
Progress Studies School - DarkContinent
https://progressstudies.school/
======
dmazin
"What problems, challenges and hardships in life and work were faced by people
in earlier generations and centuries? And how did we solve those problems
through science, technology, and invention?"

I respect Patrick Collison, but this curriculum worries me. Our understanding
of progress _already_ de-emphasizes the nasty parts (eg slavery) by hyper-
focusing on innovation. I think this curriculum, which seemingly leaves out
critical analysis of labor practices, etc., will worsen our understanding of
technological progress.

For example, the improvement of infant mortality is one of the major
accomplishments of the last couple centuries. We _could_ focus on the role
innovation in the improvement of women's health. But I believe that expressly
leaving out the exploitation along the way (eg experimentation on enslaved
women[1]), leads to understanding history worse, not better.

[1] [https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-
way/2018/04/17/603163394...](https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-
way/2018/04/17/603163394/-father-of-gynecology-who-experimented-on-slaves-no-
longer-on-pedestal-in-nyc)

~~~
apsec112
A lot of labor practices improved _because_ exponential productivity growth
made that a practical decision. You can't have an eight-hour day and a two-day
weekend when it takes hundreds of hours of labor to make a single shirt.
Factories became safer when people were rich enough that they could afford to
pay for safety equipment to prevent even rare accidents. A lot of dangerous
and exhausting jobs are now done by machine - no one picks cotton anymore
because the process has been automated. And so on.

~~~
dragonwriter
> A lot of labor practices improved because exponential productivity growth
> made that a practical decision.

No, they didn't. In some cases productivity gains may have been a necessary
prerequisite, but it was never the proximate cause—labor action to wrest
better conditions from capital was always the proximate factor.

~~~
chrisco255
First you had to have the productivity gains before you could have the labor
movement. Look, there's no easy way to farm with a mule. Most people were
subsistence farmers for most of human civilization's history. They grew just
enough to get by with not much more. That is back- breaking, life-shortening
labor. Technology changed that. Industrialization let modern society soar past
the relatively high living standards of ancient Rome, which were lost in the
dark ages.

~~~
adamsea
> First you had to have the productivity gains before you could have the labor
> movement.

That's, just, like, your opinion, man.

If the labor movement is considered one way of fighting for human rights,
then, it's been around a long time, my friend.

Think: serfdom, indentured service, slavery.

~~~
monkeycantype
It's interesting to argue the opposite, that the power past empires had over
people and their labour devalued productivity improvements, that
Industrialisation required a social context in which the expense of labour
justified the capital investment and risk of mechanisation.

~~~
adamsea
I'm not sure I understand. And tbh I'm not sure I originally expressed myself
well.

But I think we all agree that laws against child labor are good, that laws
requiring a weekend are good, and that basic safety laws in dangerous
environments like meatpacking plants are good.

And we'd all agree that those things fall somewhere on the spectrum of "human
rights".

And, if someone doesn't agree then that's an entirely conversation that needs
to be had.

But for those of us that do, well, all those things came from organized labor.
So --- organized labor, imperfect as it is, like all human institutions, has
been and is one of the ways in which people have fought for their rights over
time.

Period.

~~~
monkeycantype
Sorry for the confusion, clearly from the way I express myself, I am a
software developer and not an economist, and I use this forum to experiment
with how to communicate and think about topics on which I am not expert, but
care about.

I was meaning to respond to the idea in the conversation that I read as "the
gains in human rights and labor standards, had only been possible because of
productivity improvements" I think it's worth considering instead whether
investment in 'productivity' has been undermined by poor human rights. Could
the roman empire have mechanised, industrialised, but that the cruelty and
oppression that was fundamental made it uneconomical, when the capital cost
was compared to the cheap labor cost of buying slaves. I have a friend who
debates with me about the problems that flow from the high cost of labor and
environmental standards, and I argue back that the greater problem is the low
cost of labor, the low enforcement of human rights and environmental
standards, because these de-incentivise the upfront 'activation energy '
investment in any efforts that would make our civilisation more sustainable
and equitable.

~~~
adamsea
Thanks for explaining. I think I understand better. Interesting.

At the same time I don't think we should instrumentalize human rights -- human
rights are important because their human rights, not because of their
potential to increase productivity.

And I'm not saying you're saying anything like that at all -- moreso, I'm
responding to the logical implications of the discussion : ).

The importance and value is of human rights is unrelated to their positive or
negative impact on productivity.

Some people might like to throw in a "what if" at this point about limited
resources, etc. And sometimes in life (like in medical triage situations)
people have to make difficult or terrible decisions, but if we believe in
human life having an inherent value then that shouldn't be the basis or
starting point of our moral reasoning.

------
737maxtw
Oh good. For a minute I was worried Telerik was launching a bootcamp.

------
iron0013
It’s weird how there are so many publications, programs, think tanks, etc
devoted to pushing the idea that neo-liberalism is “progress”. And whenever
you trace the funding upstream you inevitably find a billionaire with an
agenda.

~~~
apsec112
The described curriculum has very little to do with tax policy. It's mainly
the history of applied science and engineering:

"This program will explore: what problems, challenges and hardships in life
and work were faced by people in earlier generations and centuries? And how
did we solve those problems through science, technology, and invention?

Learn about manufacturing from blacksmiths to assembly lines; about power from
water wheels to combustion to electricity; about food from famine to
industrial agriculture and genetically modified crops; about disease from
basic sanitation to scientific medicine—and the struggles and circumstances of
the men and women who worked to bend the arc of humanity upward."

~~~
claudiawerner
>Learn about manufacturing from blacksmiths to assembly lines; about power
from water wheels to combustion to electricity;

The problem with this presentation is that it will almost invariably fall upon
an implicitly political angle, using thought experiments made to further
political points; for example, blacksmiths to assembly lines could well be
explained with the Pin Factory analogy borrowing from Smith, but neglecting
his role as a _political economist_ , and likely the more abstract and
philosophical criticisms from political economists after him (such as Ricardo,
Marx, Sraffa, etc.). The course will likely not delve into these points, upon
which the whole theory stands or falls, because objections to it are viewed as
'political' rather than 'objective', despite the original view and its
assumptions already being political - just part of dominant political
positions which persist.

Further, how does a course like this avoid the sense of teleological
technological determinism which Marx was accused of? I would hope that it
includes a section on the philosophy of progress, history, and technology (of
which there is a lot written), but I'm skeptical that it will be included. The
quote from Steven Pinker at the bottom of the page leaves me doubly skeptical
- there are several key criticisms of Pinker's work (and indeed the sort of
graphs displayed at the top of the page) - a comprehensive overview is
available in "Pinker and Progress" by Ronald Aronson ( _History and Theory_
Vol. 2, 2013) and _Liberalism, Capitalism, and the Conditions of Social Peace:
A Critique of Steven Pinker’s One-Sided Humanism_ by Noonan (2019).

