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What do you mean by "minimize input to achieve a goal"?
R&D, energy, materials, infrastructure, people (if they still have some talents that exceed AI), etc. With humans mostly out of the picture, what I (as King of the World) can acheive will be limited by the resources at my disposal and how efficiently I use them. Since I own the world, all the world's resources are at my disposal. Think of all the resources that are currently "wasted" supplying products and services to the masses.
I think what other people are commenting on is the interim phase where consumer capitalism continues to function, only with a steadily dwindling but more affluent pool of consumers.
R&D, energy, materials, infrastructure, people (if they still have some talents that exceed AI), etc. With humans mostly out of the picture, what I (as King of the World) can acheive will be limited by the resources at my disposal and how efficiently I use them. Since I own the world, all the world's resources are at my disposal. Think of all the resources that are currently "wasted" supplying products and services to the masses.
You are basically contradicting yourself.
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Originally Posted by rruff
what I (as King of the World) can acheive will be limited by the resources at my disposal
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Originally Posted by rruff
Since I own the world, all the world's resources are at my disposal.
You're saying you have all the world's resources but you are limited by the resources. When you have all the world's resources you are definitely not limited by the resources.
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Originally Posted by rruff
I think what other people are commenting on is the interim phase where consumer capitalism continues to function, only with a steadily dwindling but more affluent pool of consumers.
None of them said that.
At this point in time, all of you are describing very different worlds.
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Automation has always progressed because it is more efficient than using human labor. More output with less input. Oligarchs don't use automation *because* they own a lot, automation is happening naturally because it is more efficient.
The massive game changer we will experience is automation becoming so advanced that it makes most human labor obsolete. The unemployable humans will naturally no longer be a contributing part of the economy. For the oligarchs the best scenario will be to marginalize them if they are generous (sustain them in poverty), and eliminate them if they are not.
You still haven't answered the question - Why is automation needed?
You're giving circular logic - "Automation is more efficient?" And "Efficiency leads to automation." You never arrive at the reason why automation is necessary. Where's the beef? Tell me the goal of automation. Efficiency, automation, etc; are just means to an end. What is the end?
If it is to make money, how does automation helps make money in a NON-consumer driven economy? In such economy, automation adds to the cost.
You also said profit is not important, that would rule out making money as a reason for automation. So that's why I ask for the purpose of automation. There seems to be no obvious reason for it.
In another post, you said automation is to make better use of limited resources, but then why is there limited resource in a world where all the resources are owned by the wealthy? There should be more resource than they know what to do with.
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Originally Posted by rruff
No, not by bartering. I imagine they will use currency as a medium of exchange just like now. No reason not to.
Ok then, things are still measure in currency. That makes it easy but you keep trying to block me from using currency as a measurement. Let's just use currency as a measurement then.
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Originally Posted by rruff
You have it backward. Power, wealth, and assets existed before money. Money was introduced to facilitate the *exchange* of assets.
I never said it isn't so. I am saying assets are usually measured in money.
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Originally Posted by rruff
It would be more correct to say they own them. I suspect that anything resembling the freedom we take for granted will be the privilege of a favored few. But they may be paid as well. They may simply qualify for a particular level of necessities and luxuries depending on their level of importance. It can work either way.
Then you're talking about a very different ruling system, maybe even tyrannical.
But you also said it's capitalism. How does those two usually opposing system co-exist? I think that's one reason your world is not making sense now, is because it consist of systems that one don't usually found existed together.
If this is some kind of authoritarian society, the problem is not automation, it's the authoritarian system!
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Originally Posted by rruff
The only reason for having currency (gold in this case) is to *exchange* assets.
You probably realize that no one is using gold as currency these days. The governments simply create money out of thin air. The value of each currency relative to another is determined by exchanges, and is influenced by a bunch of factors I won't go into.
Doesn't matter who created money, when, or what; the importance is that money is used as a measurement. For several posts now you kept rejecting money and that is confusing.
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Originally Posted by rruff
The true measure is the same as it has always been. Real assets. If you look at the history of civilization it appears that the most important asset is the ability to successfully wage war.
That makes no sense in a NON-consumer-based economy proposed by rruff. In this economy where the wealthy are selling only to other wealthy, profits are made by making unique and innovative things that make other wealthy wants to buy it.
You are describing a mass production line and that doesn't jive with this economy because there will not be enough people to buy your mass produced products. This economy is all about customization, not mass production.
Non of it matters when you're in a "customization" economy. If your worker is sick for a few days, just tell your client the delivery will be a few days late, the rich elite is not going to care when he already has other toys in the garage.
Plus, there are literally billions of unemployed ready to fill in for the sick or the unmotivated or those wanting a raise. The few who do have jobs are not going to be taking vacations or demanding a raise.
Also, the automation would increase cost when you are not mass producing things. In this economy, automation = higher cost.
What capitalism? Under rruff's premise this is no longer a consumer capitalism. What does capitalism looks like then?
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We may eventually reach your proposed utopia, but at the moment vast fortunes are being made by selling consumer goods. I assume there will always be a market for missles, bombs and ammunition. If you can't gain power by selling stuff, you have to gain power by killing someone. It's the American Way.
If we can use robots to make the robots that fight the wars, production lines will be essential to the survival of the wealthy. The best robots will win. Humans are irrelevant. We just killed a million Iraquis and nobody much cared.
You're saying you have all the world's resources but you are limited by the resources. When you have all the world's resources you are definitely not limited by the resources.
We must live on different worlds. The one I live on is certainly limited in its resources.
We may eventually reach your proposed utopia, but at the moment vast fortunes are being made by selling consumer goods. I assume there will always be a market for missles, bombs and ammunition. If you can't gain power by selling stuff, you have to gain power by killing someone. It's the American Way.
If we can use robots to make the robots that fight the wars, production lines will be essential to the survival of the wealthy. The best robots will win. Humans are irrelevant. We just killed a million Iraquis and nobody much cared.
I did not propose any utopia. You might have me confused with a different poster.
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Originally Posted by Larry Caldwell
but at the moment vast fortunes are being made by selling consumer goods.
You and I are not talking about the same thing. I am discussing rruff's scenario of a non-consumer capitalism. The part about fortunes being made by selling consumer goods do not apply in rruff's world.
Note that I am NOT saying the apocalypse isn't coming or that there will be more automation. I am saying in the hypothetical world where the elites only sell to elites, and the rest are living slaves-like; is a world that does not need automation.
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We must live on different worlds. The one I live on is certainly limited in its resources.
Only because the world we live in is about consumer capitalism, mass production, and having 7 billion mouths to feed; but you eliminated that scenario. Your world is non-consumer capitalism and elitist, remember?
You can't go back and forth between worlds to make your argument. In your world, profit is not important, the wealthy only sell to other wealthy, and mass production is unnecessary. The wealthy definitely won't run out of resource in your world - they're basically taking assets meant to serve 7 billion people and narrow them down to serve only a small portion of that (themselves).
Furthermore, our world is running out of resources only in some things like oil and metal. We are not running out of food (except in certain regions but the reason is mostly political), not running of most materials. But if things like oil and metal is limited in your world, that's all the more reason not to automate, since it sucks up energy and metal much more than human labor.
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Power and wealth. "What do men with power want? More power."
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If it is to make money, how does automation helps make money in a NON-consumer driven economy? In such economy, automation adds to the cost.
Why do you think it adds to the cost? That's ridiculous. Particularly when I can task robots to do anything I'd normally need a human to do. Small quantity production is still much cheaper and better quality if it is done by machine. This is true even now, and will only become more pronounced.
Plus the quantities of things produced will not necessarily be small anyway. It depends on what it is. Robots will be specialized of course, but they will have a wide range of function too. In other words you won't custom build one for every task. Computer components, electrical systems, solar panels, windmills, batteries, building materials, etc.
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Then you're talking about a very different ruling system, maybe even tyrannical. How does those two usually opposing system co-exist?
Tyranny and capitalism aren't remotely "opposed". The "guiding hand" of capitalism is greed and power... which it seeks to maximize. In the capitalists' home country that has previously been achieved by consumer-capitalism, with a strong system of laws, a fairly egalitarian wealth redistribution, and relative freedom. But if the capitalists wish to pillage the resources of a country, they most certainly don't want a democratic government there. In many cases democratic regimes were overthrown and tyrannical puppets put in place to facilitate it.
For the last 40 years the symbiotic relationship in the US (and many developed countries) between capitalists and consumers has been systematically weakened by globalization and debt escalation. This doesn't necessarily prove that they are phasing out consumer-capitalism, but when you consider the other factors that are occurring, you should be very suspicious.
But if things like oil and metal is limited in your world, that's all the more reason not to automate, since it sucks up energy and metal much more than human labor.
You are a couple orders of magnitude off in the wrong direction.
1st world humans consume way more energy and materials than a robot doing the equivalent labor. The house, utilities, the car and fuel, all the stuff they own and consume, the transportation infrastructure, the workplace, the inefficiently produced food they use for fuel, the resources used to raise and educate them, etc.
Even if the human was able to work 24/7 for their whole lives it wouldn't be close, but they work less than 1/3 of that for half their lives.
Aren't we kinda there with phones. Who could've predicted less than 20 years ago that the cellphone would transform our lives the way it has. I just wish I could've bought stock in Apple, LG, or one of the companies that make components for smartphones
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