What is "Your dream?" In just 10 words

Economics does account for automation. It simply means you have a higher return for a lower investment. And if the general population doesn't feel that on their wallets, the job of the government (in a capitalist society) is to create conditions whereby someone can take advantage of the opportunity to provide those automated services at a lower cost. Economics is not an invention, it is simply the attribution of relative value to goods and services. And a situation where you have a high return for virtually no cost is still a valid economic state. The same way that a building a 99.9% efficient engine doesn't invalidate the field of mechanical engineering.

The main problem is that there are huge problems in a capitalist society when there are collective issues that don't directly advantage anyone to invest in fixing. The environment, as you mentioned, is one. Another is the education of children. These issues can only be fixed by a strong government which imposes 'sanctions' on everyone for the benefit of the whole. But who is going to vote for a government like that, when they can vote for someone who can tell them a good story about why it isn't really an issue at all?

 

Why should civilization collapse? The current economic framework will have to go, but that is sort of expected. Everything changes. And it is far more likely that people's expectations and lifestyles will simply change to accomodate a lower cost of production.

 

If 90% of the human race ceases to be useful - in fact becomes detrimental with resource consumption and carbon emission - what's the most practical thing to do?

 

Detrimental? To who? When you've got the ability to produce anything you want very cheaply, what good would it do you to have the rest of the population disappear? The way that you describe the possibility of people becoming "detrimental with resource consumption and carbon emission" to those in power sounds more like a situation of scarcity and danger than one of abundance.

The society that an individual lives in is their reference point, the source of their gratification, the object on which they exercise their power and receive their rewards. Only a very sick mind would destroy that to their own detriment.

 

Big money, big women, big fun.

 

I think labor could be left to machines and creative tasks can be left to people since the power input for processing power output on creative tasks is still much better for the human cpu. Also, I think a reasonable shift would be.... a stipend. You can work for extra cash, but you can survive without it. There's a first world country already doing that, and the technology isn't even there yet. The world is a nice place in some spaces

For efficient solar cells of the future, that input will be practically zero

I'll believe them if they and their entire family drink the water they claim is fine.

 

That's how a lot of the oil rich countries are already, besides the extremely rich and the welfare recipients in the US and industrialized countries and yet they still have massive social problems. They need to get serious about modern law and humane treatment of people and animals because most of the world isn't too far behind these oil countries with the government now free to deficit spend to pay for development that makes human live easier, safer, and healthier - there is still all these violence, crime, and war problems. Law, immigration, and customs enforcement will have to be largely recorded and automated to curb the abuses. Big Brother will be for real but in a very technically factual way and the only ones moaning will be those that were abusing that information vacuum to begin with.

 

Heh, but that's exactly what you get with your average democratic politician.

I'm not saying democracy is bad per se, it is just that collective problems are very difficult to solve democratically because people will simply vote for the politician who is least likely to take money from them to solve the problem. There aren't any easy solutions. It is simply a fact that the democratic horse is not very good at choosing where to pull the cart, but the mere idea of any other form of government is unspeakable.

And in regards to the future of employment in an automated society, I'm not sure exactly what the outcome will be or if it would be a really great outcome but even the most badly-behaving governments need a functional society and the governments who didn't keep theirs functional didn't last long. To be perfectly honest, I think there's much more danger of there being an epidemic of boredom in such a society than from anything else. In fact a lot of the more colorful conspiracy theories these days IMO are symptoms of a population that is unable to accept how boring and monotonous their society has become.

 

Don't worry about the future. One day, you will all follow a charismatic madman who will offer solutions to your problems. He will become too powerful and utilize your resources to secure his authority. When all of the governments of the world are under this single authority, everything turns to crap and there's nothing left to do but tear it all down and start from scratch.

And that will be the last war of our age. The last chapter in our story of corporations and democracy. Of profit driven controlled war. Of poisoning our own people and selling them a cure. Of profiting from poverty in the name of Business. Money is good morality. Money is holiness and truth. Anything is justifiable if it is profitable. These are our things to own. As we cannot fathom the wanton barbarism of antiquity, so will our descendents look upon our unapologetic decadence.

 

Really? Food typically has a shelf life. Money typically does not. You can indefinitely stockpile more and more money and this increases your wealth and power. You can not do the same with food. At some point, the only purpose* and gain in gathering more food is being able to supply it to others. That's not at all true of money, and that fundamental difference is a huge one.

* Aside from stockpiling cans and other unperishables for use after the apocalypse.

 

Execute all of the non peaceful individuals. Problem solved :3

ARREST AND RE-EDUCATE THEM

I think I'd be a good dictator.

 

Not for long. You'd stop being a good anything after step one.

 

Back to the topic at hand, since I don't aspire to be Bill Gates, I'll settle for comfortable and safe obscurity and as defined by the modern industrial governments and mass media, a life of poverty all the world dreamed of prior to 1950.

 

Execute the non-peacefuls? I think I could find some...

 

Yes, but by executing them you are yourself being non-peaceful, and thus...

 

Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder today. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam...

 

Do you always begin conversations this way?

 

Good health. Great games. Happy wife. No kids. Profit.

 

As a mortal being, sacrifice for a better future is all I can leave behind.

Want to know if that mawage will last? Flip a coin

 

Sometimes I think that there would be a lot of people horribly disappointed if society actually did pull through without a lot of fanfare. However I agree with the sentiments of your second paragraph. Society has failed to find a way to curb the negative effects of capitalism and democracy (and I put those two together because they are based on the same notion - that the 'customer' is always right). But since both are relatively new, it is possible we should cut them a little slack.

And everything has always been in a state of flux. The universe expands and contracts, empires rise and rot and fall, people are born and die so that their children can do things a little differently. That civilizations destroy themselves isn't the most important thing, the most important thing is that the next one is a little better.

 

thanks for that it was the last puzzle piece missing for me to understand something ;D

 

Concrete wealth can be hoarded for a long time, and money does not have an infinite lifetime or a consistent value, so I don't agree with your point that there is a vast difference.

I think it is a little bit strange to believe that a country like the US is hoarding money when its debt is the biggest in the world. If anything it is hoarding military power. And when you hear that people like Bill Gates are worth billions of dollars, it doesn't necessarily mean that they have that money sitting in the bank collecting dust. It is the value of the means of production that they own, which produces something which people obviously like to consume which they find very useful. I don't agree that there is a problem of hoarding money, if anything there is a problem of overconsumption of goods and services, quite to the contrary.

 

The government and business elite aren't hoarding money, but are deficit spending to try and enable security and health. Money hoarding is really happening in the Middle East and other resource rich kingdoms for thousands of years now. When you live in a desert or temperate or arctic environment you hoard. Squirrels hoard. Birds hoard. As soon as you leave a lush tropical rain forest you hoard. Even in tropical forests you hoard. To stop others from hoarding you kill them and then you can hoard what they had. It's backwards, it's antiquated, and its needs human intelligence and restraint and impartial laws to stop it.

If such aggressive over hoarding cultures are ever tamed at high levels then to tame at low levels one develops entertainment and other diversionary products that are good for stopping that behavior among laypeople. The problem then becomes avoiding drugs and other forms of violence from bored people. UFC and NFL induced dementia and crippled bodies anyone?

 

This thread sure took a strange turn. We've now covered fish, squirrels, and robots. Dream on.
Gigi

 

It's a thread about dreams, anything can happen in a dream!

 

1UP Half-Life and Bully.

Or at least make something up to par with them.

Doesn't even have to be a game.

I mean the Harry Potter books/films were sick.

I suppose the idea is to create a world that is so inviting and well made that it, sort of comes to life in a way. I mean for me, Hogwarts is immortal. You people know what I mean goddamit!

I've edited this post over a dozen times lol

 

For me? I will be the best at one-man game development.

I'm not in this for money, or high ideals, though over the course of my journey I can attain both. Total mastery is what it's all about; to understand how to think about technologies; to understand why my players choose my games; to create works both beautiful and functional; ultimately, to consistently, flawlessly deliver on all of the above.

I'm in the game development game to win, even though there's no explicit victory condition.

 

Create an RPG that is as open-ended as a MMORPG

 

Be the MVP of my one man development team (sic) . Do I get bonus points for having the sic get me to 10 words.

 

+5!

 

make it make sense

 

Eliminate pooping so I save a fortune on toilet paper.

 

Without pooping, there'd be no poo-pourri!

 

Do absolutely nothing; realize it is all I ever wanted.

Yes I think the guy in Office Space had the right idea.

 

Eliminate toilet paper to make a fortune on bidets.

 

Is that how you really spell bidet? When I first read what you wrote, I thought it was some synonym for shells.

 

Yep. A lot nicer sounding than "european toilet that shoots water at your butt".

 

Ok, new meme.. I am going to write ´American Bidet´ and put it on the picture of a garden hose.

 

Literally, this is what I dream...