Ask HN: If you were God, which problem would you remove from the world?
If you were God, which problem would you remove from the world?
Rather I might empower mortals to resolve their own issues. My first change would be to universally speed up the intellectual evolution so that they might see the errors in their ways sooner. At the same time I might improve their endocrine system so that the increased intelligence does not lead to significant spikes in depression. No, I am not making them into Dr. Spock. Just enough control so that the rational mind is more dominant.
Oh and being a god with a sense of humor and given that you want me to work, I might turn things around in the food chain just a smidge and teach deer how to form a pack and hunt their predators.
- Quietly eliminate childhood cancer and diabetes (probably most terminal childhood illnesses)
- Very very publicly remove any question about my wrathful existence.
Then I would give humanity a century to think about how they respond before deciding what my next step (if any) was.
Additionally, this would solve people’s worries about nuclear energy, allow all water to be potable, resolve many pollution problems and make exploration of Mars so much easier (we can breathe the air and eat dirt).
As for everything else, I would leave it as it is… I’m not sure if you could still call us humanity if you change too much about human nature (e.g. forcibly ending wars, reducing conflict drive, etc.)
We evolved, by chance and experiment, into emotions and social structures. We can evolve out of them when we get something more profitable. People are not that interesting or influential, and we would be more productive as ants.
Future you knows anything you choose to know right now. Is ready for anything you wish to be ready for, anywhere. Has anything you require, given time enough. And so, is basically a form of God as well. If future you doesn't love you then you've solved the only problem in philosophy in a surprising and quite lethal manner.
So, I will through alchemy transfigure your question into "what would you encounter that you rather avoid on your way to being God?"
Hm. It seems that to really want to, desire to avoid something I have to had been traumatized by it to some extent, prior. I will posit that aversion and attraction are two parts of what Buddha called "attachement", though there are more to it.
So if I wanted me to not have an experience, that (would) only happen if I had that experience, which means the experience has to have been had. English is very good at processes, relations maybe not so much. I don't know how to have the thought that breeds the question that you wrote down, OK.
Or are you asking me to make a choice for you? If so, then, emphatically: "DO LIVE YOUR OWN LIFE", none of your problems for me, thank you..
Everything else is just opportunities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CI41MtiNsls
This is coming. Boston dynamics or James Bruton will eventually produce a bot that does useful things. From that platform it will later do more useful things. Eventually we don't really have scarcity.
Sure this will solve basic needs like food, water, warmth, rest, safety. Of which are generally solved in the west.
But this will utterly destroy psychological needs. Where do you make friends? How do you have a feeling of accomplishment or the prestige of doing something that a robot now does?
In some short term factor we might have less conflict but those psychological losses where accomplishments are achieved by robots will lead to far greater conflict.
Psychologically, if you treat robots as people (albeit permanent slow witted, naturally compliant servants) then it’s easy to image a post scarcity world. We will all simply live like the upper class lives today except our servants and employees are made of silicon instead of flesh.
Normal people would compete in the same way CEOs compete, by comparing how well they actually manage their resources.
So that's interesting right. Yes a plumber coming over could be replaced by a bot. But ultimately that bot replaces you as well.
>Psychologically, if you treat robots as people (albeit permanent slow witted, naturally compliant servants) then it’s easy to image a post scarcity world. We will all simply live like the upper class lives today except our servants and employees are made of silicon instead of flesh.
Like the instant I can buy a robot butler who will keep my house clean and cook me dinner. I do it. They will likely be in the $30-50,000 range. I'm getting that asap.
>Normal people would compete in the same way CEOs compete, by comparing how well they actually manage their resources.
It'll actually shift the economy to creativity. Robots make building an iphone ultra cheap but some person still needs to engineer and design it.
If it’s the former, then society will still exist because we yearn for human interaction. I might buy a book written by a bot, but I’ll still discuss it with my friends. Could my friends be replaced by bots? Maybe, but in the same vein my friends could be replaced by strangers but I don’t do that because of human fixation on individuals (e.g. I care what Joe thinks because he is Joe, no substitutions are allowed).
However, if the later applies then society collapses except for the very few people who can create bots better than the bots can create themselves and the monarchs who managed to seize ownership of all the armed drones first.
This is being studied in depth right now. Metro Toronto has around 6 million people. You know how many people that's above optimal society size? Around 6 million. The optimum city size is less than 500 people. Scientifically proven fact, but how can cities fix this problem? People point to Paris where neighbourhoods are designed around being self-sufficient. Some point of Israeli settlements and such. I don't personally think we know the answer.
It's happening in Africa right now. People from the west have gone there and have introduced economics and how to work together to build a pencil. There's a ted talk I can't find that goes into 'bring your donuts to the market, you will sell more and therefore have more to buy' etc.
>If it’s the former, then society will still exist because we yearn for human interaction.
Society is not about humans it seems.
> I might buy a book written by a bot, but I’ll still discuss it with my friends. Could my friends be replaced by bots? Maybe, but in the same vein my friends could be replaced by strangers but I don’t do that because of human fixation on individuals (e.g. I care what Joe thinks because he is Joe, no substitutions are allowed).
Or you discuss it on HN. Cant really discuss it with a bot.
>However, if the later applies then society collapses except for the very few people who can create bots better than the bots can create themselves and the monarchs who managed to seize ownership of all the armed drones first.
Society spreads out. I'm not worried about death robots and terminators. As the cost of owning 100 acres in the middle of nowhere with your own seeded pond and internet fiber right to the house is basically 0. Robots build all those things for you. Big cities collapse for sure but small communities of close families and friends will be where it's at.
That ultra wealthy beyond trillionaire can't consume or spend that money. What it effectively would do it pull the money out of the economy. Deflation would be rampant and productive workers would be worth their weight in gold. Central banks would effectively have to print so much money to avoid deflation that everyone would become effectively rich.
I dont see this as a problem in the future.
I would go further and remove the idea of "self". This leads to the idea that other organisms are "not me" and ... well, that seems to have led to our failure to solve our shared problems.
If your mind continues to live on after your body dies, then what is humanity? A hive mind?
I'd have an app that tracks all funds of wealthy and when it hits 1 billion: congratulations you win at life, now you get to go join the rest of the billionaires in hell.
As for religion, I'd prove I exist and also tell people if you even try to worship me, you'll go join the billionaires.
Anyone even seeming a bit tyrannical, oligarchical, or influenced by special interests and greed will also join billionaires. I might give a warning if they mean well, if they're like Putin or Kim Jong Yun, nah.
But, what if you're not using your perceptory/sensory consciously and can't even read that answer in the way it's formulated. Then you still have a question, still think it's a question about a subject.
Where is the subject though? Is there a subject?
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord."
“As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2tp0UNcjzl8
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Female and non-binary violence would be allowed?
https://www.mankind.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/55-Key...
I really don't want to get into a tit-for-tat argument and I universally condemn all forms of domestic abuse but to single out "male violence" and then double down on it makes you look ignorant.
Social sciences has basically fallen on its face because they discovered that these are myths if not literally the opposite. Society and even the judicial system allows women to be violent and does not punish them. It's kind of remarkable because social science leans left-wing and they basically proved the right-wing social policies right. This has resulted in quite the problem in the political sphere.
Like just going to reddit can prove this in a heartbeat. Social sciences have proven women are equal or more violent than men. Largely speaking due to getting away with their violence.
I really like this one. Though you can't actually watch the video anymore. Tons of 'social experiments' showing women being violent to men and bystanders won't lift a finger to help a man.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/5d33c36d-cd41-4351-97...
Anyway, this women arent violent stuff is actually extremely harmful to society.
I don't think I said "women aren't violent" or any form of that claim?