A World Without Work

do you think they will need to put a speed limit on fastballs when robots start pitching?
Why would you need it when you will have a batter with a processor that can make decisions in a femto-second?

More likely you will need stadiums three times the size because home runs that are 1500 feet will not be uncommon. That will be great for the marketers though because you will be able to get 9x the number of people in the stadium, and think about how many more ads you can "wallpaper" the stadium with.
 
"...It isn't that people are choosing not to work...

Actually, it IS... facilitated by government (in exchange for votes, of course). If not, people would get hungry... and decide to "take that job they thought beneath them, 'cause any paying job is better than an empty belly"... which is the way it should be.
 
the smartest hard working guy I knew once commented on this when I first moved to San Diego and asked him about his beach volleyball followed by barbeque followed by a hot tub routine.

He looked at me... smiled and asked a question... like yoda.

He said you know why the Russian classics are hundreds of pages long?
I said no.

He said 9 months of Russian winter.
He said if those guys lived in San Diego (this was back in the 80s when this place was spectacular... their novels would have been shorter.)
 
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Actually, it IS... facilitated by government (in exchange for votes, of course). If not, people would get hungry... and decide to "take that job they thought beneath them, 'cause any paying job is better than an empty belly"... which is the way it should be.
Most of America's poor have jobs.
 
Actually, it IS... facilitated by government (in exchange for votes, of course). If not, people would get hungry... and decide to "take that job they thought beneath them, 'cause any paying job is better than an empty belly"... which is the way it should be.
What are you talking about? Do you quote people and then pretend they said something you wanted to hear?

I never said anything about the government encouraging or discouraging work. It may or may not be true that government discourages work. My opinion is that they do encourage work, but they have left work creation to the private sector for too long. But this has nothing to do with the purpose of this thread. If you want to hijack it to espouse your political views, go ahead, just don't misquote me.

The point of this thread (at least as I pretended it) is to point out that many jobs will soon be lost to machines in a natural process as machines (a better approximation is "cybernetic devices") become more and more capable of doing those jobs. What was "untouchable" even twenty years ago no longer seems taboo. It will change our notion from money to the meaning of people's life in profound ways.

Is this is a good thing or a bad thing? I also claim this is a good thing, but there will be quite a bit of pain in transition. If all work is done, does it necessarily have to be done by people? Is a person's life in time terms worth $x an hour? Or any $?
 
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If the govt wanted to encourage job creation they would change the tax code dramatically, massively lower taxes and put up tariffs. (along with whatever ideas nitro has which probably include encouraging the investing in technology education and space travel).

the tax code, the laws and the lack of tariffs, has encouraged the exodus of jobs and the theft of middle class wealth.
 
What are you talking about? Do you quote people and then pretend they said something you wanted to hear?

I never said anything about the government encouraging or discouraging work. It may or may not be true that government discourages work. My opinion is that they do encourage work, but they have left work creation to the private sector for too long. But this has nothing to do with the purpose of this thread. If you want to hijack it to espouse your political views, go ahead, just don't misquote me.

The point of this thread (at least as I pretended it) is to point out that many jobs will soon be lost to machines in a natural process as machines (a better approximation is "cybernetic devices") become more and more capable of doing those jobs. What was "untouchable" even twenty years ago no longer seems taboo. It will change our notion from money to the meaning of people's life in profound ways.

Is this is a good thing or a bad thing? I also claim this is a good thing, but there will be quite a bit of pain in transition. If all work is done, does it necessarily have to be done by people? Is a person's life in time terms worth $x an hour? Or any $?
We were fine so long as demand kept rising to absorb rising productivity. But, it's been demand for nonsense stuff for quite some time. That's the demand that disappears when the business cycle turns.
 
We were fine so long as demand kept rising to absorb rising productivity. But, it's been demand for nonsense stuff for quite some time. That's the demand that disappears when the business cycle turns.
Maybe. I used to believe that a large % of the US economy is consumerism. I am now not sure:

http://www.businessweek.com/the_thread/economicsunbound/archives/2009/08/get_it_straight.html

During the last great recession, I remember going to malls and they were empty. Still, stock marktes went from 666 to 2120. I think consumers lag the economy, not the other way around. I think the reason is that when people stop buying crap, they actually continue to spend, but on far more useful things than purses and more shoes and jewelry.

Hot economies for some reason urge people to spend on non-discretionary since there is nothing else to buy.
 
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