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Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

techcrunch.com

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Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#11

Post by jurgenburgen »

steveBK123 wrote: post #3

I don’t even think most of it is deeply philosophical. They just got uberrich and now worry more about the concerns of the uberrich than the concerns they had when they were normies. Rule of law, functioning government providing services, functioning public commons, free press, freedom of speech for all, any social safety net, etc don’t matter when they are so far removed from the public they can just go buy yourself…

> Rule of law, functioning government providing services

Jokes on them, without rule of law and functioning government to enforce it there is no ownership.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#12

Post by add-sub-mul-div »

croes wrote: post #4

With Musks ideas I often think I saw that movie/read that book. For his Mars plans I see the Mars colony from Total Recall, the Schwarzenegger film Like Zuckerberg‘s shift to VR that looks like he came out of the theater of Ready Player one.

Haha it would make sense they're not even sci-fi ball-knowers.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#13

Post by Avicebron »

steveBK123 wrote: post #3

I don’t even think most of it is deeply philosophical. They just got uberrich and now worry more about the concerns of the uberrich than the concerns they had when they were normies. Rule of law, functioning government providing services, functioning public commons, free press, freedom of speech for all, any social safety net, etc don’t matter when they are so far removed from the public they can just go buy yourself…

I think part of the problem this go around is that the information landscape has changed so much in ~30 years, that we are still trying to grapple with how to navigate this new terrain. If information and technology is causing everything to accelerate, we need new democratic structures to properly counter the perverse incentives of capital to compound it's power endlessly.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#14

Post by ang_cire »

Being and especially growing up rich tends to shield you from seeing the consequences of bad decisions, and I think that results in a lot of these rich tech bros being unable to properly analyze not just risk, but any negative externalities.

Every child starts out thinking, "if I was in charge, I could fix this. It's so simple!"

Then you actually see that when you make bad choices, you or others get hurt, and you realize that you don't always know what's best.

But these guys never get hurt, because they have the money to be shielded from it, so they end up being these delusional wrecking ball assholes, who think they know better than everyone else and don't need anyone else's consent (I.e. votes) to make whatever overly simplistic or authoritarian changes their underdeveloped brains concoct.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#15

Post by Jtsummers »

DustinBrett wrote: post #9
croes wrote: post #4

With Musks ideas I often think I saw that movie/read that book. For his Mars plans I see the Mars colony from Total Recall, the Schwarzenegger film Like Zuckerberg‘s shift to VR that looks like he came out of the theater of Ready Player one.

Mars was actually discovered before Total Recall was released.

> Mars was actually discovered before Total Recall was released.

No one suggested otherwise.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#16

Post by fallinghawks »

rightbyte wrote: post #7
croes wrote: post #4

With Musks ideas I often think I saw that movie/read that book. For his Mars plans I see the Mars colony from Total Recall, the Schwarzenegger film Like Zuckerberg‘s shift to VR that looks like he came out of the theater of Ready Player one.

They take warnings in popular culture as instructions or inspiration.

Heck, we're living Idiocracy right now.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#17

Post by ygjb »

jurgenburgen wrote: post #11
steveBK123 wrote: post #3

I don’t even think most of it is deeply philosophical. They just got uberrich and now worry more about the concerns of the uberrich than the concerns they had when they were normies. Rule of law, functioning government providing services, functioning public commons, free press, freedom of speech for all, any social safety net, etc don’t matter when they are so far removed from the public they can just go buy yourself…

> Rule of law, functioning government providing services Jokes on them, without rule of law and functioning government to enforce it there is no ownership.

Jokes on you. When there isn't a functional system of government there is nothing to stop rich psychopaths from paying poor psychopaths killing those who get in there way and declaring themselves dictators.

In the absence of effective laws to align people in the direction of the society they want, and constant effort to realign in response to pressure, we will fall back to tribalism and all of the attendant forms of feudalism and government that came before it. Ownership then reverts to might (or those with the resources to buy might) makes right.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#18

Post by verandaguy »

rightbyte wrote: post #7
croes wrote: post #4

With Musks ideas I often think I saw that movie/read that book. For his Mars plans I see the Mars colony from Total Recall, the Schwarzenegger film Like Zuckerberg‘s shift to VR that looks like he came out of the theater of Ready Player one.

They take warnings in popular culture as instructions or inspiration.

It's basically the Torment Nexus meme: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torment_Nexus

... but I guess some people took this as positive reinforcement.

Re: Silicon Valley misreads science fiction and undermines democracy

#19

Post by NamlchakKhandro »

croes wrote: post #4

With Musks ideas I often think I saw that movie/read that book. For his Mars plans I see the Mars colony from Total Recall, the Schwarzenegger film Like Zuckerberg‘s shift to VR that looks like he came out of the theater of Ready Player one.

Zuckerberg style the idea from snow crash
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