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Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

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Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#31

Post by smallmancontrov »

stevenwoo wrote: post #25
smallmancontrov wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All workable policy paths involve taxing capital and you're gonna call that Marxist even though it isn't, so we're at an impasse.

Using Marxist as a denunciation feels like a shibboleth considering how often it comes out of the mouths of conservative politicians in the USA when talking about stuff that is not remotely related to it.

Yep, exactly. The USA is in the fortunate position of having a solid historical example of how to re-balance an economy that let inequality cook out of control: FDR. We didn't have a far-right Hitler or a far-left Stalin because we had a Roosevelt. We should aim for that again -- but at the moment I'm afraid our aim is drifting to the right, a right that calls its own policy position from 6 months prior "radical Marxist lunacy" and will certainly do the same to any compromise struck in that historically informed center.

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#32

Post by hurtigioll »

sp527 wrote: post #20

This author's writing style is too obnoxious for me to have gotten all the way through it, but the important thing is that he's wrong. Every single economic transaction ultimately connects to people generating demand. EVERY single one. All B2B transactions included. Sometimes this can appear to not be the case if there's a significant lag time between initial B2B transactions and some end consumer demand. That lag is…

we do not trade with animals, for they have nothing to offer.

AIs will not trade with us, for we have nothing to offer.

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#33

Post by Helloworldboy »

smallmancontrov wrote: post #13
throw391912321 wrote: post #10

I've seen this idea float around r/singularity and r/collapse for years and it's probably responsible for a horrifying amount of suicides at this point. It's not even that good of an argument. It makes some incredibly flimsy assumptions; reddit marxist priors of labor oppression being an inescapable invariant across all of human history, ultra-compliant superintelligences, a perfectly unitary elite without any desire…

All workable policy paths involve taxing capital and you're gonna call that Marxist even though it isn't, so we're at an impasse.

[dead]

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#34

Post by confidantlake »

throw391912321 wrote: post #10

I've seen this idea float around r/singularity and r/collapse for years and it's probably responsible for a horrifying amount of suicides at this point. It's not even that good of an argument. It makes some incredibly flimsy assumptions; reddit marxist priors of labor oppression being an inescapable invariant across all of human history, ultra-compliant superintelligences, a perfectly unitary elite without any desire…

It isn't inevitable but it is where we are heading. We are basically in the early 1930s. Even fighting against it and winning is going to be extremely ugly. And that is the most optimistic scenario.

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#35

Post by Helloworldboy »

jplusequalt wrote: post #26
throw391912321 wrote: post #10

I've seen this idea float around r/singularity and r/collapse for years and it's probably responsible for a horrifying amount of suicides at this point. It's not even that good of an argument. It makes some incredibly flimsy assumptions; reddit marxist priors of labor oppression being an inescapable invariant across all of human history, ultra-compliant superintelligences, a perfectly unitary elite without any desire…

>reddit marxist priors of labor oppression being an inescapable invariant across all of human history Not that I agree with all of Marx's ideas, but I think this is one of his less controversial ideas. There has always been a class struggle between business owners and workers, and there probably always will be. >anti-agency garbage and actually made an effort to advocate for policy An increasing amount of US citizens…

[dead]

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#36

Post by smallmancontrov »

andrewmutz wrote: post #11

If you want to understand the likely capabilities of AI technology in the future, listen to software engineers like this guy. If you want to understand the impact of AI technology on the economy, don't listen to software engineers, listen to economists.

Just remember that the US purged left-leaning economists during the cold war and the field re-grew under intense think-tank incentives towards the economic right, so if you think labor/capital dynamics might be important to the AI revolution you really ought to balance your "random" sampling of US economists with some Piketty (Atkinson, Stiglitz, Zucman -- but in an era where reading even one book is considered a herculean feat of focus, "Capital in the Twenty First Century" by Piketty is the canonical pick).

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#37

Post by sp527 »

hurtigioll wrote: post #32
sp527 wrote: post #20

This author's writing style is too obnoxious for me to have gotten all the way through it, but the important thing is that he's wrong. Every single economic transaction ultimately connects to people generating demand. EVERY single one. All B2B transactions included. Sometimes this can appear to not be the case if there's a significant lag time between initial B2B transactions and some end consumer demand. That lag is…

we do not trade with animals, for they have nothing to offer. AIs will not trade with us, for we have nothing to offer.

AIs are not conscious and do not have real needs that are detached from a real person. That can certainly be simulated, but I would hope that we can collectively agree to unplug them should that situation arise.

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#38

Post by smallmancontrov »

kingstnap wrote: post #29

What AI really seems to be posed to do is make labour a lot less valuable and capital a lot more valuable. Running a government requires a lot of cash flow. I think its sort of inevitable that it's going to need to start coming mostly from the later and not the former.

We've moved all the money into the capital economy and all the taxes into the labor economy and the well is running dry. There's nothing to be done!

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#39

Post by NuclearPM »

smallmancontrov wrote: post #38
kingstnap wrote: post #29

What AI really seems to be posed to do is make labour a lot less valuable and capital a lot more valuable. Running a government requires a lot of cash flow. I think its sort of inevitable that it's going to need to start coming mostly from the later and not the former.

We've moved all the money into the capital economy and all the taxes into the labor economy and the well is running dry. There's nothing to be done!

More tax cuts to the rich.

Re: Peopleless economy? Not technically impossible

#40

Post by forgetfreeman »

andrewmutz wrote: post #11

If you want to understand the likely capabilities of AI technology in the future, listen to software engineers like this guy. If you want to understand the impact of AI technology on the economy, don't listen to software engineers, listen to economists.

[dead]
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