Price of human intelligence is also falling rapidly. I suspect looking pretty is going to go up in value more rapidly.
All were working alongside me, a self-taught programmer making websites.
I've long thought that there's an oversupply of smart people in the world but for the field of software development, which was hiding that fact by soaking all of them up.
If SDE is collapsing as a field, a whole bunch of people who thought their intelligence and credentials guaranteed them a comfortable life are in for a shock.
What’s to be scared of anyway? Isn’t China a peaceful nation that abides by international law?
The PRC has land claims against almost every bordering country, which are many in number. It does wolf warrior diplomacy, surreptitiously moves border posts, and so on.
It also pretends to abide by international treaties but when a ruling against their absurd claims in the South China Sea were refuted, they rejected the ruling.
In the age of AI it uses from the same playbook as Russia to sow discontent and create internal conflict within countries in Asia.
It captures and kills dissidents abroad.
If rich people want to influence politicians, there should be hard caps on money and advertising.
There's nothing wrong in saying too much money is now destroying too much of the good parts of our country. Starting one step at a time is better than trying to build a massive reform that goes no where.
Once money in politics calms down, the next steps should become more obvious as the noise from the Billionaires no longer drown out our attention.
This comment isn’t trying to be biased any specific way, just trying to be realistic while also saying alternatives exist but would likely be disruptive for better or for worse.
You can have billions in nominal units but it is inflated to worthlessness when resources or labour disappear
I have nothing to say to this sort of disingenuous characterization.
There are about five companies who hire people with his background. They all go through boom and bust cycles together. When he graduated they were in a bust cycle and nobody was hiring new graduates, so he found a job in software. He was glad because the pay and working conditions are better, and at the time (a few years ago) it seemed like software engineering was a safe career with lots of employers, which turbine engineering was not.
Even if we accept your precondition as true, that SWEs contain multitudes of smart people who will jump to other industries, I don't think the conclusion holds.
In the US at least, SWEs are among the most entrepreneurial industry members. They'll bring that attitude to whatever their new industry is. I think there will be an explosion of new startups in different areas, and we'll Jevons Paradox our way forwards.
https://www.oecd.org/en/publications/education-at-a-glance-2...
It's generally true that the rarer something is the more valuable that is, but only if there are enough potential buyers of the thing that can recognize it. If there is an ever-decreasing amount of intelligence there is probably an ever-increasing amount of stupidity - so will the stupid be smart enough to reward the intelligent with high paid positions?
What I suppose is actually that human intelligence will become more monetizable, by allowing those with it to better take advantage of their unrecognizable ability. But only if the interlocking systems of humanity do not fall apart and destroy the world due to there not being enough intelligent people left to make things work, as per various works of science fiction on the subject.
That's the issue. No one can really systematize "discovery".
How many "group thinkers", "creatives", "non-group thinkers", "nihilists", "anarchists", "contemplatives" in the last - say, 500 years, 5000 years, whatever - have been occasioned by the fall of an Apple? Or the fall of a branch? Or a leaf? Or what have you?
Why did it spark a new flame in the mind of Newton? Science can't explain. If we could, we'd teach everyone to be that sort of contemplative.
The intern I worked with last year said her graduating class all felt like they were the last "real" graduates. Meaning: the class after her had less credibility in her eyes, having been presumed to have used AI to get past the "pons asinorum"/"bridge of asses".
On the one hand, one really can't remove all of humanity from the economy. Humans are what makes the economy matter, and if you cut them all out, they'll just replace the economy with something else, call it "the economy", and move on. ("Butlerian Jihad" pivot, I suppose.)
On the other hand... I'm reminded of dock workers and the advent of container ships. The only way to handle that was to basically pay those workers a living wage for the rest of their lives to ... not work.
So... we have options, I guess!
[1] In Orson Welles's Time Machine, the eloi were the lazy "child-like" humans not challenged to grow intellectually.When asked about how one might attain social mobility in such a society, where the intrinsic value of our intelligence and ability to do labor is gone, I unironically respond with "be hot".
Where?
What's your definition of "rapidly"?
I could see an argument for price of human intelligence going down - we're essentially in a global stagflation - which feels like a recession (sometimes moreso) even if it isn't technically one...
Rapidly? I think we have different definitions, or you're only looking in a niche.
I'd also argue that global stagflation doesn't yet have anything to do with AI. My crystal ball doesn't work. Things could change quickly. But I don't see any evidence now.