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Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

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Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#221

Post by mlrtime »

raumgeist wrote: post #129
apples_oranges wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

money is a judgement of value to society and a motivator to only allocate work in a useful way.. wouldn't UBI, even if coupled to actually producing _something_ will lead to a lot of useless stuff being made?

We as a society would profit from not categorizing everything in terms of its usefulness. Things can and should be allowed to just be . That being said, UBI would probably result in more useful things not less. There are so many cases of jobs and things that seem to just be busywork or outright scams. There are also a lot of things that only appear useful if you never take the time to think about them. A plastic stra…

I hope you don't take this as a negative, but sometimes I wish I could think like people like you, very positive, but maybe I'm old/cynical?

There is a problem with "plus some so you can participate in society"

In a massive society this will never be agreed to. The 'some' here will never be enough. Too little and it's not UBI, too much and impossible to fund. Who is going to define what a luxury is? Is owning your own home a luxury, a car, washer and dryer?

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#222

Post by mlrtime »

simianwords wrote: post #70
nine_k wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What useless things?

Partake in war

War has existed as long as humans have. If you have any ideas for how to remove fear, aggression and disagreement from humans you might just be a god or a saint.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#223

Post by cyanydeez »

10xDev wrote: post #179

You will get laid off but you won't if you create value and you will create value if you don't care about money and it will go recursive but it won't go recursive because there are limits. It won't change anything but it will change everything. No one knows what he is actually saying (see comments) but at least he managed to compress the entire discourse on AI impact into a blog post.

AI is just another realm for corporate rentseeking.

Do we really think these billions of debt generatjon is anything else?

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#224

Post by TonyStr »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #82
apples_oranges wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

money is a judgement of value to society and a motivator to only allocate work in a useful way.. wouldn't UBI, even if coupled to actually producing _something_ will lead to a lot of useless stuff being made?

> wouldn't UBI, even if coupled to actually producing _something_ will lead to a lot of useless stuff being made? The general premise of a UBI is that it's unconditional. If you tried to say someone is required to produce something without specifying what it is, they'll produce whatever is the easiest thing to produce, which will naturally be useless if they otherwise wouldn't have produced anything because the only…

Curious, how would this affect the production of things that have long supply chains, or require lots of manual labor? There are many things that require labor, like plumbing, irrigation, farming, transportation, brick firing, steel production, etc. where the product is either an intermediary step, or otherwise contributes to something that the worker doesn't themself benefit from. Who would create my car, computer, desk, house, etc. if people are only working for themselves? Maybe I misunderstood your comment

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#225

Post by fragmede »

peepee1982 wrote: post #174

[flagged]

This trope also contains a trap, however. There have been major insights from people stepping outside their lane. Physicists went into econ and built a whole subfield called econophysics, with Pareto and Mandelbrot among them. Mathematicians have transformed biology with population genetics, which led scientists to predict how genes spread through populations. Or the SIR model for how infections spread. Hidden Markov models lead to gene finding. Closer to home, we have exceptional programmers making giant piles of money in finance, with Simons and his Medallion Fund returning some 66% before fees. And then there's Bitcoin.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#226

Post by mike_hearn »

deaux wrote: post #208
mike_hearn wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quite a few governments have trouble verifying identity reliably. But to the extent they can do it, it's because there are lots of people employed to do so. The UBI thesis outline above is that you can find the money to pay for it by eliminating all those job roles from the government, so you can't use their existence to justify UBI as affordable.

Let's look at other wealthy countries with large economies. Germany, Japan, UK, France, Italy, Canada, Spain, Australia, South Korea, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Taiwan.. Which of these have trouble verifying identity reliably, to the extent that it would be a meaningful obstacle to UBI?

Even if governments were perfect at ID verification it wouldn't change the argument above, right? Being perfect at verifying UBI eligibility would require a large government infrastructure, just like today, so you can't claim that the U part makes it super cheap to administer.

But no government is close to perfect. Here are some examples for your edification.

The UK doesn't even know how many people are living there, and it's an island. There's no centralized identity scheme and during COVID more people came forward for vaccination in some age bands than theoretically existed at all.

Germany fails at reliably verifying that people who turn up for a language test as part of naturalization are the same people being given citizenship: https://www.infomigrants.net/en/post/69787/germany-police-ar...

All countries struggle with basics like "is the recipient of the welfare dead". Here's a specific case where Italy didn't notice it should stop paying out a state pension (a form of UBI) for years after death, with the fraudster only getting busted when he tried to dress up as his own mother: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/nov/25/italian-man-dr...

Paying out money to dead people is a very common problem. Here's an EU report on all the basic ways countries get defrauded by failing to track basic facts about identities:

https://www.ela.europa.eu/sites/default/files/2025-03/SSC_fi...

"Common fraud and error cases include falsified documents (birth, marriage and death certificates), identity fraud and falsified non-payment certificates"

Even in UBI, there would be a strong expectation that each person only receives it once. But checking stuff like that requires a huge bureaucracy.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#227

Post by sfn42 »

JonChesterfield wrote: post #201

This is a trap for engineers. If you don't worry about the returns, you won't get any. There are circumstances where that is fine. Be sure you're in one of them first.

I just do my job to the best of my ability. If I can help a colleague I do. I don't expect to get explicitly credited for everything I do.

If my employer can't see or don't care about the value I bring, I simply go to one who values me higher. I refuse to participate in office politics and that kind of BS.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#228

Post by camillomiller »

vasco wrote: post #218
throwaway346434 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh nonsense. Reverse the argument, does it make any sense? "Every time a (whaling ship crew, police force, oil executive, etc) gets angry at protestors and sprays them with (water cannons, rubber bullets, lawsuits), they are more likely to join them!"

Unfortunately you're so far from the point that I don't think it's worth explaining. But the wisdom I shared is not mine, it exists for thousands of years. People have known for a long time it's useless to spend too long worrying about things you can't change, and that they should focus on those they can. And that bitterness is not going to help you. Those are the only assertions I'm making. If you want to live bitte…

Stoicism must be the most misconstrued and misunderstood philosophical framework ever. It's just so good for the people in power, and Silicon Valley seems to have eaten it up perfectly and spit out a version of it that is quintessentially functional to convince people that questioning power is useless.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#229

Post by thendrill »

JonChesterfield wrote: post #201

This is a trap for engineers. If you don't worry about the returns, you won't get any. There are circumstances where that is fine. Be sure you're in one of them first.

So you think that engineers that maintain and write the FOSS that runs most of the world IT infrastructure ( Linux, Curl, GIT etc. ) do it for the returns ?

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#230

Post by globular-toast » 

    Under heaven all can see beauty as beauty only because there is ugliness.
    All can know good as good only because there is evil.
    
    Therefore having and not having arise together.
    Difficult and easy complement each other.
    Long and short contrast each other:
    High and low rest upon each other;
    Voice and sound harmonize each other;
    Front and back follow one another.
    
    Therefore the sage goes about doing nothing, teaching no-talking.
    The ten thousand things rise and fall without cease,
    Creating, yet not possessing.
    Working, yet not taking credit.
    Work is done, then forgotten.
    Therefore it lasts forever.
-- Tao Te Ching verse 2.
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