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Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

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Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#141

Post by tim333 »

>“We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters.”

The flying car thing is actually getting closer with the likes of the Terrafugia, and the advances with self driving cars give me hope that they may progress with self piloting aircraft. At the moment piloting planes is a bit tricky for everyday use. I did a private pilot's licence and it's hard work as is flying a small aircraft in terms of radioing the various air traffic controllers and similar tasks.

(http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/24/automobiles/terrafugia-tra...)

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#143

Post by therzathegza »

zenogais wrote: post #60
therzathegza wrote: post #17

I think the article unfairly bashes rail transport by singling out coal. If you read Warren Buffett's writings, his investment in rail was mostly due to being able to move something 500 miles on one gallon of diesel fuel. Regardless of what is being carried, there are very few things that efficient. Coal sucks, but but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater there. As for the science section, claiming that produc…

I think looking at it as pessimistic is simply wrong. The point is not to be optimistic but to look around and explain the major challenges that seem to be impeding rapid advancement. The biggest problem I see in science seems to be the incentive structure (publish or perish). This overwhelmingly biases against large scale breakthroughs and towards minor amendments and advances. I remember when I first started doing…

I thought the 1% figure as encompassing all science. As far as CS is concerned, I don't really know. As far as bioscience, leaps and bounds are made all the time. Electronic technology is a feedback loop that for every innovation you get there, you reap several in a diverse field such as biology. Live cell imaging by itself was revolutionized by discovery of fluorescent molecules in jellyfish. Nevermind the offshoots as mentioned, sequencing tech, PCR discovery. Just so many. I think 9-5 scientists is a very VERY pessimistic look on how science is run.

Did we mention lasers?! Lasers!

The publish or perish model is certainly a thing, but the peer review system as it exists does in fact notice if all you publish is crappy review papers. This depends a lot more on the community of researchers in that field. The more recent argument in many labs is "Can't it be both?". A longer term project run in parallel with smaller discoveries or even reviews of things in the field. Don't underestimate the utility of a good review paper either. Many people don't understand how science at the bench is done, and it gets reduced to these sorts of apocalyptic cliches. Fields come and go, that's how the sausage gets made.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#144

Post by [deleted] »

zanny wrote: post #116

> because there’s no one in the system who has any idea what to do with the money Hey look, validation of my outlook on basic income. Links the go-to source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPKKQnijnsM For some reason, we seem to have forgotten that the best investment is in people. You want your innovation, all the potential is trapped living on scraps a day in soul crushing poverty or near-poverty, while you move a…

[deleted]

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#145

Post by 123testaccount »

adamjs wrote: post #140
deciplex wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I was getting at though, is that most individuals can't take a share in that responsibility, even if they have the ability and the desire. This is an enormous waste. Not to make light of Elon Musk's accomplishments, but it is not his intelligence and leadership ability that make him exceptional (though he is a phenomenon in both respects), but rather those traits coupled with a solid bit of seed money in the for…

You're reading my mind here. (4 AM here so please excuse any ill-formed logic) Excellent points regarding the exceptional breadth of requirements necessary to effect change. I don't think this precludes my earlier belief concerning individual responsibility for our collective progress. This is a conversation that everyone needs to participate in precisely because there is such a rare chance any one individual will ha…

I don't think your or your parent's view on Notch is at all fair or justified. His situation is much different from Musk's. Notch accidentially made a huge sum of money, and now he is weary of the attention it has brought. The fact that he said he would abandon a projects that showed promise, I take as an expression of burnout/emotional stress. He is much younger than Musk, and his success was rather abrupt.

Who knows what he may use his position for in the future? He seems to me an intelligent, honest, passionate person. Maybe he will enjoy a quiet retirement. Maybe he will go on to do incredibe things in other arenas after taking some time to step back. A little empathy is in order, in my opinion.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#146

Post by ggchappell »

e_modad wrote: post #134
oh_sigh wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may like "Creating the 20th Century" by Vaclav Smil. In it, it argues that almost all big advances of the 20th century are actually based off of inventions and innovations that occurred in the 1860-1900 time period. It makes me wonder what all of our advances from 1960-2000 will create for 2040-2060?

I think one of the big reasons we haven't seen the kind of progress our predecessors had hoped for is because most people don't have the physical or mental energy. For big technological and social advancements, you need everyone (or at least most) engaged, enthusiastic and focused. Most of the world, including most citizens of the United States, are still moving up Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So yeah, you get Angry…

That's an interesting and, I think, worthwhile point.

But consider: during the huge technological advances of the early industrial revolution, much of the attention we pay today to the basic needs of society was not there. No social safety net meant that people starved. No (or few) vaccinations meant that medical treatment was more necessary. But the lack of anesthesia, antiseptics, antibiotics, etc. made medical treatment painful, dangerous, and often useless.

Certainly poor people today have it bad. But in some ways the poor of the western world (at least) enjoy a quality of life that people in past centuries could only dream of.

So, putting that together with your argument, I wonder: could a slowdown in innovation today be due to the fact that society is expending its energy meeting people's needs? In the past, in contrast, needs were ignored, and that energy was expended on innovation.

This idea would seem to be supported by the fact that so much of the innovation of recent decades has come out of the U.S., which arguably has one of the least effective social safety nets in the western world.

EDIT. Just in case anyone is wondering: for goodness sake I'm not arguing that we shouldn't be concerned about people's needs. But if the above idea is how the world really works, then there is no point in denying it.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#147

Post by seanflyon »

barney54 wrote: post #128
seanflyon wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"essentially zero" is an exaggeration, but electric cars are dramatically cheaper to fuel. They use much less energy and the energy they use is in a much cheaper form (electricity vs gasoline).

But electrics are much more expensive and are less flexible than gasoline powered cars. That's why sales of electrics have stalled at less than 4% of the market.

Sales of electric cars have not stalled, they are growing rapidly. They are also a very small segment of the market but as price drops and range increases that will cease to be the case.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#148

Post by e_modad »

ggchappell wrote: post #146
e_modad wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one of the big reasons we haven't seen the kind of progress our predecessors had hoped for is because most people don't have the physical or mental energy. For big technological and social advancements, you need everyone (or at least most) engaged, enthusiastic and focused. Most of the world, including most citizens of the United States, are still moving up Maslow's hierarchy of needs. So yeah, you get Angry…

That's an interesting and, I think, worthwhile point. But consider: during the huge technological advances of the early industrial revolution, much of the attention we pay today to the basic needs of society was not there. No social safety net meant that people starved. No (or few) vaccinations meant that medical treatment was more necessary. But the lack of anesthesia, antiseptics, antibiotics, etc. made medical tre…

"EDIT. Just in case anyone is wondering: for goodness sake I'm not arguing that we shouldn't be concerned about people's needs. But if the above idea is how the world really works, then there is no point in denying it."

No no, I get your point. No need to worry.

I would add a counter-argument here though that there was definitely more time to think in the past. There was more peace of mind because people had a less hurried lifestyle. Also, things had always been bad and were getting much better relative to the past. For example, for new parents today, think of all the various concerns that are constantly hitting them from all sides. This wasn't the case 150 years ago and I think that allowed for people to devote a least some portion of their mental energy towards innovation. And if not innovation, at least towards being socially engaged in the discussion about innovation.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#149

Post by ggchappell »

e_modad wrote: post #148
ggchappell wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an interesting and, I think, worthwhile point. But consider: during the huge technological advances of the early industrial revolution, much of the attention we pay today to the basic needs of society was not there. No social safety net meant that people starved. No (or few) vaccinations meant that medical treatment was more necessary. But the lack of anesthesia, antiseptics, antibiotics, etc. made medical tre…

"EDIT. Just in case anyone is wondering: for goodness sake I'm not arguing that we shouldn't be concerned about people's needs. But if the above idea is how the world really works, then there is no point in denying it." No no, I get your point. No need to worry. I would add a counter-argument here though that there was definitely more time to think in the past. There was more peace of mind because people had a less h…

I imagine you're right. And quite likely part of the problem is that, paradoxically, the ability to solve problems leads to increased stress. If you can't do anything about your troubles, then you're free not to worry about them.

This is an issue that I don't see being addressed at all in the U.S. On the contrary, we see articles (rather often on HN) on how to squeeze more productivity out of those silly little bits of free time in our days.

Re: Why Is Peter Thiel Pessimistic About Technological Innovation?

#150

Post by marcosdumay »

graycat wrote: post #108
marcosdumay wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but I have yet to see an explanation that truly seems to work The 70's was when energy started getting expensive again. And we did nothing to deal with the problem, not even now. The 50's and the 60's (and the 70's, 80's, 90's, 00's...) were marked by huge growth in govenments worldwide. Something that we simply never experienced before. It's quite possible that we reached an inflection point by the 70's, and it be…

> Another possibility is that we reached a level of development where going forwad is really that hard. Well, harder . See my post at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8338417 in this thread where I try to explain the sense in which harder is, with the traditional management hierarchy, too hard.

That's similar to what I was calling corporate evolution. It's nice to see more people reaching the same conclusion, as that's the second one I'm less confident that is relevant.

The one I'm less confident is that development is too hard. And I mean it in the literal sense, in that we need to create entire new thinking paradigms, and invest endless billions on tools so that we can get in another easily explited plateau. I'm not the only one expressing it on the thread, by the way.

And now that I've had time to think about it, there's another possibility - that development is too easy... The basic science developed up to the 60's left us in a place where we can create tons of wealth even with no basic improvement, and it's possible that we aren't invest on the basics just because it does not offer the hightest ROI. Once we exploit enough possibilities that further improvement gets hard again, we may revert into investing in basic science and basic development.

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