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Rethinking the Luddites

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Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#231

Post by heavyset_go »

fiftyfifty wrote: post #99
JohnFen wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By replacing labour with robots and not compensating them, you're sending a clear message that you don't respect people and the value that they bring. Companies already send that clear message even without AI. That's why there's fear here: we expect companies to behave as they always have, and that is with a level of contempt for human workers.

What about as consumers then? Without workers who's going to buy anything? We have some serious logistics to figure out if we automate the majority of jobs away, and yet somehow all these companies are expecting people to still be able to buy their products.

Read CitiGroup's Plutonomy paper and equity strategy that addresses just this contradiction[1].

The economy will shift to just addressing the wants and needs of those with wealth via luxury goods and services:

> How do we make money from this theme? We see two ways. The first is simple. If you believe, like us, that the Plutonomy exists, and explains why global imbalances have built up (for example the savings rate differentials), and you believe there is no imminent threat to plutonomy, you must in turn believe that the current “end of the world is nigh” risk premium on equities, due to current account deficits, is too high. Conclusion: buy equities.

> There is however a more refined way to play plutonomy, and this is to buy shares in the companies that make the toys that the Plutonomists enjoy.

[1] https://delong.typepad.com/plutonomy-1.pdf

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#232

Post by pixl97 »

Aerroon wrote: post #157
w_for_wumbo wrote: post #3

There's plenty of rhetoric about whether technology advancements will be a good thing or not. But I think that distracts from the core message, that the most important matter is not whether we use technology, but how we treat our fellow humans. By replacing labour with robots and not compensating them, you're sending a clear message that you don't respect people and the value that they bring. We have a mandate for us…

> By replacing labour with robots and not compensating them, you're sending a clear message that you don't respect people and the value that they bring. This just sounds like rent-seeking. People should get paid, because they once upon a time had a job. Now machines do the job better and for cheaper, therefore you deserve to be paid for it? How about the compensation is the improved products or better prices for all…

Ok, then what should they get paid for?

Lets imagine your future world.

Manual labor, right? No, that's done by robots.

Arts and music... well, no. Some generative LLM hooked up to the data feeds of all human emotions is cranking more art/music per day then all 10 billion people on the planet can ever consume.

Sex, the oldest profession. Na, Cherry (and Ken) 2000 came out a decade ago and has met our more primal needs since then.

So, now what do you do with all these masses have have no purpose. Oh, you don't care because you're going to be one of the enlightened few that somehow makes it out of the rat trap? Seems unlikely.

Stop demanding a future dystopia.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#233

Post by TerrifiedMouse »

bamboozled wrote: post #199
rossriley wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People bring the value that they generate for an economy. Once they can be replaced with AI/Robots then that labour can be reallocated further up the value chain which in turn makes our economies and culture richer and more productive. Imagine if we were all working 18 hour subsistence farming jobs now just to survive, it's ridiculous to argue that eschewing automation for anything is detrimental, it only serves to e…

Have you ever seen with your own eyes a farmer working 18 hours a day ? My theory is the 18 hour subsistence farmer story is a myth we tell ourselves that the world we’ve created is better, no questions asked. I live in a part of the world where people do a surprising amount of farming by hand. Very little machines and almost no fertiliser is used. No one, absolutely no one is working 18 hours. Mostly they have busy…

Automations like the automatic loom made clothes cheaper. Automation is responsible for a lot of our current quality of life. Do you really want to go back a 200+ years in QoL?

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#234

Post by debatem1 »

SoftTalker wrote: post #176
failuser wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100 oligarchs can own everything and trade among each other to fulfill their megaprojects. Does a pharaoh care who built his pyramid? Or spaceship? The workers will still be needed to laugh at their suffering. Unless robots get better than humans even at that.

Where are the pharaohs today? That sort of social imbalance leads inevitably to revolution. Always has. It's not sustainable.

It's no coincidence that we in the US have massive wealth inequality and are constantly teetering on the edge of political instability.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#235

Post by fatherzine »

jmye wrote: post #181
fatherzine wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, we need a system in which labor intrinsically creates the lion share of value.

Why? Should we demand that Ford shuts down its assembly lines and instead hires tens of thousands of people to manually machine and assemble all of the parts of the car? If not, why is that labor unimportant, but other labor is vital and supremely valuable? There’s this weird place some of you have ended up, wherein all prior automation is good and fine, but future automation must cease immediately, solely to preserv…

The fundamental challenge of life is striking the right balance, inhabiting an ecological niche. Too cold - die out. Too hot - die out. Too dry - die out. Too wet - die out. Etc. Why would automation be any different?

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#236

Post by TerrifiedMouse »

jmye wrote: post #181
fatherzine wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or, we need a system in which labor intrinsically creates the lion share of value.

Why? Should we demand that Ford shuts down its assembly lines and instead hires tens of thousands of people to manually machine and assemble all of the parts of the car? If not, why is that labor unimportant, but other labor is vital and supremely valuable? There’s this weird place some of you have ended up, wherein all prior automation is good and fine, but future automation must cease immediately, solely to preserv…

I think the question is what do we do when everything is automated - that’s the main “threat” of AI.

People have always been able to find other work when displaced by automation - unpleasant task though. What happens when there are no more “other work” or there aren’t enough remaining jobs to support the population?

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#237

Post by heavyset_go »

danuker wrote: post #135
w_for_wumbo wrote: post #3

There's plenty of rhetoric about whether technology advancements will be a good thing or not. But I think that distracts from the core message, that the most important matter is not whether we use technology, but how we treat our fellow humans. By replacing labour with robots and not compensating them, you're sending a clear message that you don't respect people and the value that they bring. We have a mandate for us…

> By replacing labour with robots and not compensating them, you're sending a clear message that you don't respect people and the value that they bring. I see many problems with this statement: - Is a new robot-only company fairer than firing humans at an old company? - Should we as a society forego the benefits of automation, because it makes some people unemployed? - Should there be a robot tax? What is a robot? Is…

> - Should we as a society forego the benefits of automation, because it makes some people unemployed?

We as society aren't the beneficiaries of automation, those profits go to private owners. Given that price points exist, the benefits of lowering costs of production are captured by increasing profit margins.

After those profits are captured, we as society have to shoulder the burden of caring for potentially thousands, or more, people who are put out of work, and their families.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#239

Post by pixl97 »

ta8645 wrote: post #62
OkayPhysicist wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not entirely fair. The main downside Capitalism has in this discussion is that the wellbeing of the people is not even one of it's stated goals. You can argue all you like about Socialism being a failed ideology, or impossibly utopian, that's it's own conversation. But it makes the common welfare a stated goal to strive for. Capitalism does not. Capitalism's goal is to maximize the creation wealth by allowing…

> In contrast, Communism's stated goal is the achievement of a classless What good is a stated goal if the reality is the opposite? Capitalism may not have a lofty sounding goal to your ear, but the fair trade of goods and services is actually a pursuit in the betterment and empowerment of mankind. Of course, human nature gets in the way, and leads to corruption that needs to be constantly addressed and readdressed,…

> it has the benefit of having proven to be able to lift a huge bulk of humanity out of subsistence living.

This is what happens when you smoke too much of your own propaganda.

America is very much a mixed economy, and we're the so called 'leader' of the capitalistic world. If the US had been allowed to be an unchallenged capitalistic country then we'd look very much like Russia today (which is not communistic in any way), a corrupt shithole. A huge part of our success was the labor movements of the mid 1800s in which a fair number of people died in. Then later in the 1930s after unchecked capitalism brought about a horrific crash that required a massive amount of socialistic policies to bring us back from the brink and get the economy working.

The reality of these situations is far more complex than the red white and blue cheerleading we're taught in school.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#240

Post by _aavaa_ »

selestify wrote: post #227
_aavaa_ wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I understand you correctly, selling counterfeit/falsely marketed goods is only a problem if enough buyers can tell the difference?

No, they never said anything about lying. That would be selling something the customer didn’t paying for. Selling lower quality goods like the article mentions is not a problem if the customers are fine with it given the lower price of the goods. The customer is responsible for making their own decisions about whether to prioritize cost or quality. As the person you were replying to says, by their actions (purchasing…

Hmm. You’re right. This article does not have that claim, I was misremembering it from a similar article written by Cory Doctorow [0]. Also written today, also written on the same book.

He has a long sections: > The true tale of the Luddites starts with workers demanding that the laws be upheld. When factory owners began to buy automation systems for textile production, they did so in violation of laws that required collaboration with existing craft guilds – laws designed to ensure that automation was phased in gradually, with accommodations for displaced workers. These laws also protected the public, with the guilds evaluating the quality of cloth produced on the machine, acting as a proxy for buyers who might otherwise be tricked into buying inferior goods. > > Factory owners flouted these laws. Though the machines made cloth that was less durable and of inferior weave, they sold it to consumers as though it were as good as the guild-made textiles.

Now. The New Yorker article simply states the factories sold worse goods cheaper. Other articles I’ve found published today on it are as vague, or say nothing at all about this specific thing.

The ebook is only sold with Adobe’s DRM, so I won’t be buying that. So I’ll have find another way to see what’s true.

[0]: https://pluralistic.net/2023/09/26/enochs-hammer/#more-6752

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