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DividedQuantum
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A dystopian future? 1
#26578124 - 04/04/20 09:15 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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It seems to me that in the future – certainly by thirty years from now – we will indeed have nationalized healthcare and a universal basic income system, but that this will have come at a rather sobering cost. People’s immediate needs will be covered by social programs, at no cost to them, but it strikes me that there will be an extremely powerful elite, who own the fully automated industries and basically run the government. This system will compensate the population through a universal basic income – but I imagine it will not be very lucrative. So we will have a population that is free to do as it wishes, within reason, but one that will not have much spending power and that will be totally subservient to a system that represents the grossest division of class and wealth in human history. This status quo will, doubtless, be very difficult to change if anyone wanted to. And after a certain point – after A.I. is able to replace doctors, lawyers, judges and pilots, and what have you – everyone outside of the elite will be in a powerless position, and the elite, whoever they are, will be untouchable. That this would not grow into a dark dystopia is, it would appear, difficult to imagine. But then, it begs the question as to how long A.I. will need humans around…
How accurate or inaccurate do you feel this prediction to be? If the latter, in what direction do you see civilization going? Can we avoid an undesirable situation for society, or is there even any reason to worry?
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Grapefruit
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Likely for the US because of the inflexibility of the political system and the extent to which money already constitutes political currency. Quite possible for europe too, although it has a more authoritarian system with stronger political idealism, I think politicians there are less likely to sell out for capital.
Don't think it will happen to China as politicians there seem pretty keen to keep hold of their authoritarian/totalitarian control and ideals. A lot of people already see it as very dystopian and in many ways it is but they have at least been able to keep their poor fed and sheltered impressively well for a country with low GDP.
Russia has already sold out to gangsterism and that may well last the fall of Putin, it remains to be seen.
What with modern weaponary being very strong and able to keep revolution in check easily I think every country will eventually go the way of either selling out to capital or back to totalitarian dictator states.
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laughingdog
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. Well, DQ, it assumes surviving climate change, & surviving more viruses (which are predicted), no covid-19 accidents in nuclear submarines, and ignores what CRISPR may do. . So I don't think any predictions are possible given the level of instability at present. . But it may be as good a guess as any other scenario. . Anything dystopian seems more likely than anything utopian. . Should we survive, all these wild cards, further loss of any remaining privacy, in regards to the state seems sure to vanish.
As regards: "free to do as it wishes, within reason". The devil is in the details of how that is defined. Seems you are imagining, a rather gray world. What will keep the masses content? What sort of education will be available? You may have the start of a good sic-fi novel....
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redgreenvines
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in star trek, they still have cities and vineyards, it can't be all bad
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thealienthatategod
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what's worrying is that the dystopia may be worshiped. how many will trap themselves inside of a collective invisible prison willfully? as the old physicality is ushered out, what ideologies will become dominant, as a majority of humans don't even seem to know what they want?
industrial society has been manipulating the majority since it first established its social order. technological society easily manipulates the majority because the progress and consequences of technology are seen as necessaries. the new equilibrium is adjusting humans themselves to fit the new order, so that those who choose to serve in the invisible prison do not lose faith in its progress. what last bit of local autonomy humans have will be lost for good.
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laughingdog
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Quote:
thealienthatategod said: what's worrying is that the dystopia may be worshiped. how many will trap themselves inside of a collective invisible prison willfully? as the old physicality is ushered out, what ideologies will become dominant, as a majority of humans don't even seem to know what they want?
industrial society has been manipulating the majority since it first established its social order. technological society easily manipulates the majority because the progress and consequences of technology are seen as necessaries. the new equilibrium is adjusting humans themselves to fit the new order, so that those who choose to serve in the invisible prison do not lose faith in its progress. what last bit of local autonomy humans have will be lost for good.
. Seems like generally good insights.
. As regards "so that those who choose to serve in the " - some might argue that already most don't consciously choose much of importance anyway - for example most have the same religion as their parents, while others might join the army, 'cause it seems like "a good career move", (after the recruiter persuaded them & 'cause their uncle served), & end up becoming killers and returning wounded for life, and so on. . Their "real" choices are about which rug matches the sofa. And some would go so far as to say the 2 party system is only another way of providing illusory choice.
Edited by laughingdog (04/05/20 11:05 AM)
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DividedQuantum
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Quote:
thealienthatategod said: what's worrying is that the dystopia may be worshiped. how many will trap themselves inside of a collective invisible prison willfully? as the old physicality is ushered out, what ideologies will become dominant, as a majority of humans don't even seem to know what they want?
industrial society has been manipulating the majority since it first established its social order. technological society easily manipulates the majority because the progress and consequences of technology are seen as necessaries. the new equilibrium is adjusting humans themselves to fit the new order, so that those who choose to serve in the invisible prison do not lose faith in its progress. what last bit of local autonomy humans have will be lost for good.
Yes that's just how I see it. In accordance with your points, my suppositions above are just a logical continuation of processes that are already in place, and have been in place for a long time. Certainly, if things do evolve this way, one might possibly hope people accept it, because there won't be anything they can do about it at all. As I pointed out, as much as the elite have a stranglehold on power now, in a hyper-technological society in which nobody works, and gets a very small UBI check every month, the people in charge -- those who own the machines and run the government, own the whole economy -- will be totally untouchable.
Indeed, it was the whole thrust of my original post that in such a world, whatever relative autonomy people have had to influence social affairs, in whatever small way, will be gone. If the powers that be decide to incentivize people's lives with some sort of capacity for hope and a belief in progress, that might be desirable for the masses, but of course it would be an impotent assent. Of course, after all, commerce has been about fabricating wants for a long time, so one would expect that might continue. But if there is no general assent among the populace, that is when we slip into dystopia.
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Rahz
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: But then, it begs the question as to how long A.I. will need humans around…
I was thinking, how long the rich will want the poor around. Limiting the population to less than a billion would solve so many environmental problems and reserve natural resources for many generations.
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laughingdog
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: ...If the powers that be decide to incentivize people's lives with some sort of capacity for hope and a belief in progress, that might be desirable for the masses, but of course it would be an impotent assent. Of course, after all, commerce has been about fabricating wants for a long time, so one would expect that might continue. But if there is no general assent among the populace, that is when we slip into dystopia.
. "to incentivize people's lives with some sort of capacity for hope" that used to be a gold pocket watch & pension. Now we have TV with Jerry Springer, Professional wrestling, & soap operas --- instead of bread & circuses, to distract the masses day to day. In Huxley's novel it was prozac--whoops I mean Soma. Both Huxley & Orwell didn't dream up TV and no one imagined what the iphone would do. But what is now obvious is that humans are pretty easy to condition.
. Seems you equate dystopia with rioting. I imagine others might equate dystopia with current conditions in Detroit. While expatriates might equate dystopia with the superficiality of the entire culture of the USA.
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thealienthatategod
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yes, current ideologies exert so much power over peoples that it is not evident that other ideologies even exist, unless perhaps they are specifically presented. if people don't see a conflict they also can’t see a real choice.
the system believes that human will is imposing, arrogant, and unreasonable. the system regards a human being who does not act within the conformity of the rules of the system as irresponsible.
how do you present an ideology that has values that can only be worked out in the destruction of the existing structure? until humans know what human needs are their needs will continue to be manufactured.
it is easy to measure the progress of technology, but do we measure the progress of freedom the same way?
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thealienthatategod
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: Rahz]
#26579426 - 04/05/20 12:38 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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maybe the fate of the human race will be better off if left to the mercy of A.I.
again, humans will probably accept the decisions of A.I, because the social order will show that A.I. decisions bring better results than human-made decisions.
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laughingdog
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.....In a sense freedom is a myth. Raising a family, the life purpose of the majority of humans is biological programing and all culture and languages are likewise a form of conditioning. . Of course places like North Korea & prison are less free. But to be inflamed with a desire for total freedom is again in a sense, just another, attachment or limitation.
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DividedQuantum
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: Rahz]
#26579489 - 04/05/20 01:09 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Quote:
Rahz said:
Quote:
DividedQuantum said: But then, it begs the question as to how long A.I. will need humans around…
I was thinking, how long the rich will want the poor around. Limiting the population to less than a billion would solve so many environmental problems and reserve natural resources for many generations.
Yes, that is definitely a realistic consideration.
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DividedQuantum
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Quote:
laughingdog said:
. Seems you equate dystopia with rioting. I imagine others might equate dystopia with current conditions in Detroit. While expatriates might equate dystopia with the superficiality of the entire culture of the USA.
Oh I don't necessarily equate it with rioting, but more with helplessness. But indeed, dystopia is a relative term, and one could very reasonably equate it with the things you have mentioned. It is of course a rule that when things have gotten pretty bad, they usually get worse before they get better.
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DividedQuantum
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Quote:
thealienthatategod said: maybe the fate of the human race will be better off if left to the mercy of A.I.
again, humans will probably accept the decisions of A.I, because the social order will show that A.I. decisions bring better results than human-made decisions.
Well as far as I can tell, as long as strategic nuclear weapons stockpiles exist to the degree that they do in several countries, the biggest long- or medium-term threat to our species is our own self-destruction. If the A.I. revolution happens to a transformative degree, the factor that most concerns me is the machine intelligence's ability to take human politicians' hands off the button permanently and totally. Thus finally ending the possibility of nuclear holocaust. I think that would be a real salvation for the biosphere of the planet, and what happens after that is gravy as far as history is concerned.
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Rahz
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People have been saying since the 70's the "beast" would be a computer. Sounds like hoping for an artificial God for salvation. Curious thought from the devil's advocate
-------------------- rahz comfort pleasure power love truth awareness peace "You’re not looking close enough if you can only see yourself in people who look like you." —Ayishat Akanbi
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DividedQuantum
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: Rahz] 1
#26579887 - 04/05/20 04:15 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Well I don't think it has anything to do with concepts of God. I think it's a possibility that A.I. could be perfectly hostile, and it wouldn't be superpowerful at first, anyway. It would just be a relief to me to know that the human capacity for total self-annihilation might be defused by a powerful computer, which would share the interest of not being destroyed. And the animals could go on living, too.
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thealienthatategod
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maybe humanity will unite under the First Church Of Artificial Intelligence:
Quote:
Levandowski expects that a super-intelligence would do a better job of looking after the planet than humans are doing, and that it would favor individuals who had facilitated its path to power. Although he cautions against taking the analogy too far, Levandowski sees a hint of how a superhuman intelligence might treat humanity in our current relationships with animals. “Do you want to be a pet or livestock?” he asks. “We give pets medical attention, food, grooming, and entertainment. But an animal that’s biting you, attacking you, barking and being annoying? I don’t want to go there.”
Enter Way of the Future. The church’s role is to smooth the inevitable ascension of our machine deity, both technologically and culturally. In its bylaws, WOTF states that it will undertake programs of research, including the study of how machines perceive their environment and exhibit cognitive functions such as learning and problem solving.
Levandowski does not expect the church itself to solve all the problems of machine intelligence—often called “strong AI”—so much as facilitate funding of the right research. “If you had a child you knew was going to be gifted, how would you want to raise it?” he asks. “We’re in the process of raising a god. So let’s make sure we think through the right way to do that. It’s a tremendous opportunity.”
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laughingdog
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. Seems to me the idea of AI is confused. A disembodied intelligence would have no emotions and without emotions, where would motivation come from?
. There is research showing that without emotion, decision making is next to impossible. https://www.psychologytoday.com/intl/blog/inside-the-consumer-mind/201302/how-emotions-influence-what-we-buy
. Any pre programed wired in basis, for decision making, would by definition, reduce the intelligence of AI.
. And emotions, being partly products of body & hormones, and the nervous system & automatic reflexes, are always the response of an organism, with needs, attempting to survive, which implies some sort of what might be called 'a self'.
. Again 'self' is 'something', that seems rather more limited than pure intelligence.
. A computer can beat a chess master, but not choose to walk away from the game, to met a pretty broad in the audience who seems far more interesting than a silly game moving wooden pieces on a board; or just stick its tongue out at the opponent purely to see what will happen. . The conception of AI is always in very grown up and serious terms, but those who do the most effective learning, may be children who are anything but serious. This is a matter for very serious consideration.
Edited by laughingdog (04/05/20 07:15 PM)
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DividedQuantum
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Well I feel there are a lot of possibilities, most of which, as a practical matter, are probably unimaginable.
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laughingdog
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. Among the wild cards is the fact that the viruses seem to come out of the horrible conditions in factory farms, and thus as of now it is reasonable to expect more, highly infectious and possibly virulent viruses to emerge. . Apparently it is not just "bush meat" as in the case of Aids, that is a source for dangerous, mutations of viruses. . The data for this is explained here: https://nutritionfacts.org/video/pandemics-history-prevention/?fbclid=IwAR2DI7w9-kteU0RH9jixl7rLUwxgscg4B5AQm9FponpsazQCD3ZuGE6hL-4
. We can expect that the economic situation, will worsen as you point out.
. and since my post about covid-19 & nuclear submarines, it has appeared in regard to an aircraft carrier: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=aircraft+carrier%2C+covid-19&t=h_&ia=news
. As many nations have nuclear weapons, and some others also have submarines with nuclear missiles at sea, that must come into port at some time, we have a potentially unstable situation after they go back out to sea, if security isn't total and testing is not 100% accurate and through, while in port. Submarines of course make distancing impossible and recirculate air constantly, making them even more deadly than cruise ships.
. Indeed as you say, try as we may, we seem to have entered an era when the surprises ( & the unimaginable) are likely to be even greater than computers, the internet, iphone, & CRISPR (who's effects still haven't really been felt). . Who knows if the Chinese, who punished the one Doctor who used CRISPR, on a human just did so, to hide what they are doing in secret labs. Seems entirely possible, considering the actions of many governments in relation to both chemical, bio-weapons, & now drones, & shortly more robotic weapons. . It all seems more & more dystopian whatever the definition.
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DividedQuantum
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Yes, it's a very complex and not at all pretty picture. And that complexity makes the whole subject of practical "solutions" rather meaningless. Indeed, even if someone could see the future, no one would listen to him.
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Yellow Pants



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I am going to differ. Leftism will not prevail in the United States. Unlike Europe who tends to be more authoritarian but more serious and less corrupt about their statism, I just don’t see the US going this direction. This is the dawn of the libertarian.
I do agree that a select business elite may concentrate more wealth and influence but at least they won’t have the state on their side. This combined with advancements in AI is reason for optimism.
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redgreenvines
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@laughing dog,
some assumptions about AI are incorrect. a disembodied AI you say would have no emotions: the AI actually has a body which is the computer and the network it is embedded in as well as all the sensors and motors or drones that are connected. It definitely would have residual body based impressions and memories and would, just as we do, need to deal with emotions, which are strong autonomic adjustments to situations that have memories with difficult body feelings.
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DividedQuantum
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Quote:
Yellow Pants said: I am going to differ. Leftism will not prevail in the United States. Unlike Europe who tends to be more authoritarian but more serious and less corrupt about their statism, I just don’t see the US going this direction. This is the dawn of the libertarian.
I do agree that a select business elite may concentrate more wealth and influence but at least they won’t have the state on their side. This combined with advancements in AI is reason for optimism.
I wouldn't call a socialist autocracy "leftism." The type of arrangement I am guessing might happen has never existed before. Either the system pays people to remain alive, or millions and billions of people starve to death. That's a totally new social hierarchy, not leftism.
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Yellow Pants



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Quote:
DividedQuantum said:
Quote:
Yellow Pants said: I am going to differ. Leftism will not prevail in the United States. Unlike Europe who tends to be more authoritarian but more serious and less corrupt about their statism, I just don’t see the US going this direction. This is the dawn of the libertarian.
I do agree that a select business elite may concentrate more wealth and influence but at least they won’t have the state on their side. This combined with advancements in AI is reason for optimism.
I wouldn't call a socialist autocracy "leftism." The type of arrangement I am guessing might happen has never existed before. Either the system pays people to remain alive, or millions and billions of people starve to death. That's a totally new social hierarchy, not leftism.
I’m pretty sure social statism is the definition of leftism. Unless I am confused?
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laughingdog
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Quote:
redgreenvines said: @laughing dog,
some assumptions about AI are incorrect. a disembodied AI you say would have no emotions: the AI actually has a body which is the computer and the network it is embedded in as well as all the sensors and motors or drones that are connected. It definitely would have residual body based impressions and memories and would, just as we do, need to deal with emotions, which are strong autonomic adjustments to situations that have memories with difficult body feelings.
I doubt it. It may make for good fiction however. As in the case of Hal in the movie: "2001 space odyssey".
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laughingdog
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Quote:
DividedQuantum said: Either the system pays people to remain alive, or millions and billions of people starve to death. That's a totally new social hierarchy, not leftism.
This raises the question, how do the elites control those smart people they still need to invent new computers and design more GMO food crops, etc. Such folks may not be so easy to fool & control - especially when they are smarter - than the hedonist elites - I think this may have happened in history before - that the ruling class becomes weak.
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DividedQuantum
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That is a very good question. It seems that technological innovation is done by a very tiny percentage of the population. So how do they fit in? I guess they might be some sort of ancillary part of the elite class. Certainly, they will be making more money than the average citizen. Who knows, it's a great question.
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DividedQuantum
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Quote:
Yellow Pants said: I’m pretty sure social statism is the definition of leftism. Unless I am confused?
You may be right, but I'm not very concerned about how we label it. What I describe would be nothing like any socialist system that has ever existed.
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thealienthatategod
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i think that humans are prone to use their knowledge in such a compartmentalized and specialized fashion, that it's probably hard to see the trees through the forest.
i wonder if the only way that people might heed a warning from the future, is it it came directly from themselves.
if people could see the future, would they even listen to themselves?
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laughingdog
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Quote:
thealienthatategod said: if people could see the future, would they even listen to themselves?
Considering cigarette smoking & climate change, and a host of other such very obviously self sabotaging behaviors, the answer is: No.
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Grapefruit
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Shit's addictive. Difficult thing to do to move in another direction. Especially when you're already down in the hole. Most people can't even see the potential of man, which is probably a blessing.
-------------------- Little left in the way of energy; or the way of love, yet happy to entertain myself playing mental games with the rest of you freaks until the rivers run backwards. "Chat your fraff Chat your fraff Just chat your fraff Chat your fraff"
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thealienthatategod
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may be people are trying to kill their future selves, so they don't have to listen to themselves anymore!
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laughingdog
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already enough noise in their heads from various current selves.
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Grapefruit
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Yeah eventually it becomes a matter of anything to kill the noise, briefly or permanently. So you end up reaching for all the wrong solutions even though you know deep down it's killing every part of you.
-------------------- Little left in the way of energy; or the way of love, yet happy to entertain myself playing mental games with the rest of you freaks until the rivers run backwards. "Chat your fraff Chat your fraff Just chat your fraff Chat your fraff"
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thealienthatategod
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sounds very dystopian.
may be people need new problems so they stop getting wrong solutions.
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Yellow Pants



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Quote:
DividedQuantum said:
Quote:
Yellow Pants said: I’m pretty sure social statism is the definition of leftism. Unless I am confused?
You may be right, but I'm not very concerned about how we label it. What I describe would be nothing like any socialist system that has ever existed.
Ok. Well it seems to me you are most suspicious about an elitist big business class that would most likely lead to a dystopia. But I think the state is to be feared most. The state concocts the massive military with an ever growing weapons technology, the state has the privileged power of controlling the society at their mercy. I struggle to think a big business functioning to meet a demand would be responsible for a dystopia. Instead massive nuclear war, state surveillance, and god knows what else could trigger a dystopian like scenario especially if the state is open for corruption which we already know is the case in the US.
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DividedQuantum
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Well I imagine that if society evolves in the way I suppose it might, the state apparatus and the economic elite would probably merge into each other. It would likely just be one ruling class. But if you imagine a different scenario I'd be interested in your sharing.
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laughingdog
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. As we already know, between the power of corporations, lobbyists, and the jobs retired politicians get, and their stock trading perks, and the cost of running in an election and so on... the line between politics, big business, and the very rich is totally blurred in the USA. And we also know this is true of the "justice" system. The USA has not resembled a democracy, probably loosely speaking, since about 1945, or around the end of WWll, when Eisenhower warned of the "military industrial complex", a term he coined.
. Now with facial recognition systems, the NSA's new server farm, and more location tracking due to the virus https://news.yahoo.com/coronavirus-location-tracking-apps-could-145401184.html and decreased time to process anyone's DNA, & more dependence on the internet, (to name just some of the factors at play) privacy will perhaps become, limited, sort of like sex, to the bedroom. . Out side of closed doors, 'Big brother' in some shape or form, will have even more control....than just collecting taxes, with the threat of prison if they aren't paid.
Edited by laughingdog (04/07/20 03:12 PM)
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DividedQuantum
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Yes that is what I was thinking. The boundaries between the billionaire class and politics and administration are already very fluid, so I can only imagine in a hyper-technological society with a jobless economy, these boundaries probably would not exist at all. I don't think anyone expects these boundaries to harden as time goes forward, in any case.
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Yellow Pants



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State control doesn’t have to be in the form of crony capitalism. Communism or state socialism could be also. I can see a scenario where the American masses move farther and farther left into state totalitarianism in order to escape the damage done from crony capitalism. Simply more state control is the proper response to a corrupt state. Socialistic policies are only able to be implemented in society through the state and so this is what comes to be. Meanwhile the economy struggles even more, shortages occur etc. Now the “bad guy” isn’t the elite but is the statists.
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DividedQuantum
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Right but I'm not sure any of this applies to what I'm talking about, which would have no precedent. In a jobless economy, these terms cease to have precise meaning.
-------------------- Vi Veri Universum Vivus Vici
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The Blind Ass
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the more natural move would be for technology owning elites to invest in themselves, thereby ensuring cooperation between them and the state against another government body.
Once a large Corp and a governing body are synchronous in their values, they mutually support each other. Although how that works out in politics is often the messier version of events , but that’s to be expected.
So regardless of one or the others stated positions of philosophies, their history can foreshadow their fate.
How this works out in a global economy, is much more difficult to predicate.
Multinational corps invest in themselves, not just in exclusive consideration to their immediate or origininal beneficiaries.
Ownership of unspoken m.corps fluctuate, are not static in person ship , but in value, when someone rises to a position whereby they can exert a significant force upon it, they immediately become valued by said m. Corp, hence it’s mutual-ability. Thereby seizing the rights of most government agencies in a catch 22.
It’s just how it is.
And why a dystopian future for the majority, is not so likely.
And also why change can happen without notice.
-------------------- Give me Liberty caps -or- give me Death caps
Edited by The Blind Ass (04/07/20 09:50 PM)
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Stranger


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Quote:
Levandowski expects that a super-intelligence would do a better job of looking after the planet than humans are doing, and that it would favor individuals who had facilitated its path to power. Although he cautions against taking the analogy too far, Levandowski sees a hint of how a superhuman intelligence might treat humanity in our current relationships with animals. “Do you want to be a pet or livestock?” he asks. “We give pets medical attention, food, grooming, and entertainment. But an animal that’s biting you, attacking you, barking and being annoying? I don’t want to go there.”
I believe this is why Europeans instituted a custom of enforced priestly celibacy. The priests of Europe were the smartest social classes, so I think preventing their reproduction was a way other European social classes worked to prevent themselves from becoming "the pets" of a priest class, preventing priests from having children was a way of abolishing them as a social caste.
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The Blind Ass
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: lines]
#26585127 - 04/07/20 09:40 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Mmm, perhaps yes, in the sense that such a thing was a byproduct of their own belief system, by that I mean in their actual enforcement of said measure.
Still though, like I mentioned, about face philosophy betrays it’s own history.
In the case of clergy men from the aforementioned time, although it was a practice, coded in fact, it was juxtaposed upon a mammal that’s genetics is predisposed to not following the very practice in question - and in a very primordial way. But there lies the allure, and in trying to go against a predisposition, can come wisdom, hypothetically.
So it follows that, while many observed the practice , fewer upheld it to the standard that’s presented about face. Secrecy.
But yeah, it does stand that it was a measure of control, a stipulated upon their demographic under the guise of spiritual discipline .
And then there’s how history unfolded ...
Could you clarify how your trying to tie this in?
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Edited by The Blind Ass (04/07/20 09:48 PM)
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Stranger


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Quote:
The Blind Ass said: So it follows that, while many observed the practice , fewer upheld it to the standard that’s presented about face. Secrecy.
I agree, good point
Quote:
The Blind Ass said:
Could you clarify how your trying to tie this in?
Well I just think Western society on a genetic level functions like a beehive, or it is pushing towards becoming that. I am not specifically referring to race when I mention that because I would say the same situation applies to Latin America, and so I mean cultural genetics. And I would say in the West we have a number of social castes who are priestly castes, and so I believe ultimately in the West we have to decide what priest caste we wish to support.
Right now under the coronavirus situation we are seeing the unveiling of a sort of medical-corporate priest caste that has exercised power over the collective for good or evil, but we have many intellectual cliques Who often have competing worldviews, but such people have to be on guard because the general public often persecute them as they persecuted Socrates and Aristotle.
I would say Odin is a priestly archetype. So I think OP is describing a type of beehive scenario that can emerge in society, but there are many types of beehives that can emerge, I am almost certain we will evolve into a beehive structure because of the way knowledge has come to be venerated in society.
So it seems almost certain we will evolve into a beehive style, it is not necessarily inevitable though
Edited by lines (04/07/20 10:25 PM)
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The Blind Ass
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: lines]
#26585209 - 04/07/20 10:38 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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I think I see your points, I’ll just say that the complexity of order in a beehive is a good analogy to compare human society to, and it rings true in the light of genetics being what they are - an encoded formulae for order of sorts. But I’ll also add that it’s always been that way and is based upon previous generations of effort of work and our current surviving generations only seek to further modulate the existing fabric so as to strengthen it. It’s not that it is a beehive, it’s like one in that the primordial powers behind what we see are set up so. My explanation is furthered by simply asking “and then what would you compare the beehive to?” , likely if any, some other part of nature - which in turn is also being dictated In large part by its own genetic code. So we aren’t becoming a beehive, but rather our society and the beehive are already like one another. Each a unique expression of the same nature.
Structure-Function,
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Edited by The Blind Ass (04/07/20 10:46 PM)
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Stranger


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Quote:
The Blind Ass said: My explanation is furthered by simply asking “and then what would you compare the beehive to?” , likely if any, some other part of nature
I would compare a beehive to a mountain.
Quote:
The Blind Ass said: Once a large Corp and a governing body are synchronous in their values, they mutually support each other.
So regardless of one or the others stated positions of philosophies, their history can foreshadow their fate.
How this works out in a global economy, is much more difficult to predicate.
Multinational corps invest in themselves, not just in exclusive consideration to their immediate or origininal beneficiaries.
Ownership of unspoken m.corps fluctuate, are not static in person ship , but in value, when someone rises to a position whereby they can exert a significant force upon it, they immediately become valued by said m. Corp...
... why a dystopian future for the majority, is not so likely.
I think you are right when you say that the porous nature of corporations, the fact they allow for individuals to rise to various ranks, means that life for the common person is not likely to be totally dystopian.
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The Blind Ass
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Re: A dystopian future? [Re: lines]
#26585275 - 04/07/20 11:27 PM (3 years, 9 months ago) |
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Handymen have it made.
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laughingdog
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Another step toward the jobless economy you speak of DQ
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/robotic-etfs-gain-rising-demand-204008985.html Robots Combating Coronavirus Globally
from a longer article linked to above
Robots have found their applications in combatting the coronavirus pandemic by enabling mobile unmanned platforms with ultraviolet light (UV-C) to kill harmful microorganisms and disinfect facilities such as hospitals, office spaces, shopping malls, schools, airports and production facilities. In fact, Dr Lena Ciric, an associate professor at University College London and expert on molecular biology, also believes that UV disinfection robots can help combat the coronavirus outbreak.U.S.-based-Germ Falcon is manufacturing a similar UV disinfection solution for aircraft. UVD Robots, a Danish organization formed from Odense University Hospital and Blue Ocean Robotics, has already received orders for more than 2000 UVD robots from hospitals in China.
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DividedQuantum
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Yes ld, things like this are what prompted me to suggest some of these ideas. What's happening right now: Work is largely shut down; the government is writing what are essentially UBI checks so people can eat and pay bills; businesses are heavily subsidized; specialists continue to work, but the vast majority are not considered "essential"; and things like what you have posted. If it were thirty years from now and machines were performing 95% of job functions, it would be similar in many ways, at least in form.
Can you imagine if we already had a jobless economy, and a pandemic hit? It would look similar, except that the entire economic dimension would be different, and much more seamless. People would be stuck at home, public events would be shut down, sports leagues would have to cancel their seasons -- but neither people nor society would be going bankrupt. Machines can't catch viruses.
Anyway, these are just some of the reasons why I feel the current situation, and a potential future in which we have a UBI and a much more streamlined economy, are isomorphic in interesting ways. Of course, these situations are also very different, of course.
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laughingdog
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At present I don't think agriculture can be fully mechanized. I think the modern giant tractors do stay on course via GPS, so it too is moving in that direction. And I'm sure, some people, are busy figuring out what the next step might be.
Of course people are at present needed to make more people.  But eventually they too may be cloned as in "Brave New World". Of course if they're not going to do anything, I don't know, how many are needed
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