Comment by ctchocula | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ctchocula | Hacker News Reader

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Trekonomics is a nice non-fiction book about the utopian ideas presented in Star Trek and especially TNG. There, they treat the replicator as more of a metaphor for post-scarcity rather than recipe (i.e. Star Trek technology is sufficient but not necessary).

I would say I'm more optimistic than you about post-scarcity. Bertrand Russell makes a case for the insanity of modern society by noting that during WWI half of British populace was sufficient to produce enough for all of Britain. Even if we allow for some margin of error in his statement, since that time productivity in the US has increased 4.5x since then.

To me the show is increasingly relevant. For example, it presents a clear answer to a popular criticism to UBI: what is to prevent everyone from staying home to play video games and leeching off society?

The optimistic answer is that once society can produce enough goods for everyone, the traditional value system of society (material wealth => proxy for contributions to society => virtue) loses meaning and will be overtaken by new ones (contributing to society => virtue).

I agree with most of your summary except the end. What if the problems in the US and around the developed world are more due to how society is organized rather than technological? I think the Star Trek value system is appealing and IMO something we ought to strive for.

My comment didn't present my full view on the topic - I was seconding the warning that "don't reason from fictional evidence" applies to both dystopia and utopia visions. In truth, I am more hopeful about the post-scarcity scenario than that comment might have implied.

I am (currently) in favour of UBI, though there are two things that I'm not sure about. One, what's to prevent prices immediately rising to eat the entire UBI, returning everything to status quo but with no welfare budget? Two, how to deal with migration from countries with no UBI to countries with UBI?

As for Star Trek itself (the TNG/DS9/VOY timeline, at least), I do consider it a good vision of what the world could be like. The question that's always in my mind is "how do we get there". I dream humanity can get to a post-scarcity era; the trick is surviving the transition.

As for prices rising - increased demand in a flexible commodity do not result in prices rising, but falling. Economies of scale, right? So many of the things that folks spend UBI money on, will get cheaper.

But will there be increased demand? For the basics - food, shelter - the demand is pretty much proportional to population. With more money around and same demand, will competition on commodities be enough to keep the prices where they were? My naïve expectation is that they'll in fact rise, and tie up most of the UBI.

So folks will spend their money on other things. I just don't get it - how does "people have money" lead to "I know how they will spend it, and it will be on housing and food"?

In a competitive market (I can go to any grocery store I like) the prices are not set to what people have to pay but on what the other stores are selling for.

The offerings may depend on that - more caviar if folks have more spendable income. But that's called Standard of Living, and if it goes up well that's the whole purpose of UBI

> I just don't get it - how does "people have money" lead to "I know how they will spend it, and it will be on housing and food"?

It was more of "people have more money" -> "are able to pay more" -> "prices will raise to what market full of slightly richer people can bear". But I'm not arguing that, just asking about it. I don't have enough economic understanding to make predictions here.

Its easy to choose one strand of economics and sketch together a story. I call it 'playing dot-to-dot'. But economics has many strands, all in play at the same time. Its not just here; folks post such sketches all the time.

Competition determines prices. Folks can spend money on lots of things. People can share an apartment if they are too expensive, which would drive the price down, and spend their money on other things. More money in circulation means more lending thus more development, which increases housing supply. And on and on.

Getting there is definitely the hard part. Even in the show they had to go through nuclear apocalypse and rebuild society in order to get there.

Another problem is getting people to think "contributing to society is virtuous". It's possible that this idea may be at odds with human nature (similar to Soviet and Chinese implementation of communism).

> Getting there is definitely the hard part. Even in the show they had to go through nuclear apocalypse and rebuild society in order to get there.

Also a well-timed first contact with arrogant aliens, that made humans want to show their best side.

> Another problem is getting people to think "contributing to society is virtuous". It's possible that this idea may be at odds with human nature (similar to Soviet and Chinese implementation of communism).

I haven't studied this in any length, but with what little I read, my impression is that the core problem was that communism tried to do away with the concept of private property, and this concept turned out to be pretty much human nature. People want to have things to call their own, and want to see rewards proportional to their efforts. I don't feel like the concept of "contributing to society is virtuous" is at odds with human nature, it actually seems pretty aligned (after all, that's how societies form and grow). I'd love to read more about this. Any recommendations?

>Also a well-timed first contact with arrogant aliens, that made humans want to show their best side.

In the same way the colonies wanted to show their best side when the British showed up to civilize them?

Sorry.. this is a utopia, I forgot. Per ardua ad astra and whatnot. Must not be cynical. Must not be...

the only reason there was a utopia at all was a global holocaust reducing the population, widespread genetic manipulation and subliminal cultural reprogramming by a race of alien telepaths. The entire franchise is Federation propaganda. The universal translators are literal propaganda machines.

NO GET OUT CYNICISM YOU DONT EVEN FIT.

> NO GET OUT CYNICISM YOU DONT EVEN FIT.

I'd say stop feeding the wrong wolf, but you seem to have a whole pack there, searching the forest of your mind for any positive thought to hunt down. You might want to call Wildlife Services on this one.

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