Have you ever wished you were born decades later?

[BT04]

- Structural unemployment is a simple reality and has been since the dawn of civilization, it is outright necessary to ensure that people seek the skills that are required at that day. You cannot hold back technological progress because of it. Does it suck? Of course, and I'm not discounting those who suffer because of it. But you can't wish it away, no matter how much you try. Progress comes whether you like it or not. Dealing with the fallout of structural unemployment is a major socio-economic political issue that can be addressed through that avenue, the answer is not to simply freeze progress. (Certainly there is a weakness in addressing it, but that is beside the point.)

- You can't take the good of technology without the bad, even if you presume that something like this would be bad. For instance, the very fact we are talking right now. The fact that this forum and others like it are available. The fact that I can visit a therapist online (which, just btw, largely was necessary because as little as 2 months ago I couldn't drive because of severe phobias and anxiety!)... The surgeries we covet in particular... Not possible without the progression of technology.

There are assumptions implicit here that border on the ideological, and I'm going to point them out because they are rarely ever, in this day and age and in this culture, considered ideological and usually taken as mere fact:

1. The notion that "progress" exists and that it is linear (a mistake that people also often make when talking about evolution, for example), rather than circular, directionless, or some other shape. This is a rather modern, western notion that is not shared by, for example, most native peoples or even some of the ancient Greeks, who actually believed that progress was linear in the opposite direction.

2. The notion that "progress" is morally good, and to try and "stop" it, or to otherwise desire it's cessation is reprehensible. Note that the language often used subtly implies that progress functions similarly to a kind of cosmic gift-giving mechanism, whereby "stopping" it would amount to depriving people of something they are owed now or in the future. In this way, "progress" is no different than any promissory doctrine of religion that teaches X, Y, and Z actions (in this case, supporting or contributing to complex technological development, automation, AI, fiat production and delivery of goods, and the capitalist-consumerist crank that turns the whole machine) will result in achieving the modern secular equivalent of immortality or paradise. So to question the "goodness" of the progress concept in modern western society is about as well-received as questioning the existence of sin in a Baptist church.

[Roll]

There are assumptions implicit here that border on the ideological, and I'm going to point them out because they are rarely ever, in this day and age and in this culture, considered ideological and usually taken as mere fact:

1. The notion that "progress" exists and that it is linear (a mistake that people also often make when talking about evolution, for example), rather than circular, directionless, or some other shape. This is a rather modern, western notion that is not shared by, for example, most native peoples or even some of the ancient Greeks, who actually believed that progress was linear in the opposite direction.

I speak generally of explicitly technological progress, which while branching certainly can be clearly defined by any reasonable standard as moving forward, insofar as it isn't impacted by extraneous circumstances (ie: catastrophic events, mass book burnings in history, etc.). Cultural and sociological progress is a different thing entirely, and outside the scope of driver-less cars discussion.

2. The notion that "progress" is morally good, and to try and "stop" it, or to otherwise desire it's cessation is reprehensible. Note that the language often used subtly implies that progress functions similarly to a kind of cosmic gift-giving mechanism, whereby "stopping" it would amount to depriving people of something they are owed now or in the future. In this way, "progress" is no different than any promissory doctrine of religion that teaches X, Y, and Z actions (in this case, supporting or contributing to complex technological development, automation, AI, fiat production and delivery of goods, and the capitalist-consumerist crank that turns the whole machine) will result in achieving the modern secular equivalent of immortality or paradise. So to question the "goodness" of the progress concept in modern western society is about as well-received as questioning the existence of sin in a Baptist church.

I did not say that technological progress was morally good, on the contrary as I explicitly pointed out the subjective view of this issue being bad in the views of some. I simply stated that you can't take what favors you (again, the very fact of our conversation) without also taking what does not. Technology is inherently neutral, and its morality or goodness is determined by its use, but it is virtually impossible to pick and choose. Particularly considering that it is subjective in the first place.

I also speak of it from a logistical perspective, not that you shouldn't stop it, but that you can't, not practically. The advancements are being made, and short of millions of people going Unabomber, there's not a whole lot you can do about it, that ship has long since sailed. The better avenue is to focus on handling it and the fallout properly. (Ie: Proper government handling of structural unemployment to go back to the automation issue.) (Though in the instance of driverless cars, I would certainly suggest that you shouldn't. The good far outweighs any potential bad.)

[BT04]

I speak generally of explicitly technological progress, which while branching certainly can be clearly defined by any reasonable standard as moving forward, insofar as it isn't impacted by extraneous circumstances (ie: catastrophic events, mass book burnings in history, etc.). Cultural and sociological progress is a different thing entirely, and outside the scope of driver-less cars discussion.

As I understand it, "forward" can only genuinely refer to the natural progression of causes and effects - being humans rather than photons or some other subatomic particle, time is fixed for us - and I'm sure we can all agree that causes happen before effects. I do not view increasing complexity, or the filling of 'notional space' (a concept that refers to the "room" that ideas and notions can occupy in a socio-psyco-cultural space, the implication being that there is a maximum carrying capacity) as being a good thing, and right now I'm very skeptical that the net positives outweigh the net negatives - or that the net positives are actually such, and that the rubric used to determine them isn't just plain broken.

I did not say that technological progress was morally good, on the contrary as I explicitly pointed out the subjective view of this issue being bad in the views of some. I simply stated that you can't take what favors you (again, the very fact of our conversation) without also taking what does not. Technology is inherently neutral, and its morality or goodness is determined by its use, but it is virtually impossible to pick and choose. Particularly considering that it is subjective in the first place.

I also speak of it from a logistical perspective, not that you shouldn't stop it, but that you can't, not practically. The advancements are being made, and short of millions of people going Unabomber, there's not a whole lot you can do about it, that ship has long since sailed. The better avenue is to focus on handling it and the fallout properly. (Ie: Proper government handling of structural unemployment to go back to the automation issue.) (Though in the instance of driverless cars, I would certainly suggest that you shouldn't. The good far outweighs any potential bad.)

I would disagree that all technology and all objects are neutral - I'd hardly consider a guillotine or conversion therapy (a psychological technology) to be neutral, let alone discriminatory language, language being a communicative technology. Also, if technology was neutral, then why is so much of it illegal? Certainly, culture doesn't agree with this notion, and since there's no escaping culture, I couldn't, in good faith, argue that it's neutral since there's no escaping cultural norms, only trading one for another.

From my research, it wouldn't take a million Unabombers to undo this, because we're setting ourselves up for structural failures pretty well as it is. The more complex a system is, the more moving parts it has, and the more opportunities for a black swan event to happen. Driverless cars are not an antifragile technology, and neither, frankly, is the whole of digital infrastructure. But as far as structural failures and resources bubbles are concerned, Gail Tverberg, an actuary internationally known for her work on energy and economic forecasting, has a lot of pretty good information about it. There are too many potential places to start there, but I'll suggest this slideshow presentation.

I'd say it's hubris to assume that the greatest liability the system has is the incompetence of the user - rather, the greatest liability is the incompetence of its designers, which cannot ever be engineered away.

ETA: Oh, her most recent one, Nine Reasons Why Globalization Can't Be Permanent is also relevant to the discussion, driverless cars and all - especially since car parts are made in so many places, and digital infrastructure can't really exist without tightly-connected global markets due to the nature of computer hardware production.

[PollyQMcLovely]

Couldn't you, should you fancy, define technological progress simply as an increase in computational power? And wouldn't that be fairly easily assessed as moving forward?

[BT04]

Couldn't you, should you fancy, define technological progress simply as an increase in computational power? And wouldn't that be fairly easily assessed as moving forward?

I mean, at the end of the day, the whole thing is really a philosophical question best left to be debated by white-haired men in fancy institutions with British names, or, I guess, actuaries who have the wherewithal to make sense of oceans of charts and graphs.

The post-mortem for Moore's Law, though, has been written by a lot of smart people in the tech business. So by that definition, "progress" is coming to a standstill. Gonna need something else.

On that note, however, I'm bowing out. For those of you who remain unconvinced (everyone, I'm sure), I'm more than happy to agree to disagree on this single niche subject. Thanks for the debate practice, and apologies, OP, for hijacking your thread lol~

[PollyQMcLovely]

Moore's law isn't really relevant on large enough timescales if you remove human mortality from the equation. You could build a network so large that it would take ridiculous amounts of time to transfer data from one end to the other even at relativistic speeds and this wouldn't be an issue so long as the physical system is able to maintain itself.