
Trump's Rebel Yell: How the Tech Revolution Is Setting Up Another Civil War - chatmasta
http://www.newsweek.com/trump-rebel-yell-tech-revolution-setting-civil-war-436212
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fndjdh
The issue is globalization and economic abuse by certain elites, not
technology. While I don't personally think Trump is sincere given his history,
people are voting for him because they want to end the trade policies that
have been objectively hurting the country in order to enrich a certain small
demographic.

Whoever wrote this article just pulled something out of their ass with enough
trendy buzzwords and quotes to get readership.

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alanwatts
>Somebody has to step up and lead us through this transition—rally us and help
us all benefit from the great inventions of our time.

It seems here that the author is calling for some sort of Napoleonic
figurehead to lead the way into the electric age and does not realize the
meaning of "the medium is the message".

Paper-based, literate societies naturally form centralized hierarchies because
that is the nature of the paper and printing press technologies. It is a one
way flow of centrally controlled information where the end user has highly
limited feedback to the source and so this is how rigid bureaucratic
hierarchies were formed in the Roman, British, and French empires. They kept
mountains of papyrus, parchment, or paper-based documentation in order to
manage their militaries and colonies.

The electric medium is the opposite of that in many ways. Electricity is
distributed (as opposed to centralized) and allows for feedback. So naturally,
electric societies form distributed, flat hierarchies -- like that of many
non-literate nomadic tribal cultures. There is no use for the Napoleonic
figurehead in the electric age. This tribal design is implemented by terrorist
organizations whose most effective tools use the electric medium (i.e. cell
phones, remote IEDs, and of course the insatiable coverage they receive on
television).

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ddw
I agree with this, but I read that line as meaning that there needs to be a
politician that can communicate a technology focused long-term view of the
economy.

All of the US candidates are using social media effectively to communicate
their message, but none of them actually understand technology (witness how
they talk about encryption). It would be good to have a politician that could
talk about the vision of where the economy is truly going.

Sanders' projects that he's telling "the truth" but his vision of rolling back
the economy to the good old days is naive. But it's not surprising that a 74
year-old would lean that way.

None of this should be surprising because the main way that politicians use
technology is to target their voters.

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hkon
I think outsourcing of services and production jobs to low-cost countries is
the major problem, cheaper labour make people obsolete,not technology.

~~~
alanwatts
>cheaper labour make people obsolete,not technology.

I never thought of it that way. It would be interesting to see the change in
average wages for the entire globe over the past 50 years considering how many
relatively good paying industrial age jobs have been outsourced to serf and
slave labor in "3rd world" areas

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hkmurakami
It's gone way up. Global standard of living has never been higher.

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alanwatts
Indeed but I'm curious about the average wage rather than the standard of
living. A decreasing average wage and increasing standard of living would
indicate the obsolescence of wage labor.

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akozak
Arguments usually work best when you support them with ample evidence.

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abhi3
First Agriculture was automed, then manufacturing was automated, now we are
starting to automate services with software/AI.

One has to wonder what jobs would 10 billion people we are going to have in
2050 be doing.

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yazaddaruvala
Very similar things to today (just with a few of them mundane things removed):

Sports/Prostitution/(non-sexual paid)Companionship/Parenting/Baby sitting/Dog
sitting (will never be automated).

Gambling/Consumption (will never be automated). With a large basic income
compared to cost of living ratio, these might actually be people's day-day
9-5.

Politics/War (because ofcourse that isn't going anywhere in the next 35 years)
- By 2050 we may see the first AI Senators though.

Creative endeavors: Dancing, Stage Performances, Movies, Books, Music (while
computers can write, or make art, potentially any of the above, there will
always be a higher appreciation for human creativity).

Writing and maintaining all this software (until that is automated - not by
2050 though).

Data-analysis to ensure these ML systems are doing the correct things (until
that is automated - not by 2050 though).

Apart from that my bet is on academics. Humans will be full-time students (my
personal career of choice). Hopefully more scientific research/advancement.
Primarily theoretical endeavors, like philosophy, mathematics, theoretical
physics (i.e. abstract thought - things that are not exclusively based on
previously aggregated data).

Exploration/colonization. We are still the most adaptable machine/energy
efficient machines (it is still unclear if curiosity can be built into a
machine's "personality").

Note: I'm sure there will continue to be Amish 19th century societies,
alongside the new Amish 20th century societies that will start to pop up.

Note: This is all given that we do not destroy civilization first. Automation
/ increased productivity isn't all good! It doesn't just mean you need fewer
people to make more money. It means you need fewer people to attain your
goals. Even if your goal is to hurt other people!

Note: This is also given there is a separation between humans and machines in
2050. Given the adaptability of our brains, it is conceivable to give it new
input/output streams. For example, what happens if I were to implant a
calculator-chip into my brain? Once I was trained to use that implant, could I
multiply/divide arbitrarily sized numbers as quickly as a computer? If so,
instead of implants, can we collectively edit the human genome to have these
bio-chips grow into our bodies i.e. such that no future generation has to
worry about "implants"?

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galfarragem
Risking to be simplist I would resume the main idea clash to this:

The right to be supported VS the right to work

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smoyer
It looks like this story was moderated ... it disappeared from the top 200
shortly after reaching the top five of the front page. While discussing
politics can often make sane people fight a flame war, this article is in
NewsWeek and offers an interesting historic perspective. I didn't submit it,
but thanks to @chatmasta for pointing it out.

 _EDIT_ \- Found it at position 695

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dang
Users flagged it, which is the most frequent reason why stories drop in rank
on HN, especially when the drop is precipitous. That's what happens when flags
reach a critical mass relative to upvotes.

We sometimes override the flags when the article is unusually substantive. I'm
not seeing that here though.

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smoyer
I wasn't blaming this on _The Moderators_ but failed to differentiate between
user moderation and official moderation. Sorry I was unclear.

I've seen other cases where stories dropped that fast, and while you didn't
find a reason to "resurrect" it, I didn't see a reason for it to drop. It's
obviously a community standard and we're (those who liked the history aspect)
only a couple of voices, so all is fine. Thanks for answering!

~~~
dang
In general The Moderators are strongly biased in favor of historical material,
so I hope I didn't indicate otherwise.

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odinduty
I wish all paywalls were like this: a modal I can remove with the developer
tools.

