> it’s not like we can just sit with old tech and say “nah, that’s good enough.”
But, why not?
But, why not?
Imagine if video games' audio/video just stopped improving past the SNES. Imagine if we decided that 56k dialup was good enough. Imagine if we stopped improving cell phone cameras past the iPhone 3G. These things seem pretty low quality now because we've incrementally built so many better things in the interim. The unleaded gasoline of today is going to be as absurd as the leaded gasoline of yesterday within many our lifetimes. But we can't make big leaps without the interim nudges forward - the N64, the DOCSIS cable modem, modern phone cameras, hybrid vehicles. To do those, we need better microchips.
We also need more of them. Just because the richest areas of the world have theirs doesn't mean the less-well-off areas need to be shut out because they didn't get in on time.
No because that is a made up quote.
As someone whose daily drivers consist of decade-old flagship hardware, I don't need to. Outside software support, the main downside of my phone is battery. Maybe I should get a new one - it's from an era where these were still user-replaceable.
My similarly aged laptop? Same thing. I could upgrade the hardware; the small increase in compute power isn't worth the reduction in connectivity (ports) though.
Sure, some will have specific needs. But for the vast majority that doesn't need a 96 GB desktop or a 10K screen, flagship HW from 10 years ago is more than good enough. Just as for your examples where we need better chips: that was true 30 years ago. Nowadays, a smaller nanometer scale than the last 2 cycles probably matters far less than a better chip design for most use cases.
Such as the massive engineered screen addictions pandemic that afflicts most of the world today, especially the younger generation that never knew any other way.
Or the mountains, rivers and oceans of e-waste. Or decline of physical and mental health from lack of natural physical activity.
There are benefits of course, but it's wise to keep a balanced view on the pros and the cons as well.