My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse” • Hacker News Board

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by robertlagrant » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 6:21 PM UTC

ksaj wrote: post #463

coldtea wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And if we suggested ten years ago that your burgers would be plant-based Ten years ago? I'll still say it now and in 50 years.

That's all fine if you want a 100% processed food diet. Some of us want to eat less-processed food than that, and save the "treat" foods for treat times. In Toronto there is a decades-long established vegan restaurant called Buddha's Vegetarian Restaurant. They make a lot of mock meat products that are as realistic as the Impossible Burger, by layering and preparing things in such a way that they end up resembling me…

But are they "not mainstream" or just "not affordable"?

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

#482

Post by native_samples » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 6:28 PM UTC

cjohnson318 wrote: post #469

native_samples wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, I'll do so. To put it brutally it's because on Hacker News and probably your social circle, there are too many people whose social status and income depends on being clever, or at least the perception of being clever. This leads us to seriously over-index on things that look like science or data analysis, without even being able to see alternatives that in my experience easily occur to the less (over?) educated.…

Things always seem fine until they aren't, and then they're real bad. Invariably, the nature of a difficult situation is that they're difficult to get out of, so we tend to be very interested in avoiding difficult situations. This is why people are so interested in avoiding climate change, rather than waiting for more real-time data about how much climate change actually sucks so they can update their Bayesian priors…

It's worth noting that the Limits to Growth didn't talk about climate change, just generalized 'pollution'.

One now obscure reason for this is that back in the 1970s people didn't believe in global warming and the term "climate change" didn't exist as we know it today. Climatologists were worried about global cooling instead. At that point their records showed a generalized decline in temperature from the 1940s onwards and they believed it might continue indefinitely, leading to a new ice age. This was taken quite seriously, as newspaper records from the time show.

These days it can be hard to understand why they thought that, because if you get a modern graph of the long term temperature record it doesn't show this cooling effect. The reason is that climatologists have repeatedly issued new versions of the historical time series, each time reducing the extent to which this cooling period can be seen. The differences between versions are the extent to which models are allowed to modify the raw data. The climatologists do this because they are very certain in their theories, but a long period of cooling in the 20th century is not compatible with them, and thus they look for reasons why the data must be wrong. When they come up with such a reason it gets merged into the model and the next version "corrects" for it.

Modern graphs show basically no cooling, leading to some people concluding that the belief in global cooling was some sort of fringe belief, or even an urban legend, because obviously, how could they have thought that when no such cooling is visible.

Given the long track record of educated people having near unshakeable confidence in models even in the face of failed predictions (of which World3 is a salient example), this progressive replacement of measured historical data with synthetic data is well worth pondering deeply.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

#483

Post by harimau777 » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 6:36 PM UTC

AlgorithmicTime wrote: post #404

harimau777 wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that the issue is when the financial rewards are dramatically greater than how much harder someone could conceivably be working. A billionaire could conceivably work much harder than the median person. However, they don't work 8000 times harder ($1 billion divided by the median net worth in America of $122k).

They may not work 8000 times harder, but they may bring to the table a skill which is 8000 times more valuable than a shelf stocker at Walmart.

That's certainly possible, but the argument that usually gets made is that they worked harder and therefore earned being a billionaire.

That being said, I think it's also unlikely that they brought a skill to the table that's 8000 times more valuable. My understanding is that people who become billionaires do so by leveraging capital.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

#484

Post by coldtea » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 6:41 PM UTC

ksaj wrote: post #463

coldtea wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And if we suggested ten years ago that your burgers would be plant-based Ten years ago? I'll still say it now and in 50 years.

That's all fine if you want a 100% processed food diet. Some of us want to eat less-processed food than that, and save the "treat" foods for treat times. In Toronto there is a decades-long established vegan restaurant called Buddha's Vegetarian Restaurant. They make a lot of mock meat products that are as realistic as the Impossible Burger, by layering and preparing things in such a way that they end up resembling me…

>That's all fine if you want a 100% processed food diet. Some of us want to eat less-processed food than that, and save the "treat" foods for treat times.

Where I'm at, I do the mediterranean diet, like most people (with a little more meat and BS snacks thrown in following the cultural example of the US, but still, nothing like the S.A.D.).

I'll also mention that most staple plants, legumes, etc. on that diet is cheaper in the US than here, where wages are double and more in the US. So price is not an excuse for Americans not to eat similarly.

People who want to eat "less processed food" can start eating less processed food. Highly processed, lab grown "meat" is hardly the way to eat "less processed food".

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

#485

Post by harimau777 » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 6:42 PM UTC

simonh wrote: post #466

harimau777 wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that the issue is when the financial rewards are dramatically greater than how much harder someone could conceivably be working. A billionaire could conceivably work much harder than the median person. However, they don't work 8000 times harder ($1 billion divided by the median net worth in America of $122k).

The thing is nobody gets to build a fortune in the billions from saving up their salary. The principal way to do it is through ownership and control of a company. So what's the alternative to private individuals founding companies, finding ways to provide valuable goods and services, employ lots of people and grow successful businesses. Is that something we want to discourage? I think we all benefit from having hard…

I don't think it's black and white. I have no issue with someone starting a business and becoming hundreds of times more wealthy than the median American. However, I think that's a lot different than becoming thousands of times more wealthy.

Opposition to addressing inequality in the US tends to take the form of arguing that the rich worked harder, earned their wealth, are more valuable, etc.; therefore, it is immoral to redistribute that wealth. The argument that I am attempting to make is that the differences in wealth are so dramatic that it isn't realistic that they earned it in the sense that free market advocates are implying.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by CyberDildonics » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 7:27 PM UTC

swader999 wrote: post #193

phkahler wrote: post #121

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>> A rowdy protest is not “an attempted coup”. Oh is this referring to the so called "insurection"? That was like a mild protest compared to other recent ones.

The only ones creating trouble were the fbi informants that were there as agitators. Why haven't these people been charged yet? The rest were let and even motioned in. They took a tour and left peacefully when asked.

Please tell me this is supposed to be a joke and that you don't seriously think this, given the ocean of literal video evidence out there.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by seibelj » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 7:48 PM UTC

jhoechtl wrote: post #261

seibelj wrote: post #89

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The Austrian view of economics (and of human philosophy), when I finally sat down and read through the material, made so much sense to me and deeply affected me. It clarified several things I had been feeling about the world that I couldn’t fully comprehend, and made me feel much less stressed and more content. The Malthusian (doom scrolling) impulse is stronger than ever. I feel happier not subscribing to the “end o…

The term "Austrian School" reads innocuous yet it really is about the fundamentals of neo-capitalism driven by greed. I do not feel easy about your comment. Sure the Austrian School describes a comprehensive model which might give you feelings of being able to describe the world, yet it might be a model towards self-destruction?

No idea what your comment means. The Austrians begin by looking at the individual. Only individuals can ascribe value to things. Nature does not know that an apple or a house has value - only people do. Individuals thus are the drivers of the economy. Furthermore trying to model the economy and predict the future is a fool's errand - the amount of variables are too complex, and macroeconomics as a discipline is no better than guessing.

Individuals are motivated primarily by self-interest. Within a family people are strongly charitable, within a neighborhood (tribe) somewhat helpful, and beyond that altruism cannot be relied on to power the system forwards. Any system that relies on people to be altruistic to strangers is doomed to failure. Instead, you should create systems where people, by acting in their own self interest, help the larger society.

Capitalism is emergent phenomena - where you ban markets, they spring up organically. This occurs even in the most socialist / communist systems such as Cuba and North Korea. Markets allow people to agree voluntarily to prices based on their own subjective opinions of value.

Within any society that isn't forcing everyone to be perfectly equal by threat of death, differences in wealth naturally emerge. Over time they become pronounced. It is impossible to end inequality without coercion - some people naturally value their leisure time over being productive, and it is unfair to coerce someone to artificially reduce their productivity. There is no such thing as economic equality in any meaningful sense, only equality under the law.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by wisty » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 8:10 PM UTC

bmitc wrote: post #173

mythrwy wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never accepted the premise of that book as being universally true. Societies have collapsed for reasons other then resource scarcity. In fact I'd say more often they collapse for reasons other then resource scarcity. I don't think the Mayans ran out of anything. Neither do I believe the Romans ran out of anything. My guess? The professional political/priestly/mid-level manager class gaining self serving control and…

> I don't think the Mayans ran out of anything. Neither do I believe the Romans ran out of anything. Is this true? I thought it was drought and deforestation and over-farming that sped up the Mayan decline and that soil erosion and exhaustion and agricultural decline aided in the fall of Rome. https://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2009/0...

One suggestion I heard was that the Mayans were a bunch of imperialist tax collectors and their "empire" simply started refusing to pay tax when the military advantages were no longer so important.

You could probably say the same about Rome. Once everyone in the empire could out-Legionary the Romans (the provinces were the main source of military might anyway at this point), sending tribute suddenly became a bit of a waste of time. Any disruption can trigger a chain of revolts. A revolt could be armed, or a soft revolt where the locals start acting like feudal lords and claim it's necessary to keep the peace.

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by ganafagol » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 8:18 PM UTC

anticodon wrote: post #311

ganafagol wrote: post #270

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> The next target will be also rich in oil, although it would be definitely said that it's only because of lack of democracy in the said country. Haiti.

It was just a minor coup at the USA backdoor. The next victim of US military incursion will be oil rich country. There's no reason for incursion if it is not going to be profitable for the US. If there's "no democracy" in some country but also no valuable natural resources, it's not worth spending expensive missiles and bombs. E.g. dictatorship in Cambodia would be always safe as there're little gains in occupying Ca…

> The next victim of US military incursion will be oil rich country. There's no reason for incursion if it is not going to be profitable for the US.

That's exactly what I'm talking about. See e.g. https://www.worldoil.com/news/2010/1/27/haiti-could-have-lar...

Re: My take on the study from MIT that predicts “societal collapse”

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Post by evgen » Fri, Jul 16, 2021, 8:55 PM UTC

cjohnson318 wrote: post #464

evgen wrote: post #329

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At the time these studies were being created the idea that PV solar would be cost-effective and that battery tech would progress to the point where it provided a viable path to grid-scale energy storage was deep into 'magic bullet' territory. There are a long list of technologies that have already started to bend the curve on several of those trend lines and the idea that we are simply done creating solutions seems u…

PV solar and battery technology are approaching the "diminishing returns" territory, if they're not already there. Battery energy density had been improving at about 5-8% over the last 100 years, but I don't think anyone seriously expects that to continue. IMHO, unfathomably short sighted is expecting the rate of technological progress over the last hundred years to be matched by the next 100 years. We went from the…

People have been saying we are reaching the end of improvements to battery chemistry for decades, and yet every year we keep pumping out small improvements and we double production capacity. PV solar continues to get cheaper as we increase capacity and apply the previous generation of chip technology to the production process. None of this is 'breakthrough' technology, just the slow and constant grind of iterative improvement.

The technological progress of the next hundred years will make the previous hundred look like we were all standing still. In the 20th century GPS was a bulky device, wireless comm was power hungry and slow, and any sort of real computing required an expensive lump at least the size of a small book -- two decades into the 21st century and I have a device in my pocket that is magic and for $10 I can put a SoC into an existing device (or something new) that has good GPS, fast cellular data, and sips power to give it “smarts” that would have been unprecedented in the late 20th.

The 20th century may have seen big changes in aerospace as we first learned how to master the field, but it was the dark ages when it comes to computing, materials sciences, biology, and solid-state physics -- every one of those fields will deliver results over the next 50 years that will make the 20th century look like the 18th century in terms of technological advancement.