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The good things in the current age in tech

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Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#41

Post by alexashka »

bpodgursky wrote: post #18

My take: fusion will change everything. I don't think people understand that controlled fusion is actually on the horizon finally, and it is going to change absolutely everything.

- You know, a brilliant scientist who beats his wife, will continue beating his wife, right?

- Yes, but if he invents X, that'll change everything!

- ...

Weren't we supposed to be working 1-2 hours/week by now, thanks to techno-utopia? :)

Technology at this point is like children running around with scissors. What's needed is some adult supervision, not new toys.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#42

Post by DethNinja »

I don’t want to dox myself but I’m currently solo developing an application that would’ve took a company of minimum 100 to build just 15 years ago.

People are amazed when they see the stuff I solo built and imagine there is a huge company behind it.

It is all because of advances in DevOps, cheap server infrastructure, and good quality open source libraries.

It is actually scary to see this first hand because human productivity is increasing at a such a rapid speed, it will result in extreme levels of excess productivity in future.

So an economy without scarcity is getting closer to our reach but political landscape, general populace, and influential people try their hardest to prevent this from happening.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#43

Post by mikewarot »

Software defined radio (SDR) is amazing stuff. $30 buys you a kit that can receive a 2 Mhz slice of radio spectrum anywhere from about 60 to 1200 Mhz, and it runs through a USB 2 port!

I learned there was a VOR navigation system nearby, and was able to build a flowgraph in GNU Radio that showed the bearing as I moved around the area.

It's amazing how much computing power you can get for about that amount of money as well, with the Raspberry Pi and Arduino boards.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#44

Post by ashleyn »

Tooling in general has massively improved. I compare Cargo or NPM to what was available 15-20 years ago and it's leaps and bounds above anything that was (or is still) available for languages like C or C++. It was exceedingly common to look at an OSS project and know immediately it would be a massive PITA to set up and build - the more modern a project is, the less this seems to be a problem.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#45

Post by secondaryacct »

ryukafalz wrote: post #22
kaycebasques wrote: post #13

My unfiltered additions: * SpaceX. I have lots of reservations about the company but the fact that they are consistently doing things previously thought impossible is very important for humanity in general. * The new Dune movie was downright amazing. The CGI was believable and an important part of the story. * AI-generated art. Fascinating. * Wikipedia. Wow. * I can invest in lots of different assets relatively easil…

> The prospect of cities with much less air pollution is wonderful. For cities with a dense urban core (of which mine, Philly, certainly is) I'm really hoping we lean in on bikes (electric or not) moreso than electric cars. Even less carbon-intensive to produce, and in a city with this level of density it's shocking how quickly you can get around by bike. I would go so far as to say it's often faster than driving if…

In Hong Kong, a bit denser than Philly (I googled for giggles: HK is 6300 p/km2, Philly is 4500 p/km, still surprisingly high), we have, I think, reached your no-car target simply because it's unthinkable people get cars when space is so rare and expensive (people here do mortgages to buy 200k USD parkings as retirement investment when they cant buy a home).

Bicycle is non existent though, what is really different from my low density european experience is the amount and low cost of traditional taxis (Uber gave up and now is a normal taxi provider here because they cant beat their price - https://www.uber.com/en-HK/blog/introducing-uber-taxi/ ) and the insane quality of the metro and bus networks (we didnt have double deckers every 5 minutes in my city in Normandy, we were lucky if the schedule was remotely accurate)

I ve seen some other places more dense that american cities explode in little motor bikes (Taipei, Kuala Lumpur), but that depends a lot on regulation.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#46

Post by WalterBright »

kaycebasques wrote: post #13

My unfiltered additions: * SpaceX. I have lots of reservations about the company but the fact that they are consistently doing things previously thought impossible is very important for humanity in general. * The new Dune movie was downright amazing. The CGI was believable and an important part of the story. * AI-generated art. Fascinating. * Wikipedia. Wow. * I can invest in lots of different assets relatively easil…

I have no reservations about SpaceX. SpaceX is doing what every entrepreneur wished they were doing. I want to buy stock in SpaceX. I don't even care if the stock tanks, I just want a piece of the dream.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#47

Post by bpodgursky »

alexashka wrote: post #41
bpodgursky wrote: post #18

My take: fusion will change everything. I don't think people understand that controlled fusion is actually on the horizon finally, and it is going to change absolutely everything.

- You know, a brilliant scientist who beats his wife, will continue beating his wife, right? - Yes, but if he invents X, that'll change everything! - ... Weren't we supposed to be working 1-2 hours/week by now, thanks to techno-utopia? :) Technology at this point is like children running around with scissors. What's needed is some adult supervision, not new toys.

No, what we need is infinite clean energy.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#49

Post by uncomputation »

Very good perspective. It’s the “epicurean treadmill” of technology. 20 years ago, you would’ve spent days or weeks getting a server and infrastructure set up. The slower pace was due to natural constraints and generally speaking things are simpler within constraints. Now that you can spin up an infinitely scalable, globally available cluster of servers in minutes, the question rather becomes “what now?” It’s absolutely an objective improvement. Things have gotten better. But the human mind is not built to be satisfied. We always reach out for more, to push the boundaries, and now that the boundaries are pushed so much further than before, the questions and demands asked are much greater.

Re: The good things in the current age in tech

#50

Post by tapan_jk »

kaycebasques wrote: post #13

My unfiltered additions: * SpaceX. I have lots of reservations about the company but the fact that they are consistently doing things previously thought impossible is very important for humanity in general. * The new Dune movie was downright amazing. The CGI was believable and an important part of the story. * AI-generated art. Fascinating. * Wikipedia. Wow. * I can invest in lots of different assets relatively easil…

> Our civilization will make the transition. It will be messy and could have been much less painful but we will do it.

I wish to see this kind of positivity around me more often. I have worked with a colleague or two in the past who viewed problems as something that needed to be solved, and were a step or two ahead of the rest of us in terms of finding solutions. Lately, I see that the default reaction to problems is to complain. Don't get me wrong... complaining is fine if it leads to action, but isn't it rare.

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