271–280 of 354 posts
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The option is still available to you though. Sticking your head in the sand could be a great strategy if it improves your happiness and wellbeing.
> The option is still available to you though. Sticking your head in the sand could be a great strategy if it improves your happiness and wellbeing. Right now I am picturing the dog drinking coffee in the burning room meme.
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I hear a lot more rage, envy, cynicism, bitterness, nihilism, and and learned helplessness than grief.
it sounds like you should learn a bit more about grief. also, please, for god's sake, read the original. I've linked to it in at the top of the article. As to envious, I'm a Director of Engineering. What exactly do you think is left for me to be envious of? The levels above (VP, SVP, CTO at a non-startup) are outside of my interest.
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i dunno. i'm happy to read in the comments here (and elsewhere) that my experience is not unique, many others have similar experiences and are going through the same feelings: grief. i think we're allowed to grieve, don't you?
I hear a lot more rage, envy, cynicism, bitterness, nihilism, and and learned helplessness than grief.
Yes. And the reason for all of this is the same as it's always been, and requires literally no technical knowledge to understand. There is essentially zero accountability for harm. There is no button on your toaster that blows up the toaster. But there's a link in your email. And that's a button. And no one has figured out how to punish Microsoft or Apple or Google for allowing that to continue, though we do this jus…
I agree, but would dare you to go one step further: there is no accountability for harm because, being the "bourgeoisie" under neoliberal capitalism, capital insulates them from consequences.
Gotta sue people and companies. Gotta get governments to do more regulation. I know this place is kind of allergic to that, but hey.
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> The option is still available to you though. Sticking your head in the sand could be a great strategy if it improves your happiness and wellbeing. Right now I am picturing the dog drinking coffee in the burning room meme.
I really think this is extreme doomerism. Things are not that bad. And as I say, wouldn't you be happier if you lived in an environment where you were not impacted by all the stuff you dislike?
Four things:
1. I am a parent. Ignoring like the world doesn't exist is not an option.
> wouldn't you be happier if you lived in an environment where you were not impacted by all the stuff you dislike?
2. That would not be possible.
3. If you have the capability to do something, some believe you have an obligation to. Actively working to not make a shit world requires a deep awareness and understanding that leads to consistent action.
4. Trying to isolate yourself like in the face of so much suffering, including those around you, seems like the most selfish thing I can imagine. Could never be me.
> Things are not that bad.
For YOU maybe, for fucks sake.
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So? We produce enough food for 10 billion people every year, there's only 8 billion of us and a billion are hungry. Those seem like legible KPIs for shareholders (i.e. humanity) to pursue, no? And while World GDP is up, it's come at the expensive of the systems we depend on. I want my son to live on a livable planet, and not under the constant threat of destitution. And I want that for all children, not just mine.
Everyone wants that. But people on this thread are arguing that technology is reducing our standard of living, which is just factually untrue.
High trust societies, a feeling of place and well-being in a culture, connectedness, etc.
https://data.worldhappiness.report/map
Note: Look at the US continuing to move down the report year after year.
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> People don’t hand wash clothing for money because we have machines to do that now. We don’t need people delivering news papers because the news is delivered digitally. Those jobs aren't creative knowledge work. The advent of digital audio workstations didn't reduce the number of musicians - it increased the amount of music. Now that we can write code with AI, we (as a civilization) will simply write more code than…
What you're describing is akin to Jevon's paradox. Let's see. The Industrial Revolution, I think a good analogy, caused years of death & suffering before raising standards of living, and even then only so because of mass organizing & uprising.
Long hours? Sure, but that's not new (or universal), and AI definitely didn't cause it.
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You are the rich people.
No, there's a difference between doing well for yourself and exploiting the labor of others to capture stupendous amounts of excess capital, then reinvesting part of that to make even more.