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Rethinking the Luddites

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Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#451

Post by jampekka »

livrem wrote: post #428
jampekka wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The better of countries have already reached the point where increase in GDP doesn't increase wellbeing, and wellbeing is actually in decline.

This is probably one of the reasons why there is finally talk in some countries of moving on to a four-day week.

At least in nordic countries there was a systematic (and even somewhat successful) political agenda to reduce working hours in the 1980s (when social democracy was the leading ideology). This has appeared sporadically in discussions as well but in practice during the neoliberal era the push has been to longer hours.

IMHO having to work more when productivity and automation increases is quite a clear sign of a fundamentally broken economic system.

https://www.atlasofplaces.com/essays/on-the-phenomenon-of-bu...

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#452

Post by hef19898 »

glimshe wrote: post #448
Joker_vD wrote: post #442

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the government reaction to the whole thing was equally absurd. It, however, would later give Marx a nice example of how the government is the tool that the ruling class uses to oppress the working classes and get their way: because when seen from this angle, the reaction was entirely reasonable.

While originating in Marxism, this thought is also exposed by Libertarians in their critique of government. Giving too much power to the government is basically the same as giving power to elites and thus it is a move against freedom.

Ironic how most egalitarians are themselves elites. They want less government, when it hinders them. For all other reasons, government is good. E.g. fighting wars to get oil...

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#453

Post by klik99 »

I heard Brian Merchant on 99% Invisible and this take is slight historical revisionism, but I'm ok with that.

It's revisionist because he's conflating the earlier movement when workers tried to negotiate with factory owners and organize with the Luddite movement. True - the failure of the first movement led to Ludditism out of desperation, but the groups are separate. Luddite literally is named after Ned Ludd smashing machinery, so it cannot be the name of the movement that was around organizing and negotiation because they only turned to smashing when organizing was made illegal. Basically workers tried to negotiate, were stymied, and a bunch of frustrated people started smashing machines, which caused a positive reaction from people so it started spreading and others started smashing stuff too.

When I first heard of Ludditism it was with more nuance that it's used today - to be a Luddite was to rage against technology with the art of a bull in a china shop. It wasn't a blanket term against "anti-progress" like it is now, but rather a dumb approach to dealing with change. Of course now it is used just to shut down people who don't like technology, so that's why I'm ok with some amount of revisionism, since the way it's being used currently is revisionist itself.

The only danger in conflating these legit concerns about automation with a violent movement is this implication that violence is the only way to bridge this gap, and I can see a strong argument that is was true back in those days, due to the Crown literally making any organizing and collective negotiation illegal, I strongly don't believe it's true today. I believe a violent reaction today would cause more harm to workers rights than help.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#454

Post by FrustratedMonky »

davidgoudet wrote: post #343
sakex wrote: post #330

> Today, the word “Luddite” is used as an insult to anyone resistant to technological innovation Interesting, I never thought of the term as pejorative. I always thought of the movement as a kind of working-class heroes trying to navigate an uncertain future where rich people made them obsolete.

It's not pejorative for you if you are a liberal, for me it is pejorative, I see Luddites as people who damage important parts of production systems and threaten people's lives. I understand your point of view if you're from a first-world country and you never experienced the terror of having people interfering with the means of production.

No It is pejorative in First World also. I'd say the dominant view is that it is pejorative .

Really, all through collage and career, in the US for last 30 years.

Calling someone a Luddite was an insult, someone that is standing in the way, not smart, desiring to just go live on a farm without any technology because it is all just too complicated.

I've never heard the term used in a positive way.

Not saying this is true of the actual Luddites, just how the term is used in the US.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#455

Post by adwn »

zlg_codes wrote: post #55
lolinder wrote: post #6

This version of the Luddites is the one I was taught in my history classes—in both HS and college my teachers were careful to emphasize that the colloquial usage and the actual movement are only loosely related, and we discussed how the Luddites weren't rejecting technology per se so much as they were acting out of desperation to preserve their way of life. This is certainly something worth learning from today, and a…

There are many things twisted like this in our living memory and it irritates the hell out of me. How do we deal with it aside from endlessly correcting people? Indeed, Luddites weren't against technology. The McDonald's hot coffee lady case wasn't frivolous. "The customer is always right..."? Yeah, "... in matters of taste." It means you don't sell a customer who wants a green car a red one. The "welfare queen" stor…

> The McDonald's hot coffee lady case wasn't frivolous.

No, this isn't "twisted in our living memory". The people who think that the lawsuit is frivolous haven't forgotten that the coffee was hotter than other fast-food coffee, or rather, it has no bearing on their assessment.

Coffee is a hot beverage, and it's in your personal responsibility not to put a flimsy cup containing a hot beverage between your legs, especially not while sitting in a car. It's completely irrelevant whether the coffee was 85°C, 75°C, or 65°C, or whether there's a large warning label on the side of the cup – as an adult you can be expected to exert common sense, and if you don't, then McDonald's shouldn't be held liable for your clumsiness.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#456

Post by nemo44x »

myth_drannon wrote: post #426
jampekka wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And we have the, mostly commercial, propaganda machine controlling the masses. And regardless, if the masses would try to use the ballot box to make moves to something like FALC, it would be taken away, by force if necessary. This has been seen countless times. Looking at how wealth, capital and power are concentrating, we are well on our way to some sort of new feudal system.

How do we know we are not in feudal system right now? Propaganda machine is telling us we are in a democracy, but all I see is oligarchy controlling the system.

It’s called the iron law of oligarchy.[1] All democratic organizations decay into oligarchies - a minority group of elites that are in control. So the question becomes who gets to join that elite and how do people get cycled out of it. When there isn’t a sufficient cycling (people who shouldn’t be a part any longer remain - nepotism etc; people that don’t deserve to be a part are invited - diversity for diversities sake, etc) people then it becomes rotten.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_law_of_oligarchy

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#457

Post by shanusmagnus »

psychoslave wrote: post #321

Directly make me think about Bill Joy: Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us https://www.wired.com/2000/04/joy-2/ https://reasonandmeaning.com/2014/12/02/bill-joy-why-the-fut...

Thanks for making that connection, Joy was an interesting voice back in the day. Curious: has he done anything in longer form than that Wired article to expand this idea?

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#458

Post by creer »

jschveibinz wrote: post #361
Modified3019 wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Conversely, a country that allows AI to replace too many jobs will find itself buried in masses of angry people with little to lose except their devalued lives.

Both of these comments are excellent. However, countries don’t make decisions. Individuals (that are mentally capable) make decisions, within their economic framework, and the result emerges at the national or global level. Individuals will decide how to respond to AI, and we will see what happens. My guess, based on past adoptions of work-saving technologies, is that anyone capable of using AI to make their job easi…

Countries (governments) make lots of decisions as (governmental) entities with their own (effective) lives. Probably too many too fast. The problem is they often make the wrong decisions in spite of having very large and often educated staff. That's a problem. Someone asked recently what are the large problems facing humanity going forward and I think this is one of them. Government as entities will make lots of decisions in this case and no doubt most will be at counter-purpose. And this is a huge problem for humanity in general (because of the gross, terrible economic inefficiency of the process.)

We must find far more effective ways for governments to think, deliberate, simulate, act or not act, implement, enforce.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#459

Post by klik99 »

__loam wrote: post #402
hef19898 wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is sometimes scary how long propaganda continues to work. In the case of the Luddites, ot was factory owners propaganda about, rightfully, discruntled workers opossing abuse and exploitation. In a sense, this propaganda win in England gave us the current oppossition to unions we see in the US and among corporations.

It's funny this guy was worried about the luddites hurting people when several luddites were ultimately gunned down.

Luddites were very careful not to hurt any people (I think in one case they were cornered by defensive action, but that was clearly in self-defense), and they even only targeted specific machines they had problems with, leaving all other machines intact. But just the same I don't agree with their methods since any violence is easily co-opted to paint them as bad and ultimately hurts the goals they were trying to achieve.

Re: Rethinking the Luddites

#460

Post by thiagoharry »

jmye wrote: post #195
OkayPhysicist wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about lofty idealism. It's about central goals. Sometimes, even oftentimes, goals are failed to be met. But, when it comes time to sacrifice something, it's invariable that a side effect will be cut rather than the central goal. Look at a company. The purpose of a company is to make money. Not all companies are successful: lots of companies fail to make money. But, when push comes to shove, and a company nee…

> The purpose of a company is to make money. Not all companies are successful: lots of companies fail to make money. But, when push comes to shove, and a company needs to choose between "make money" and something else, say, a commitment to not being evil, the company will choose "make money". Are non-profits not “companies”? Are there no small businesses that opt against expansion? This is a reductive and ridiculous…

> Are non-profits not “companies”? Are there no small businesses that opt against expansion?

Well, non-profits are not exactly capitalist companies like the ones for profit. Neither necessarily are the small business where the owner values other things over the expansion and profit. But these things are not much relevant when concerning most of production, the things that influence a country's GDP. These small businesses or non-profit organizations indeed may have concerns other than profit. But good luck convincing shareholders in a big company that they should take the less profitable path, especially if there is competition with other companies.

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