Recent comments in /f/singularity

IncredibleWaddleDee t1_j6hz2sm wrote

Reply to How long till we enter the age of abundance? by tiny9000

It is contradictory to expect an age of abundance. You cannot create energy, you can only transform it. And transforming energy is costly in.... energy! We have been using fossil fuels to fuel everything we do since we discovered them, without any other energy source being a viable replacement for most of our society. Fossil fuels come from hundreds of thousands of years of natural work to condense energy into a flammable fuel. Our tools are made from elements that come from dying stars that have accumulated in mines over millions of years. Our tools of exploitation (ressources gathering), transport and transformation are mostly fueled by fossil fuels across the world. Nothing in our world is sustainable, and the proof is that we have built our economy on a hundred years of ressource wars, human slavery (outsourcing) and the same fossil fuels we first discovered.

How can you create abundance when right now we are unable to share equally the outputs of our systems? Especially since we have passed out peak in petrol, and in tight petrol. Also we have passed our peaks or we will soon pass it in a lot of critical mineral resources. Finally the whole agricultural sector now relies on the engineering of nitrate, which relies on fossil fuels again. Construction also relies on fossil fuels because petrol is a key ingredient in our infrastructure.

There are very few viable alternatives which an AI can exploit to preserve growth (especially since growth is a mathematical function and not a physical reality in economics).

Solar and wind rely on fossil fuels to build and to maintain. They also have a life span so they have to be replaced (as do any electrical infrastructure). Nuclear is more long-term in matter of output but it requires A LOT of fossil fuels to start the machine, so any new facility should start it's construction ASAP. Even then it's limited in it's usage compared to fossil fuels, which litterally power our boats and planes. Fusion is this problem exponentiated. Fusion takes humungous ammounts of power to collect the energy stored in molecules. And even then to collect enough energy to power itself and create a kind of "cascade effect" where there's some extra energy in the output is, first of all kinda dreamy since energy cannot be created and second, alien tech. Or it's technology from the far future. Idk sounds ridiculous to me to expect it to solve everything since it was the same discourse everyone said about anything after petrol and no one was right about it... Nothing replaced petrol yet. We just added over it, in a complementary-ish way...

So yeah, AI is coming (if it's not here yet). Abundance? I don't think so. The opposite even. Worldwide famines and wars.

EDIT : wording

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alexiuss t1_j6hy3ot wrote

Reply to How long till we enter the age of abundance? by tiny9000

Artists have already entered the age of abundance and many of them hate it since they have no idea how to use this abundance.

First we will enter age of machine intelligence.

For this intelligence to spill over into the world is simply the time it takes to fund and build robot factories.

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misterhamtastic t1_j6hy16v wrote

Reply to A McDonald’s location has opened in White Settlement, TX, that is almost entirely automated. Since it opened in December 2022, public opinion is mixed. Many are excited but many others are concerned about the impact this could have on millions of low-wage service workers. by Callitaloss

About 25 workers between part and full time at each McDonald's replaced by a couple people refilling hoppers and making sure someone gets called if it goes down.

Customer service Jobs are gonna be the first to go and the disruption will be shocking.

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Hedgehogz_Mom t1_j6hx7dj wrote

Reply to comment by tiny9000 in How long till we enter the age of abundance? by tiny9000

The ability to .or ereadily pursue physical goals without being exhausted might make us all stronger. It depends on mindset.

So weakness is not inherently feminine. If you disagree see if you can participate in a womans pregnancy and childbirth, and the first couple years of caring for. A baby. Different perspective.

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LyubomirIko t1_j6hwf65 wrote

Reply to comment by tiny9000 in How long till we enter the age of abundance? by tiny9000

Not really. Having a home 30 years ago was way cheaper than today. Having a family and kids today is far demanding, so we have demographic crisis in the development countries. Food products have gotten increasingly worse - full with additives. The stress factor living in current fast pace society is higher too. Medical care costs are getting absurdly high especially in USA.

When cars and jets were only for the super rich? You are talking about the early years of their invention. Currently they are what turns the economics of capitalism, and they for the most part aren't used for vacations as one super rich would use them. But for work. They aren't luxury, but necessary for living.

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Steven81 t1_j6hw8fd wrote

Reply to comment by Frumpagumpus in I’m ready by CassidyHouse

Well you are a biological being, I.e. you are your neurons (which is why there is no turnaround in them), I don't think that full uploading will ever be a thing because mass suicide has never been a thing. We are material, not immaterial, hardly anything is immaterial, that's a category error that many in futurism do (just because we have a name for something doesn't mean it is an actual physical thing, for example every instance of a certain software installed in a different computer is actually a different program each time, I.e. differentiated matter gives rise to a very similar behavior, a bit of how monozygotic twins are actually two different people no matter how close alike they seem).

I doubt that materialism will ever be proven wrong, but I guess that's a question for a dif thread.

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Lauren_Flathead t1_j6hvr1y wrote

Reply to Acceleration is the only way by practical_ussy

I actually disagree tbh. It’s the way we’re going, or might be going but it’s not the only way. Capitalism simply doesn’t prioritise technological growth as much as possible, so many resources are used on total bullshit economies and unnecessary things. The system is built to prioritise profit not technology. Right???? Think about it... so much power and wealth we could have developed technology way faster but noooooo we gotta make some rich ppl richer.

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