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0 pointsfragmede5mo ago0 comments

If you're asking for AI hype, promises that haven't come to pass and may not ever, but proponents want you to believe (I mean, I want to believe, the question is if it's a rational belief or not), I can give you some. AI could lead to scientific advancements and make fusion reactors on Earth feasible. (We have one in the sky already, it's just 1 AU away.) With AI enabling fusion, (because controlling the magnetic fields is beyond what humans can do), we get cheap energy. Cheap energy means electrolysis is feasible, making water cheaper. AI robots to farm the fields means land that was previously uneconomical to farm on becomes usable. More arable land means more crops can be grown. Food is already cheap as hell though, farmers don't make a good living in the global economy. Shelter, unfortunately, is a political problem. We have the technology to build more housing right fucking now. China has a glut of housing. Blame the NIMBYs for your housing cost. But AI, in the form of a machine that fills out the paperwork required to build, faster and cheaper will help. Especially in the case of nuclear power plant permits. AI, in the form of helping to generate architectural models of your home that you get 3d printed is also a thing.

But that's all a bunch of hype that may never come to pass. Some people don't want to hear any hype. Hoping is too much to take if you've been let down too hard before. Or for the rich and you're poor. It's there though, if you want to dream. Dream big.

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hn_acc15mo ago

So let's say everything is cheap - will that lower housing prices? Grocery prices? Energy prices?

Or will the cheapest provider gobble everyone else up and then raise prices to maximize marginal revenue / whatever everyone can bear? For example, imagine if Oracle (or whoever you want) somehow wins the AI price wars and completely owns every energy company, every housing company, every farm on earth, every bank, etc. You think they'll LOWER prices to make life easy for everyone? When they'll know exactly just how much you can pay each month to still survive and not riot?

fragmedeOP5mo ago

Haha I mean if you’re asking for doomerism, I’ve got that too! Once robots can do it all, why keep any of the poors alive? Implement human breeding programs based on attractiveness and intelligence, and cull the rest. You know who don't riot? The dead. Once there's robot soldiers and baristas, everyone who's not super intelligent (but none of that autism) tall white and blonde, with blue eyes, is of no use to the overlords in this dystopian scenario, and is just a waste of resources. Better, then, to make it quick and painless for all of them. So they'll select "the good ones" among the poor to escape away on nuclear submarines, nuke the planet, get the rest of humanity to die off, then resurface once it's safe and repopulate the Earth in their own image. We're firmly in to writing science fiction now though, so we might as well add in a time machine and a cure for aging and bioengineering so I can have extra arms and also gills for breathing underwater.

If you want to go to conspiracies theory land, the world is already controlled by 100 families, or corporations, or the Jews or the lizard people. We’re all just toys for them to play with.

At the end of the day, you have three options and a choice to make: corporations, government, or billionaires. Which one are you going to throw your lot in with to survive the upcoming upheaval?

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