171–180 of 211 posts
On Twitter, Colin Fraser pointed out that Black Mirror was somewhat optimistic in that the horrible evil technology actually works as described[1]. Truly pessimistic science fiction would have - people worshipping an AI God which is demonstrably dumber than a dog - friendly humanoid robots which don't really understand how to walk down a flight of stairs - gravitational warp drives which are purely cosmetic and canno…
Hmm I could argue that Philip Dick's doors that demand payment to open are a good pessimistic prediction of the current entshittification.
I do think it's a genuinely interesting speculation—what happens if we paid real-life things not as a subscription, but based on usage, like an API. Not advocating for that at all, but it makes me want to read Ubik or write a short story about how it would affect life.
Are you thinking a flat rate or one based on local population density?
Optimistic science fiction shows humanity applying unique ingenuity to solve tough problems. Our lived reality today is that we already know the technical solutions to many tough problems (hunger, homelessness, many diseases, overpopulation, climate change, war) but simply refuse to apply them. Of course people don’t believe optimistic sci-fi anymore. Star Trek the original series is usually taken as an example of op…
> Our lived reality today is that we already know the technical solutions to many tough problems (hunger, homelessness, many diseases, overpopulation, climate change, war) but simply refuse to apply them. Do we? We can do a lot for individuals, but even with cooperation, maybe can’t immediately give food and shelter to everyone, let alone fix climate change (war is fixable with cooperation, but unless I’m mistaken a…
The problem isn't lack of solutions. It's lack of cooperation on every level from individuals to organizations to social groups to nations to transnational organizations.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Our lived reality today is that we already know the technical solutions to many tough problems (hunger, homelessness, many diseases, overpopulation, climate change, war) but simply refuse to apply them. Do we? We can do a lot for individuals, but even with cooperation, maybe can’t immediately give food and shelter to everyone, let alone fix climate change (war is fixable with cooperation, but unless I’m mistaken a…
> We can do a lot for individuals, but even with cooperation, maybe can’t immediately give food and shelter to everyone It oddly isn't all that desirable. You don't want to depend entirely on the generosity of others. What you want is a fighting chance to take care of yourself. Helping there, even a little bit is both very effective and very easy.
My biggest issue with most scifi now-a-days is it ignores the acceleration of tech. Of course there's "Accelerando" and "Marooned in Realtime" but lots of scifi has "race/society X has been doing Y for 1000s of years" and now I immediately tune out because no society is going to remain static enough to do Y for thousands of years unless there is some premise in the book preventing anyone from inventing anything new.…
Or, there's always the potential for war and decline. Advanced civilizations have risen before, then crumbled and lost a lot of their technology. The same could happen on a larger scale.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
You never hear people talk about what slavery did for homelessness. One can be quite deranged, if a mean and a bed are provided and we beat you with a stick you are motivated to do the manual labor. It is also a sound method to overcome addiction. If pampered people living the good life cant quit smoking, stop drinking, cant quit Valium, cant stop eating. What would it be like to wake up under the bridge with an empt…
This is just slavery fanfiction. Mentally ill, uncooperative slaves would more likely have been killed to "send a message" to the others, and I expect functional addiction would be encouraged for manual labourers so long as it didn't harm productivity. I don't know what would lead you to draw assumptions like this (well, beyond the obvious).
We've made a lot of progress collectively and want to help everyone but end up doing a pretty crappy job.
I know some people who aren't doing very well mentally and do some substance abuse. Their job preserves what little sanity they have left. The periods between jobs are sheer terror, they almost die and might lose their home.
Star Trek ToS and TNG were more utopian, but I loved those ss well. The difference with today? It was about grand ideas and exploration, not pew pew and 1 sec crosscut fisticuffs by toddlers throwing a tantrum at a pindrop.
I look forward to a world where people no longer need to sacrifice their curiosity to earn bread, clothes and basic housing. UBI would be a good start, but with the resources at hand we should be able to do more. I look forward to a world where potentials are promptly discovered and put to be nurtured, instead of being wasted or randomly thrown to the society. Every one willing to share what they have learned or made…