pursue their own causes. And believe me, we won't need new shoes and new apps and perfect games every week if w…

> spending all their energy working for corporates,

Without corporates, we'd be spending all our energy working on subsistence farms. No thanks.

Re: Technology Without Industry

#23

Post by jackcosgrove »

catmanjan wrote: post #18

Although only a paragraph is dedicated to the topic, I think this essay is more about the wonders of biology. I've been thinking about this more lately, how cells are more or less the nanomachines we read about in sci-fi. Animals and plants are living machines, much more compatible with humans than the machines we have created - yet the investment in artificial machines dwarfs the natural ones... (I make this stateme…

Biology is inductive technology, built from the specific to the general through trial and error.

Human inventions are mostly deductive technology, built from the general to the specific through the understanding of principles, and trial and error.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Biology's biggest advantage is a head start. However biology while sometimes elegant can also be very dumb. For example DNA is spaghetti code.

Re: Technology Without Industry

#24

Post by doggodaddo78 »

Curiously and coincidentally, I bought several of Ted's writings recently. I think he has some salient points but without colleagues, he fell in love with his "solo-founder crazy ideas," effectively delusions that couldn't be realized by his methods. If he had others around to temper his thinking rather than retreating completely from civilization, he might've had a chance to make a positive and constructive impact rather than causing random, impotent harm.

Re: Technology Without Industry

#25

Post by jackcosgrove »

carapace wrote: post #9

An ecologically harmonious lifestyle is economically cheaper, both for the household (in reduced expenses) and the surrounding economy (via reduced degradation of "ecosystem services"[1].) This, along with advances in technology, should result in massive reduction of work required to maintain a given quality of life. E.g. a 24-hour work week, and the option to retire after working only a few years. One's leisure time…

While "we" had the capability of a high-tech, leisure society in the 1970s, "we" probably refers to a minority of people in developed countries at the time, so maybe 1-2% of people on the planet.

Indeed since the 1970s the great economic story has been the spread of this way of life to others rather than an acceleration of technology to greater heights. Although the latter has happened, most effort has been focused on spreading existing technology.

We're just now seriously thinking about returning to the moon after a fifty year absence. However during those fifty years about two billion people were lifted out of crushing poverty.

Re: Technology Without Industry

#27

Post by barumrho »

Hmm, if you view biology as technology, isn't the ecosystem required for human life basically an industry in itself?

It seems that centralization is the natural outcome of decentralization. We live in the tension in between the two extremes.

Re: Technology Without Industry

#28

Post by throwaway2a02 »

doggodaddo78 wrote: post #24

Curiously and coincidentally, I bought several of Ted's writings recently. I think he has some salient points but without colleagues, he fell in love with his "solo-founder crazy ideas," effectively delusions that couldn't be realized by his methods. If he had others around to temper his thinking rather than retreating completely from civilization, he might've had a chance to make a positive and constructive impact r…

Could you be more specific? Ted who?

Re: Technology Without Industry

#29

Post by planxty »

throwaway2a02 wrote: post #28
doggodaddo78 wrote: post #24

Curiously and coincidentally, I bought several of Ted's writings recently. I think he has some salient points but without colleagues, he fell in love with his "solo-founder crazy ideas," effectively delusions that couldn't be realized by his methods. If he had others around to temper his thinking rather than retreating completely from civilization, he might've had a chance to make a positive and constructive impact r…

Could you be more specific? Ted who?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Kaczynski

Re: Technology Without Industry

#30

Post by avivo »

With all due respect George, I now disagree, even if I did agree in 2012 (when we road tripped together to SXSW; celebrating the destruction of SOPA!). I still think SOPA was terrible! But my broader thinking has dramatically evolved as I learned more about how technology and power interact in society.

You assume a common fallacy that I often bring up on HN — the magical decentralization fallacy — "the mistaken belief that decentralization on its own can address governance problems."

Decentralization can actually cement authoritarianism. More details here: https://aviv.medium.com/the-magical-decentralization-fallacy...

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