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Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

danwang.co

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Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#71

Post by dragonwriter »

rpedela wrote: post #21
dragonwriter wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When mature, electric vehicles mean the cost of fuel is essentially zero. Whenever there has a been a massive drop in energy costs, there has also been an economic boom. But the first sentence is wrong -- it only means the cost of energy for a vehicle is equal to the cost of the same energy on the electric grid, plus the cost of wear on the onboard storage system (battery, etc.) Unless your definition of "mature" f…

> plus the cost of wear on the onboard storage system (battery, etc.) That falls under vehicle maintenance and does not play into the cost of fuel. > it only means the cost of energy for a vehicle is equal to the cost of the same energy on the electric grid Yes, I was exaggerating but it is already pretty cheap. If memory serves, it is about $0.08/kWh in the US or $6.80 to charge Tesla's largest battery pack which is…

> > > plus the cost of wear on the onboard storage system (battery, etc.)

> That falls under vehicle maintenance and does not play into the cost of fuel.

Whenever you talk about "fuel" with an electric vehicle, you are doing so by loose analogy; the battery electrolytes are the closest thing to "fuel" in an electric vehicle. I suppose one could quibble over the degree to which the battery is analogous to the "fuel tank" vs. part of the "fuel", the main point, in any case, is that even the electricity isn't even approximately zero cost.

> Yes, I was exaggerating but it is already pretty cheap. If memory serves, it is about $0.08/kWh

Which is equivalent (by GGE [1]) to $2.67/gallon of gasoline, which, while lower than current gasoline prices, is so by less than factor of 2, so its an incremental improvement improvement, not the kind of orders-of-magnitude implied by "essentially zero", even allowing for a bit of artistic exaggeration.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gasoline_gallon_equivalent

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#72

Post by dragonwriter »

dllthomas wrote: post #16
dragonwriter wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> When mature, electric vehicles mean the cost of fuel is essentially zero. Whenever there has a been a massive drop in energy costs, there has also been an economic boom. But the first sentence is wrong -- it only means the cost of energy for a vehicle is equal to the cost of the same energy on the electric grid, plus the cost of wear on the onboard storage system (battery, etc.) Unless your definition of "mature" f…

I agree with your point, but I think an interesting aspect is that a shift toward pushing our transportation energy through the grid might (maybe) lead to some additional economies of scale that could bring down energy costs more broadly. That said, there might instead be diseconomies of scale that dominate - so certainly not a sure thing.

> I think an interesting aspect is that a shift toward pushing our transportation energy through the grid might (maybe) lead to some additional economies of scale that could bring down energy costs more broadly.

I do think that both the economies of scale that this involves and the fact that it makes the shift to alternative (whether "cheaper" or "cleaner" or both) fuels one that involves changing grid inputs without requiring changes to vehicles, fueling infrastructure (once you have the electric charging infrastructure in place), etc., are big gains.

When I was dismissing the idea that electric vehicles had a near-zero energy cost, I wasn't intending to dismiss the idea that electric vehicles offer some real opportunities for improvement.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#73

Post by narrator »

api wrote: post #3

"I sort-of date the end of rapid technological progress to the late-60s or early-70s. At that point something more or less broke in this country and in the western world more generally which has put us into a zone where there’s much slower technological progress." I've believed for years that we entered something like a minor dark age (dim age?) on or about 1970, and that computers have become synonymous with "techno…

Mildly paranoid rant follows:

The 1970s was when the Club Of Rome, The Limits to Growth, The Population Bomb and all the Malthusian overpopulation scare mongering went absolutely bonkers and the elites bought into it completely. Rich people have been fascinated with reducing the world's population growth ever since. There is no "good" future anymore among "serious" prognosticators. It's wall-to-wall eco-doom. This has led to a almost pathological derision of any new ideas in energy, food production, and transport as they just contribute more to our success as a species and more overpopulation.

The developing world, namely India and China didn't get the memo and now they've quickly caught up and there is a lot of angst coming out of the west about how they can't control the carbon emissions of the BRICs and slow down their economies. The BRICs say that the west is responsible for the majority of the carbon emissions when their economies were developing so they should pay the economic burden.

I really think revolutionary technology is poised to come out of China. They've caught up and now they are going to surpass us with the development of new nuclear reactors, alternative energy and their massive rollout of high speed rail across the country. They might even surprise us with something we weren't even expecting. Broad Corp's ultra-fast skyscraper building techniques seem like a sign of things to come.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#74

Post by michaelochurch »

Technology has shitty leadership, and society as a whole has even worse leadership.

Thiel is right. Global economic growth was 5-6% per year in the 1960s. Now it's around 4%. The main culprit: disinvestment in R&D. Those "cushy jobs" for engineers whom the MBA dickheads claimed "weren't earning their keep" were actually the R&D pushing the country (and the world) forward.

Transportation is another thing we suck at, as a country. We're frozen in the 1960s, but with worst traffic. Trains are expensive and slow, planes are only cheap if you play the constantly changing, convoluted system, and cars are probably up against the limits of human reflexes and the roads.

Finally, the middle class has had its collective face ripped off by the Satanic Trinity (housing, healthcare, tuition costs). Things that used to be comparable to utility bills are now life-wrecking constraints and, because no one has any fucking savings anymore, entrepreneurship is at an all-time low (whatever nonsense the VCs fund isn't entrepreneurship; in that world, investors are just bosses by another name).

Thiel is right. We've had a lack of vision and leadership for a long time and it has really slowed the world down.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#75

Post by happyscrappy »

angersock wrote: post #57
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #19

We're close to getting cars that can drive themselves. We have cars that can detect when the brakes are locking and fix it, so that you never go into a skid. We have railroad locomotives that can tell when an axle is just starting to slip, and cut the power to that one axle, so that the wheels never slip even at full power on slick rails. We have jet aircraft engines that can report when a part is getting close to fa…

And yet over 3B ( billion ) people are below the poverty line... EDIT: Luckily, weapons systems are much more effective than they were in the 1970s, so I guess we will be able to fend off the poor. EDIT2: Look, downvote all you want...the elephant in the room is that the rewards and advances in technology are not and can not be distributed evenly. Even in a first-world nation such as the US, so many of the products l…

The poor are far better off than they were in the 1970s but that doesn't fit the narrative that things are always getting worse. If anything technology is moving too fast for regulation to keep up and any decrease in acceleration could be helpful.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#77

Post by foobarqux »

nostrademons wrote: post #43
api wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everything you cite is in or closely related to the IT sector, which is the exception. Every other sector has gone cold or even backwards since ~1970.

That's only because you're unaware of innovations that have happened in other sectors and their consequences. In oil, there've been huge breakthroughs in fracking, horizontal drilling, and oil shale and tar sands mining. As a result, U.S. oil imports have fallen by a third since 2008 [1], and domestic crude oil production is up nearly 50%. We've pulled out of Iraq and Afghanistan because the Middle East is no longer…

The US pulled out once they thought they had installed stable vassal governments.

Moreover, the US will try to gain control over energy resources in the Middle East long after US energy independence: They remain valuable as a means of influence against countries that rely on externally sourced energy.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#78

Post by HCIdivision17 »

angersock wrote: post #57
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #19

We're close to getting cars that can drive themselves. We have cars that can detect when the brakes are locking and fix it, so that you never go into a skid. We have railroad locomotives that can tell when an axle is just starting to slip, and cut the power to that one axle, so that the wheels never slip even at full power on slick rails. We have jet aircraft engines that can report when a part is getting close to fa…

And yet over 3B ( billion ) people are below the poverty line... EDIT: Luckily, weapons systems are much more effective than they were in the 1970s, so I guess we will be able to fend off the poor. EDIT2: Look, downvote all you want...the elephant in the room is that the rewards and advances in technology are not and can not be distributed evenly. Even in a first-world nation such as the US, so many of the products l…

I think I could agree with your point if I agreed that we're slowing down. But I don't think that's going to happen. A lot of the stupefyingly awesome and expensive tech is going to miniaturize and cheapen faster than people will rise up.

Your example of a CT scan got me to think that way. I don't think it's practical to assume that such a device would be widely distributed; heck, I'm not even sure it's possible to fuel them all with liquid He if we tried to proliferate it. But I would bet anything the tech matures and branches such that the cost incrementally drops and the quality incrementally goes up. Or it leads to a breakthrough tech that supplants it (prolly more likely).

So I'm optimistic that the incremental improvements will compound faster than unrest; I think that's what's historically different now than times past - the compound improvements are taking less than a generation. We've made the jumps in tech, now to refine it to be available to all. (Cell phones are a pretty good example of this happening, I think.)

But I suppose there's no telling other than time passing. I prefer optimism, as the alternative is heartbreaking, as you note.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#79

Post by ahomescu1 »

FD3SA wrote: post #39

The takeaway from Thiel's fairly accurate assessment of broad technological progress is the following: You get what you incentivize. Winner-take-all free market capitalism is not synonymous with advanced, century-long research and development projects at the national scale. Our current socioeconomic system rewards convincing others to depart with their money in the quickest way possible. Ponzi-schemes, marketing, fin…

> Thus, I propose the only solution that has any precedence: Big R&D as a government mandate. Much like education, healthcare, and social benefits, Big R&D must become a central pillar of a modern society.

Health care and social benefits get politicians a lot of votes. Heavy government-sponsored research wouldn't, I imagine. To get this kind of support for research, you'd have to sell it to the voters (it was easier to sell during the Cold War, I think it's harder now, especially during a recession).

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#80

Post by api »

narrator wrote: post #73
api wrote: post #3

"I sort-of date the end of rapid technological progress to the late-60s or early-70s. At that point something more or less broke in this country and in the western world more generally which has put us into a zone where there’s much slower technological progress." I've believed for years that we entered something like a minor dark age (dim age?) on or about 1970, and that computers have become synonymous with "techno…

Mildly paranoid rant follows: The 1970s was when the Club Of Rome, The Limits to Growth, The Population Bomb and all the Malthusian overpopulation scare mongering went absolutely bonkers and the elites bought into it completely. Rich people have been fascinated with reducing the world's population growth ever since. There is no "good" future anymore among "serious" prognosticators. It's wall-to-wall eco-doom. This ha…

I don't think this is particularly nutty, but I don't see it as a root cause.

LTG pointed out some real problems. If we were in the 50s-60s can-do mindset we'd have reacted with "well let's roll up our sleeves and fix it then!" But that wasn't the reaction at all. The reaction was doom and gloom and futility with a hefty helping of thinly veiled racism and classism. Gotta stop those poor and brown people from overrunning the country club!

I think LTG was an example of something that hit at just the right time to capture a dominant zeitgeist that was already shifting toward conservatism and pessimism. It was a lightning rod.

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