5 ms·

Since the dawn of industry, people have been amazed by the new possibilities and how that would affect society once it's evenly distributed. Technical progress

by rixed 17d ago

Since the dawn of industry, people have been amazed by the new possibilities and how that would affect society once it's evenly distributed. Technical progress has been going on, percolating in every places and down to every person. Yet it's never been "evenly distributed". What would happen when every one would have access to Internet? How different will the world be when everyone carries a computer in their pocket? Can communicate with anyone regardless of location and language, with no intermediary? Those were questions we used to ask ourselves not so long ago. Turned out: not much have changed. For the future to be evenly distributed, much bigger changes will have to happen than large scale manufacture of efficient GPUs. Otherwise, tech will just be used to make sure progress and knowledge stays unevently distributed. That's the whole game of herding humans, after all; It's called "organized scarcity".

gwern 17d ago
> Turned out: not much have changed. I think the world has changed a lot since the 1980s.
- rbanffy 17d ago
  Most people still go to work every day, inequality still exists, as does famine, disease, wars… Our cars are cleaner, our phones are much better, our TVs much lighter and bigger.
  - cheema33 17d ago
    > Most people still go to work every day.. And trees and mountains and animals still exist... Rate of change, it appears, depends entirely on someone's perspective.
  - bawolff 17d ago
    > Most people still go to work every day, Ironically, that is one of the things that have changed. In 1980 working from home was borderline unthinkable. Now, while it is far from universal its also not that unusual.
    - 1718627440 17d ago
      Society wise yes, but if you had an office job, you essentially take inbound mail and transfrom it into outbound mail. That has been possible to do from home in the 80s. If you work in a large corporation, you also don't talk to people directly, you call them. That's possible from home too. Until the industrial revolution, every work was home work.
      - rbanffy 17d ago
        Everyone working in an office (maintenance excepcted) could work from home right now. The fact so few of us do, and that so many companies (read "people who are invested in urban office space") force employees to work from offices.
        1718627440 17d ago
        I honestly still see some benefit from working together, quick meetings over lunch and the psychological effects of leaving work. Needing to physically leave your workplace helps your brain leave work at work.
        rbanffy 17d ago
        The downsides of it are well known, however. Higher costs of living near work, less mobility (both home and work need to be mostly in the same place, so you end up missing opportunities), unmet demands for housing (resources invested in office space), more time spent commuting in public transport (or worse, cars), and so on. Even for employers, the cost is limiting where you can hire talent. I live in Ireland and, while a lot of talent is concentrated in the Dublin area, there are other talent pools that are simply out of reach to us. I too love to meet my colleagues in person, but the cost for society, and for myself, are non-trivial. I would love if we had a weekly office day, so we could have meetings, lunch, discuss work, projects, intersections on what we are doing, and so on.
  - toyg 17d ago
    Life in Asia and Africa has changed pretty dramatically, and improvements are accelerating. Yeah, we're not in utopia yet, but more people than ever live comfortable, safe lives. "Business at the speed of light" has become a reality, and we're still getting to grips with it. We dealt with a global pandemic with an efficiency never seen before - had it happened in the previous century, we would have probably seen "black death" levels of casualties. Issues like inequality and conflict are mostly rooted in the human psyche more than the human condition, so they will continue to be there probably forever; but we're getting better.
    - alexashka 17d ago
      The fertility rate in China is 1. The fertility rate where I live is 1.21. 1 in 5 adult women where I live are on prescription anti-depressant medication. For comparison - the fertility rate under Stalin - the uber evil bad guy as we all know was between 3 and 4.5.
      - bbmatryoshka 17d ago
        fertility is NOT a measure of happiness
        alexashka 17d ago
        Name one species that is happy whilst rapidly going extinct.
        DrScientist 17d ago
        A species isn't a thing that can be happy or not. Also the idea of a replacement rate of 1 equals rapidly going extinct is mathematically illiterate. Exponentials work both ways - in growth and decay - ie let's say the population halves every generation ~ 25 years - it would take nearly 1000 years to reach near zero - as half of half is a smaller absolute reduction each time.
        17d ago
guax 17d ago
> not much have changed. So much have changed. The way we shop, travel, navigate a town, the way we socialize, receive information. My formative memory is during the transition from computers are a furniture piece and internet a thing you do to being on your pocket with constant high speed connection and the difference is incredible. I was also part of the people that thought everyone having access would turn out a lot better than it ended up being. I think the issue is not that it did not change much, is that good changes got offset a bit by a lot of very bad outcomes. No comment on the distribution and concentration part, that one I agree.
- camillomiller 17d ago
  In the limited pockets of society you experience directly. How much has changed in the relationship between the West and Asia, the economic inequalities globally, or even in the West, etc... if you look at macro, everything moves according to laws that have little to do with the even distribution of technology and a lot to do with the decision makers that get to pick how that distribution takes place.
  - elil17 17d ago
    Just because something doesn't impact geopolitics doesn't mean it isn't important
    - camillomiller 17d ago
      That's not what I'm saying, and I don't know where you inferred that from. I'm saying that tech has changed the world in the way we experience it, for sure, but it has been driven by political choices, more that drive political choices itself if we look at the bigger picture.
      - mistermann 17d ago
        [dead]
      - DrScientist 17d ago
mshanu 17d ago
> Turned out: not much have changed Changed a lot, I am getting to know what a random person living some where in the world think about what change it has brought
jazzprogramming 17d ago
I was thinking of something similar. Waxing poetic, it's been a while since the wheel was invented and we've gone through a lot since then, yet the rich are still rich and the poor are still poor and the loved are still loved and the loveless still loveless. Would one GPU data center/person make a difference? Probably not, but it could be quite fun to have your own personal genie. And then we get used to it. Still, I'm not sure if most people care to make the distinction between technology (a rocket promising to reach for the stars) and the human condition (has it ever changed since the dawn of time?).
mistermann 17d ago
[dead]
prolly97 17d ago
I think the idea of "even distribution" is dangerous, as it often assumes equal preferences and views of what needs to be distributed. Do we want equal outcomes or equal opportunities. What constitute and outcome and an opportunity. Even in something as harmless as giving people equal access to e.g. internet, we're assuming that the cost of access to internet < than the cost of their alternative preferences. If people want to live nude in the jungle, that should be their prerogative. Let's just turn it around for a second, where a nude-jungle-living population was majority, and had the ability to force their will on you. Would you like for them to make nude-jungle-living a universal and equally distributed circumstance, in alignment with their preferences? (I wouldn't). I want access to more and "better" compute. I'm willing to sacrifice my time to get access. With my current compute spend, I'd estimate that roughly 1 hour of work per week, goes to purchase compute and related equipment. It's only fair that those who have worked hard to manifest this compute in the world, also want something in return. I too want something in return for the hours I spend producing things that people want. The idea that people have a "claim" on things I produce, purely as an artifact of existing, is completely bonkers. If you want to give something to others, use your free will to do so. I do so, on occation. And I don't expect others to. But I do expect others to leave me and the things I produce alone, unless we've agreed to transact. Sorry, but these socialist ideas of "those who make things are evil and only does so to get power over others" are so fucking tiring. "The world would be a better place if we just distributed x equal to my preference (y)". Fuck off. I don't want your Lada. But by all means go out and exchange the things YOU produce, for free internet for others. Sounds terrific. Don't force me to do the same. I have other but equal ideas of how to make the world a better place.
chrisjj 17d ago
> What would happen when every one would have access to Internet? How different will the world be when everyone carries a computer in their pocket? Can communicate with anyone regardless of location and language, with no intermediary? Those were questions we used to ask ourselves not so long ago. Turned out: not much have changed. We are far short of everyone having access to the internet.

by rixed 17d ago

gwern 17d ago

> Turned out: not much have changed. I think the world has changed a lot since the 1980s.

rbanffy 17d ago
Most people still go to work every day, inequality still exists, as does famine, disease, wars… Our cars are cleaner, our phones are much better, our TVs much lighter and bigger.
- cheema33 17d ago
  > Most people still go to work every day.. And trees and mountains and animals still exist... Rate of change, it appears, depends entirely on someone's perspective.
- bawolff 17d ago
  > Most people still go to work every day, Ironically, that is one of the things that have changed. In 1980 working from home was borderline unthinkable. Now, while it is far from universal its also not that unusual.
  - 1718627440 17d ago
    Society wise yes, but if you had an office job, you essentially take inbound mail and transfrom it into outbound mail. That has been possible to do from home in the 80s. If you work in a large corporation, you also don't talk to people directly, you call them. That's possible from home too. Until the industrial revolution, every work was home work.
    - rbanffy 17d ago
      Everyone working in an office (maintenance excepcted) could work from home right now. The fact so few of us do, and that so many companies (read "people who are invested in urban office space") force employees to work from offices.
      - 1718627440 17d ago
        I honestly still see some benefit from working together, quick meetings over lunch and the psychological effects of leaving work. Needing to physically leave your workplace helps your brain leave work at work.
        rbanffy 17d ago
        The downsides of it are well known, however. Higher costs of living near work, less mobility (both home and work need to be mostly in the same place, so you end up missing opportunities), unmet demands for housing (resources invested in office space), more time spent commuting in public transport (or worse, cars), and so on. Even for employers, the cost is limiting where you can hire talent. I live in Ireland and, while a lot of talent is concentrated in the Dublin area, there are other talent pools that are simply out of reach to us. I too love to meet my colleagues in person, but the cost for society, and for myself, are non-trivial. I would love if we had a weekly office day, so we could have meetings, lunch, discuss work, projects, intersections on what we are doing, and so on.
- toyg 17d ago
  Life in Asia and Africa has changed pretty dramatically, and improvements are accelerating. Yeah, we're not in utopia yet, but more people than ever live comfortable, safe lives. "Business at the speed of light" has become a reality, and we're still getting to grips with it. We dealt with a global pandemic with an efficiency never seen before - had it happened in the previous century, we would have probably seen "black death" levels of casualties. Issues like inequality and conflict are mostly rooted in the human psyche more than the human condition, so they will continue to be there probably forever; but we're getting better.
  - alexashka 17d ago
    The fertility rate in China is 1. The fertility rate where I live is 1.21. 1 in 5 adult women where I live are on prescription anti-depressant medication. For comparison - the fertility rate under Stalin - the uber evil bad guy as we all know was between 3 and 4.5.
    - bbmatryoshka 17d ago
      fertility is NOT a measure of happiness
      - alexashka 17d ago
        Name one species that is happy whilst rapidly going extinct.
        DrScientist 17d ago
        A species isn't a thing that can be happy or not. Also the idea of a replacement rate of 1 equals rapidly going extinct is mathematically illiterate. Exponentials work both ways - in growth and decay - ie let's say the population halves every generation ~ 25 years - it would take nearly 1000 years to reach near zero - as half of half is a smaller absolute reduction each time.
        17d ago

guax 17d ago

> not much have changed. So much have changed. The way we shop, travel, navigate a town, the way we socialize, receive information. My formative memory is during the transition from computers are a furniture piece and internet a thing you do to being on your pocket with constant high speed connection and the difference is incredible. I was also part of the people that thought everyone having access would turn out a lot better than it ended up being. I think the issue is not that it did not change much, is that good changes got offset a bit by a lot of very bad outcomes. No comment on the distribution and concentration part, that one I agree.

camillomiller 17d ago
In the limited pockets of society you experience directly. How much has changed in the relationship between the West and Asia, the economic inequalities globally, or even in the West, etc... if you look at macro, everything moves according to laws that have little to do with the even distribution of technology and a lot to do with the decision makers that get to pick how that distribution takes place.
- elil17 17d ago
  Just because something doesn't impact geopolitics doesn't mean it isn't important
  - camillomiller 17d ago
    That's not what I'm saying, and I don't know where you inferred that from. I'm saying that tech has changed the world in the way we experience it, for sure, but it has been driven by political choices, more that drive political choices itself if we look at the bigger picture.
    - mistermann 17d ago
      [dead]
    - DrScientist 17d ago

mshanu 17d ago

> Turned out: not much have changed Changed a lot, I am getting to know what a random person living some where in the world think about what change it has brought

jazzprogramming 17d ago

I was thinking of something similar. Waxing poetic, it's been a while since the wheel was invented and we've gone through a lot since then, yet the rich are still rich and the poor are still poor and the loved are still loved and the loveless still loveless. Would one GPU data center/person make a difference? Probably not, but it could be quite fun to have your own personal genie. And then we get used to it. Still, I'm not sure if most people care to make the distinction between technology (a rocket promising to reach for the stars) and the human condition (has it ever changed since the dawn of time?).

mistermann 17d ago

[dead]

prolly97 17d ago

I think the idea of "even distribution" is dangerous, as it often assumes equal preferences and views of what needs to be distributed. Do we want equal outcomes or equal opportunities. What constitute and outcome and an opportunity. Even in something as harmless as giving people equal access to e.g. internet, we're assuming that the cost of access to internet < than the cost of their alternative preferences. If people want to live nude in the jungle, that should be their prerogative. Let's just turn it around for a second, where a nude-jungle-living population was majority, and had the ability to force their will on you. Would you like for them to make nude-jungle-living a universal and equally distributed circumstance, in alignment with their preferences? (I wouldn't). I want access to more and "better" compute. I'm willing to sacrifice my time to get access. With my current compute spend, I'd estimate that roughly 1 hour of work per week, goes to purchase compute and related equipment. It's only fair that those who have worked hard to manifest this compute in the world, also want something in return. I too want something in return for the hours I spend producing things that people want. The idea that people have a "claim" on things I produce, purely as an artifact of existing, is completely bonkers. If you want to give something to others, use your free will to do so. I do so, on occation. And I don't expect others to. But I do expect others to leave me and the things I produce alone, unless we've agreed to transact. Sorry, but these socialist ideas of "those who make things are evil and only does so to get power over others" are so fucking tiring. "The world would be a better place if we just distributed x equal to my preference (y)". Fuck off. I don't want your Lada. But by all means go out and exchange the things YOU produce, for free internet for others. Sounds terrific. Don't force me to do the same. I have other but equal ideas of how to make the world a better place.

chrisjj 17d ago

> What would happen when every one would have access to Internet? How different will the world be when everyone carries a computer in their pocket? Can communicate with anyone regardless of location and language, with no intermediary? Those were questions we used to ask ourselves not so long ago. Turned out: not much have changed. We are far short of everyone having access to the internet.