Are you a luddite?

[luka]

this is why i start talking about we should start killing people. i dont really want to have to kill people but sometimes you think it's the only language they'll understand

 

[Clinamenic]

It's the same thing we've gone back and forth on re: capitalism as some sort of entity too.

At the theoretical center of it seems to be the work of Robert Solow who, if I understand, accounts for technological development as an exogenous factor in his models for economic growth, wherein technological development is understood a driving force of capitalism essentially.

Makes sense to me. It seems obvious to me that, because of technology hyperboosted by capital, the middle class citizen in a developed nation today enjoys a quality of life comparable to that of aristocrats a couple centuries ago.

 

[luka]

you think, why can't we exercise any control here? how many people want a microchip up the bum? very few i'd imagine and yet here come the microchips

 

[luka]

At the theoretical center of it seems to be the work of Robert Solow who, if I understand, accounts for technological development as an exogenous factor in his models for economic growth, wherein technological development is understood a driving force of capitalism essentially.

Makes sense to me. It seems obvious to me that, because of technology hyperboosted by capital, the middle class citizen in a developed nation today enjoys a quality of life comparable to that of aristocrats a couple centuries ago.

do they bollocks. the middle class citizen has to work!

 

[Clinamenic]

Food availability, speed of transportation, medicine, education, speed of information, etc.

All things profoundly benefited by our ancient and sprawling stack of technology.

 

[william_kent]

Microsoft Accidentally Leaks One Outlook Project Monarch Image​

On an Office Insider Preview blog, Microsoft’s One Outlook – known as Project Monarch – seems to have made an appearance.

ahem... taking the piss?

 

[Clinamenic]

do they bollocks. the middle class citizen has to work!

True, and that is probably the biggest point in favor of the aristocrats. But even aristocrats lounging their parlor having sex with their servants still seem to suffer from many things that many of us today do not.

 

[version]

you think, why can't we exercise any control here? how many people want a microchip up the bum? very few i'd imagine and yet here come the microchips

How many gamers wanted microtransactions?

 

[luka]

it's a stupid argument anyway. i hate all that line of discussion it just gets me down.

 

[Clinamenic]

But I do think there is an obvious argument to be made for technology raising the status quo of quality of life, for more than just the upper class.

 

[luka]

But I do think there is an obvious argument to be made for technology raising the status quo of quality of life, for more than just the upper class.

yes but this is too tedious to make and elides the very question that version is raising

 

[Clinamenic]

True, and that is probably the biggest point in favor of the aristocrats. But even aristocrats lounging their parlor having sex with their servants still seem to suffer from many things that many of us today do not.

e.g. a subway is an easier and more effective means of transportation than even the most lavish of horse-drawn buggies.

 

[luka]

but you just do your malfunctioning droid routine anytime this comes up there's no sense to be got out of you

 

[Clinamenic]

yes but this is too tedious to make and elides the very question that version is raising

The point version is making is that the pro-tech and pro-capitalist arguments people make, often defer their own value judgements to some allegedly objective and borderline metaphysical trend, which I have done on numerous occasions.

Now I'm just pitching it as a mere argument.

 

[Clinamenic]

An argument I don't think is very controversial at its roots, despite how unsexy and anathema it is to anti-capitalists.

 

[version]

They're two different arguments. We're saying people with ill intent frame their preferred technological change as inevitable. You're saying some technologies have improved people's lives.

 

[luka]

your missing the point as always cos you just do your routines with no regard for what anyone else is saying. i mostly like the routines but sometimes they get a bit annoying

 

[Clinamenic]

They're two different arguments. We're saying people with ill intent frame their preferred technological change as inevitable. You're saying some technologies have improved people's lives.

Ill intent, beyond being pro-capital and pro-tech in general?

 

[Clinamenic]

They're two different arguments. We're saying people with ill intent frame their preferred technological change as inevitable. You're saying some technologies have improved people's lives.

Well I'm also arguing that technologically driven capitalism has resulted in a net-positive effect on the status quo of quality of life, more or less across the board. "Net-positive" being the operative term, i.e. after the glaring negative impacts have been considered.

 

[Clinamenic]

Just seems like the glaring negative symptoms of capitalism are less prominent than those of prior economic paradigms, from what little I know of that history.