Today's Environmentalists Are Really Luddites (5 Viewers)

[Thales750]

If I don't respond as often, it is because I am losing hope for this country and am perhaps a bit disheartened.

I have a saying about not worrying about a big rock falling out of the shy. Doc, everything you thought to be the future is ending. We are at the end of a dark ages, a renaissance is here. Embrace it.
And like the bubonic plague in Europe bringing the needed death on a continent scale as a catalyst, the folks you support in government are already allowing the big die off. And all those billionaires you are so eager to defend by quoting jungle law, well they are currently killing off the old poor folks, paving the way.

Look it up the life expectancy in America between the wealthy and the poor.

Our future holds one of these outcomes, or similar. Pets in a Nany State looked over by AI, prisoners of global dictatorship propped up by AIs, thermonuclear war with the machines (Skynet)... you see the pattern, your futures are ended. There will be no place for Conservative Ideology in the Future.

The big rock is falling Doc. get used to it. The odds are, that for the ones that survive, this second Renaissance will be like none other in history. Glorious or apocalyptic, I guess we'll see.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

There will be no place for Conservative Ideology in the Future.

There will be no place for Liberal ideology in the future as long as Liberals don't embrace responsibility for one's actions as a major governmental factor. Without responsibility, we devolve into chaotic societies. Economics has to change as well. Given evolutionary tendencies towards striving and dominance, things that have grown even as humans have grown, conflict will be inevitable. The Progressive Liberal view of DEI is impossible to last for any length of time as long as there is an issue of people needing money as a medium of exchange. Diversity? Got no problem. Inclusion? Got no problem. Equality? Heap big problem. Equality of outcome ONLY works when everyone's internal talents and physical abilities are the same. Forced equality of result means there is no longer any incentive, and it HAS been shown (is continuing to be shown in China) that if there is no incentive to improve your lot in life, there is no incentive to work.

 

[AccessBlaster]

I am not an expert, but having lived my entire 68 years in California, I have four recommendations for the doomers:

1. Fresh air and sunshine.
2. Meditation.
3. Occasional glass of wine.
4. Get a cat.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Let's see... #1 I can get in south Louisiana. #2 I can do anywhere peaceful, such as the Lake Ponchartrain lake levee about 3 blocks away #3 is totally contra-indicated because of liver issues, #4 runs afoul of wife's allergies.

I guess 2 out of 4 ain't SO bad.

 

[Thales750]

There will be no place for Liberal ideology in the future as long as Liberals don't embrace responsibility for one's actions as a major governmental factor. Without responsibility, we devolve into chaotic societies. Economics has to change as well. Given evolutionary tendencies towards striving and dominance, things that have grown even as humans have grown, conflict will be inevitable. The Progressive Liberal view of DEI is impossible to last for any length of time as long as there is an issue of people needing money as a medium of exchange. Diversity? Got no problem. Inclusion? Got no problem. Equality? Heap big problem. Equality of outcome ONLY works when everyone's internal talents and physical abilities are the same. Forced equality of result means there is no longer any incentive, and it HAS been shown (is continuing to be shown in China) that if there is no incentive to improve your lot in life, there is no incentive to work.

I don't think it will be forced inequality as much as the people with all the wealth will have to pay the poor people just for being poor. Else how will they have any customers. And in any scenario, the population is going to decline.

 

[Thales750]

I am not an expert, but having lived my entire 68 years in California, I have four recommendations for the doomers:

1. Fresh air and sunshine.
2. Meditation.
3. Occasional glass of wine.
4. Get a cat.

I'm looking forward to living though this fundamental change.

I didn't know you were an old guy, I right there with you. I'm 66, I lived in Texas-Houston- Arlington-Seabrook-Galveston Island- Clear Lake, Oklahoma, Florida twice, and then Northern Virginia for 26 years where I raised my daughter. but back in Texas for the last 14 years.
I may sound like a doomer, but I'm not really. I just think that conservative style capitalism is not going to survive the AI revolution, so I bring it up to make Conservative question their own belief system.

Already, Musk's wealth is more than the lower 52% combined. It's not to hard to follow the trend line.

 

[Thales750]

There will be no place for Liberal ideology in the future as long as Liberals don't embrace responsibility for one's actions as a major governmental factor. Without responsibility, we devolve into chaotic societies. Economics has to change as well. Given evolutionary tendencies towards striving and dominance, things that have grown even as humans have grown, conflict will be inevitable. The Progressive Liberal view of DEI is impossible to last for any length of time as long as there is an issue of people needing money as a medium of exchange. Diversity? Got no problem. Inclusion? Got no problem. Equality? Heap big problem. Equality of outcome ONLY works when everyone's internal talents and physical abilities are the same. Forced equality of result means there is no longer any incentive, and it HAS been shown (is continuing to be shown in China) that if there is no incentive to improve your lot in life, there is no incentive to work.

Robots don't care about incentives. Or at least no more than your cordless drill does. Their AI controller probably won't really care about whatever incentives humans can offer them.
The incentive to work will be like it is in Star Trek, many people will work to better themselves.

 

[AccessBlaster]

Already, Musk's wealth is more than the lower 52% combined. It's not to hard to follow the trend line.

And that affects you how?

 

[The_Doc_Man]

I don't think it will be forced inequality as much as the people with all the wealth will have to pay the poor people just for being poor. Else how will they have any customers.

Socialism never works unless you carefully - and I DO mean carefully - avoid the doom of failed socialist governments of the past. They fail when they run out of someone else's money to spend. So GO AHEAD and spend the billionaires' money. Until you find that demand has yet again outpaced supply and it all crashes around you. You keep on harping on social reforms - but if basic economics stays the same, NOTHING HAPPENS DIFFERENTLY. Supply, production, demand - all tied together by economic forces that, as long as they are unchanging that will doom your prediction. You have to make a base change to the economic principles of business.

 

[Cotswold]

Nothing changes..........unfortunately

 

[Thales750]

Socialism never works unless you carefully - and I DO mean carefully - avoid the doom of failed socialist governments of the past. They fail when they run out of someone else's money to spend. So GO AHEAD and spend the billionaires' money. Until you find that demand has yet again outpaced supply and it all crashes around you. You keep on harping on social reforms - but if basic economics stays the same, NOTHING HAPPENS DIFFERENTLY. Supply, production, demand - all tied together by economic forces that, as long as they are unchanging that will doom your prediction. You have to make a base change to the economic principles of business.

The missing link in your 20th Century observation is that nothing in history has ever been invented that is eliminating every semblence of work = income.
If you look around the reason that billionaires have been created is simple and universal. the revenue stream has been evolving less and less people around the world have been able to provide goods for more an more people.

This is one area where Trump's concepts actually aligns with reality, even as his methods are flawed and from the wrong incentives. Creating regional instead of global supply will prolong the ramping down of human involvement in the system. It will be artificial of course, with many less efficient processes than are possible in a global economy, but it will empower the people in those regions.

Robots and AI do not need incentive to build build better cars for less.

 

[Thales750]

And that affects you how?

Just because I can navigate the world, does not make it ok for the world to be on an unsustainable trajectory. I'm not that selfish.

 

[Thales750]

Nothing changes..........unfortunately

That is so true, and yet, not. Many people like to use the analogy that the coach makers or the seamstresses had to be retrained to survive. And, that is true.
But, the industrial revolution did not eliminate workers, it create unimaginable wealth and new jobs by increasing human productivity through augmenting effort.

A force multiplier.

What we are seeing now is a complete and total replacement of all workers, not just factory workers, all of us.

How do you suppose we are going to accomidate that? And do you think that will be the same "nothing changes" scenario?

 

[AccessBlaster]

Just because I can navigate the world, does not make it ok for the world to be on an unsustainable trajectory. I'm not that selfish.

Does the solution evolve taxing billionaires? Because this is causing an exodus from blue states like CA and NY.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

If the force multiplier doesn't work its way down to the poor people of the world, nothing will change except the size of the gap. Basic to all of this is that the way to add value to something is through your labor. If you cannot improve the additive value of your labor, you will get left behind.

 

[AngelSpeaks]

Does the solution evolve taxing billionaires? Because this is causing an exodus from blue states like CA and NY.

And IL. If the taxing goes federal, they will leave the country.

Moving is easy for the wealthy. They already have multiple homes all over.

 

[Thales750]

Does the solution evolve taxing billionaires? Because this is causing an exodus from blue states like CA and NY.

But that's why Musk wants to get to Mars.
Still haven't address the reality, the reality is if no one's making any money how are all the corporations in the billionaires going to sell us stuff?

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Study history. 1929, stock market crashed and the ripple effect put everyone out looking for any kind of work. People had an incentive to do even the back-breaking jobs, just to put bread on the table. Prices adjusted dramatically so that folks could afford to eat. My dad lived through that time as a young man in the job market. He told me a few horror stories. Anyone who had real jobs would quickly learn not to sass the boss or take overly long lunch breaks. See also the Maslow triangle for lowest-economic-level economics.

 

[Isaac]

The direction I see is that DJT is asking a totally legit question: Given the way the U.S. Constitution is written, who is in charge of the Executive Branch of government? So far, SCOTUS has favored DJT's interpretation, for the most part. So he passed one of the checks & balances (SCOTUS) on his accumulation of power... or perhaps, since SCOTUS sided with him, it is the REALIZATION of power (that was already there).

I see a lot of the issue is that folks don't recognize what powers the government truly has and DJT, by testing those limits, triggers some very emotional responses from folks who suddenly realize they've been backing the wrong team. There is a Biblical admonition regarding "whose ox is gored?" and the answer is "bureaucrats who thought THEY ran the country and so they could make the rules." Ask me if I care that their ox has been gored. DJT is exposing the bleeding that exposes some of the causes for the ballooning national debt AND in so doing, he exposes those who inflicted the wounds and now might have to fact the blame. If I were in that position, I'd howl too.

I DO agree with Trump exposing just how beaurocrats have been running this country with little-to-no authority for doing so
Now the solution to that isn't to abuse his own authority, of course, but I do agree with the exposing and dealing with that problem.

 

[Isaac]

But that's why Musk wants to get to Mars.
Still haven't address the reality, the reality is if no one's making any money how are all the corporations in the billionaires going to sell us stuff?

I've been confused recently, reading stories about people still fleeing California supposedly due to the wealth tax, but that wealth tax would apply to anyone who lived in CA as of 1/1/2026, so ...