Technology by and large accelerates and concentrates.
I like the framing that technology is obligate. It doesn't matter whether you've built a machine that will transform the world into paperclips, sowing misery on its path and decimating the community of life. Even if you refuse to use it, someone will, because it gives short term benefits.
As you say, the root issue lies in the framework of co-habitation that we are currently practicing. I think one important step has to be decoupling the concept of wealth from growth.
> I like the framing that technology is obligate. It doesn't matter whether you've built a machine that will transform the world into paperclips, sowing misery on its path and decimating the community of life. Even if you refuse to use it, someone will, because it gives short term benefits.
Anyway, I'm skeptical. For one, that seems to assume an anarchic social order, where anyone can make any choice they like (externalities be damned) and no one can stop them. That doesn't describe our world except maybe, sometimes, at the nation-state level between great powers.
Secondly, I think embracing that idea would mainly serve to create a permission structure for "techbros" (for lack of a better term), to pursue whatever harmful technology they have the impulse to and reject any personal responsibility for their actions or the harm they cause (e.g. exactly "It's ok for me to hurt you, because if I don't someone else will, so it's inevitable and quit complaining").
> Anyway, I'm skeptical. For one, that seems to assume an anarchic social order, where anyone can make any choice they like (externalities be damned) and no one can stop them. That doesn't describe our world except maybe, sometimes, at the nation-state level between great powers.
> Secondly, I think embracing that idea would mainly serve to create a permission structure for "techbros" (for lack of a better term), to pursue whatever harmful technology they have the impulse to and reject any personal responsibility for their actions or the harm they cause (e.g. exactly "It's ok for me to hurt you, because if I don't someone else will, so it's inevitable and quit complaining").
I was making an observation of the effects technology has had the last 12000 years. So far it has been predominantly obligate. I want a future where that's not the case anymore. I don't have the full plan on how to get there. But I believe an important step is to get away of our current concept of wealth, as tied to growth and resource usage.
I like the framing that technology is obligate. It doesn't matter whether you've built a machine that will transform the world into paperclips, sowing misery on its path and decimating the community of life. Even if you refuse to use it, someone will, because it gives short term benefits.
As you say, the root issue lies in the framework of co-habitation that we are currently practicing. I think one important step has to be decoupling the concept of wealth from growth.