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Comment by Allocator2008 | Hacker News Reader

Allocator2008

I'm not buying. As Howard Roarke, the protagonist in 'The Fountainhead' says, "The world is perishing from an orgy of self-sacrificing."

We don't need more altruism or nobless-oblige. We need more innovation. Google, who all but started the cloud computing model, is a leader in innovation. They should stick with what they are good at, technological innovation, and not have some kind of save the world guilt trip. The world benefits most by a Google that is focused on the one thing they are great at: search and a cloud computing dev environment.

Don't save us, google. Just keep up the good work. That way, by benefiting from your technology, we can save ourselves. :-)

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That's like saying to Bill Gates "you're rich, forget about the Gates foundation, just focus on making money for yourself and creating jobs." Warren Buffet, or how bout the Carnegies, Mellons, and Rockefellers.

This has got to be the least coherent analysis I've read on HN in a while. Google is an organization, yes, but one composed of people, and those people are affected by the decisions of invididuals or groups who could incrementally change the world for better or for worse.

You don't think the engineers writing JS to improve that "cloud computing model" (let's use Google Docs as an example) wouldn't benefit either directly or indirectly from some of the ideas that will come out of this project?

How are innovation and this project mutually exclusive? Google is (and has been via Google.org) trying to spearhead innovation outside of its known core competencies (i.e. search, ads, and apps) and does this project not contribute to that?

Wow, it's like someone invented a time machine and invited a 14-year-old-me to come and comment on hacker news.

Seriously though, many hackers have loved Ayn Rand's ideas, but the simple biological fact is that we get gratification from helping people and we feel, to some extent, the pain of people whose suffering we see. Our evolved nature is hacked to make us not perfectly selfish.

actually, empathy is simply the most effective way of convincing others that you care about their interests. this perceived commonality of interests is what holds society together. but the motivation is ultimately selfish because we only want to band together to increase our own chances for survival and the survival of our offspring.

That's just empirically false, unless you're using "motivation" in some convoluted and incorrect way. Humans are innately motivated to help each other[1], and though that motivation was evolutionarily selected for its positive effects on gene survival, it is now a fundamental human desire that I find noble and beautiful.

[1] See http://www.cbc.ca/health/story/2006/03/02/altruism060302.htm... or http://www.justfuckinggoogleit.com

it is now a fundamental human desire

I didn't claim otherwise. we are adaptation executers, not gene survival maximizers. this is why it is so important to keep in mind how changes in our environment can have unintended consequences. witness the dual rise of food processed heavily with sugar and degenerative diseases such as diabetes.

The world is perishing from an orgy of self-sacrificing.

Where do you see the orgy of self-sacrificing? And how is this presumed orgy making the world "perish"?

This is just nonsense.

every lobbyist who spouts "for the good of the children" or other nonsense. self-interest hides behind altruism. If humanity would just grow the fuck up and recognize it for what it is we could stop pussy-footing around the moral issues and come up with solutions that actually work.

Yeeeeess.. Let's have companies focus solely on shareholder value. That's working out so well lately.

Where is their shareholder value now?

And, are we not left clinging like shipwrecked sailors to those companies who successfully guarded their shareholder value?

Nope, we're left clinging like shipwrecked sailors to the Federal Reserve.

Do you think the Fed is the economy? Those notes the Fed is churning out are promises against the future work of Americans. Just printing without profit makes you Zimbabwe.

Government is broke and always has been. It spends what it takes. A government rescue is a private rescue at second hand.

Uh.. Yeah. My point exactly.

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