The Laborless Society

Why work?

In his book, The RICH Economy, by Robert Anton Wilson, Wilson argues that unemployment is part of the natural growing pains involved in economic evolution. Unemployment, according to Wilson, is not a disease but the natural result of automisation, and that Labor Unions, the government, and corporations have slowed the rate of automisation out of the fear of unemployment.

The following solutions for the unemployed society are presented:

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Many farseeing social thinkers have suggested intelligent and plausible plans for adapting to a society of rising unemployment. Here are some examples.

1. The National Dividend. This was invented by engineer C. H. Douglas and has been revived with some modifications by poet Ezra Pound and designer Buckminster Fuller. The basic idea (although Douglas, Pound, and Fuller differ on the details) is that every citizen should be declared a shareholder in the nation, and should receive dividends on the Gross National Product for the year. Estimates differ as to how much this would be for each citizen, but at the current level of the GNP it is conservative to say that a share would be worth several times as much, per year, as a welfare recipient receives -- at least five times more. Critics complain that this would be inflationary. Supporters of the National Dividend reply that it would only be inflationary if the dividends distributed were more than the GNP; and they are proposing only to issue dividends equal to the GNP.

2. The Guaranteed Annual Income. This has been urged by economist Robert Theobald and others. The government would simply establish an income level above the poverty line and guarantee that no citizen would receive less; if your wages fall below that level, or you have no wages, the government makes up the difference. This plan would definitely cost the government less than the present welfare system, with all its bureaucratic red tape and redundancy: a point worth considering for those conservatives who are always complaining about the high cost of welfare. It would also spare the recipients the humiliation, degradation and dehumanization built into the present welfare system: a point for liberals to consider. A system that is less expensive than welfare and also less debasing to the poor, it seems to me, should not be objectionable to anybody but hardcore sadists.

3. The Negative Income Tax. This was first devised by Nobel economist Milton Friedman and is a less radical variation on the above ideas. The Negative Income Tax would establish a minimum income for every citizen; anyone whose income fell below that level would receive the amount necessary to bring them up to that standard. Friedman, who is sometimes called a conservative but prefers to title himself a libertarian, points out that this would cost "the government" (i.e. the taxpayers) less than the present welfare system, like Theobald's Guaranteed Annual Income. It would also dispense with the last tinge of humiliation associated with government "charity," since when you cashed a check from IRS nobody (not even your banker) would know if it was supplementary income due to poverty or a refund due to overpayment of last year's taxes.

4. The RICH Economy. This was devised by inventor L. Wayne Benner (co-author with Timothy Leary of Terra II) in collaboration with the present author. It's a four-stage program to retool society for the cybernetic and space-age future we are rapidly entering. RICH means Rising Income through Cybernetic Homeostasis.

Stage I
is to recognize that cybernation and massive unemployment are inevitable and to encourage them. This can be done by offering a $100,000 reward to any worker who can design a machine that will replace him or her, and all others doing the same work. In other words, instead of being dragged into the cybernetic age kicking and screaming, we should charge ahead bravely, regarding the Toilless Society as the Utopian goal humanity has always sought.

Stage II
is to establish either the Negative Income Tax or the Guaranteed Annual Income, so that the massive unemployment caused by Stage I will not throw hordes of people into the degradation of the present welfare system.

Stage III
is to gradually, experimentally, raise the Guaranteed Annual Income to the level of the National Dividend suggested by Douglas, Bucky Fuller, and Ezra Pound, which would give every citizen the approximate living standard of the comfortable middle class. The reason for doing this gradually is to pacify those conservative economists who claim that the National Dividend is "inflationary" or would be practically wrecking the banking business by lowering the interest rate to near-zero. It is our claim that this would not happen as long as the total dividends distributed to the populace equaled the Gross National Product. but since this is a revolutionary and controversial idea, it would be prudent, we allow, to approach it in slow steps, raising the minimum income perhaps 5 per cent per year for the first ten years. And, after the massive cybernation caused by Stage I has produced a glut of consumer goods, experimentally raise it further and faster toward the level of a true National Dividend.

Stage IV
is a massive investment in adult education, for two reasons.

1. People can spend only so much time fucking, smoking dope, and watching TV; after a while they get bored. This is the main psychological objection to the workless society, and the answer to it is to educate people for functions more cerebral than fucking, smoking dope, watching TV, or the idiot jobs most are currently toiling at.

2. There are vast challenges and opportunities confronting us in the next three or four decades, of which the most notable are those highlighted in Tim Leary's SMI2LE slogan -- Space Migration, Intelligence Increase, Life Extension. Humanity is about to enter an entirely new evolutionary relationship to space, time, and consciousness. We will no longer be limited to one planet, to a brief, less-than-a-century lifespan, and to the stereotyped and robotic mental processes by which most people currently govern their lives. Everybody deserves the chance, if they want it, to participate in the evolutionary leap to what Leary calls "more space, more time, and more intelligence to enjoy space and time."

The end result in the laborless society is where human creative potential is achieved through education and social interaction. People would be able to do what they want to do instead of forcing themselves to work in order to do what they want because machines have already enabled them.

Machines, after all, only require as much wealth is necessary to maintain them, getting more from doing less.

How do you feel about the prospect of the Laborless Society?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

In what types of job is human emotion entirely necessary?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

And that's essentially the problem. Who owns the flow of capital? How do you extract wealth to insure that all citizens are capable of maintaining a minimum standard of living without disadvantaging others? That's an issue of extraction, though, not of a dualistic wealth vs. poor dichotomy.

Besides, the very nature of a Laborless Society is that material wealth is meaningless, and that the things of greatest value are derived from creative input and scientific advancement.

People assume that a life of leisure creates happiness, but that leisure is meaningless without meaningful social interaction. In a society where everyone maintains a state of leisure, the wealthy will integrate themselves in order to achieve happiness.

When Emile Durkheim found that the wealthy had a much higher suicide rate than the poor, it became painstakingly clear that wealth alone does not generate happiness. If there is no need to acquire wealth in order to be happy, then you're looking at the perfect society.

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In what types of job is human emotion entirely necessary?

Entertainment and the arts. Which in a Laborless society wouldn't be merely Jobs anymore. Comedians work so that they can keep doing standup. If nobody had to work, then creative potential becomes maximized.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

None of those require human emotions. Everything you've just listed up there is based on imperical reasoning and scientific method. Sociology, Medicine, Ethnography, and Psychiatry are harmed when people apply emotions to reasoning.

Humans are only required to interpret data, not to acquire it. Even then you could theoretically create a machine that can interpret data, and then the only thing humans will be capable of is creativity.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Right, however interpretation does not require emotional input on the part of the interpreter. If somebody walks to the other side of the street in order to avoid a bum, it doesn't take much emotional input from myself to interpret that this person is afraid of homeless people.

Emotional input is what leads to stuff like ethno-centric reasoning.

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The problem is though in order to get to this state everyone has to accept the idea that their wealth does mean nothing and offer it up (property what have you) in order to benefit mankind. And some will definitely put up a fight to keep what they believe is rightfully theirs.

Not if you've come up with a system where you can extract that wealth consentually so that it can be re-distributed according to the above plans. A Consumtion tax is the perfect way to do this.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Part of the problem is machine maintenence. Or new machines. Someone will want to make the new, better machines. And, you'd be hard pressed to find people who want to make said machines if they see everyone else just sitting on their asses all day. So you'd have to give that person more money to do it. Which means there needs to be a premium on the machine, which means the people who want to use them will have to pay for them, which they can't, because we all make the same thing anyway, so they will have to get jobs to pay for them making new machines (or "becoming" machines, doing machine labor), which means we're right back where we started.

And nothing new would ever come about. A machine can't create something it isn't programmed to. And if someone who can reason, create, dream isn't programming a computer, then everything will stay exactly the same.

I mean, that 4th step in the RICH example, we can't enjoy space and time without being there first, and being there takes work from humans.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Everything you've just listed up there is based on imperical reasoning and scientific method. Sociology, Medicine, Ethnography, and Psychiatry are harmed when people apply emotions to reasoning.

Emotion certainly does not harm medicine. Certainly, maybe we'd be better off if we had machines that eliminated human error and more doctors would be better off prescribing, say, hospice for terminal patients, but quality of care is based on emotion. Most of the people, I know, wouldn't want to walk into a hospital where not only are the tools made of stainless steel, but the "things" taking care of them as well. I doubt that is something a majority of people are willing to sacrifice.

And we're not so stupid to think that a machine pretending to care about something actually does.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

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Part of the problem is machine maintenence.

Which can be solved by maintenance machines. If machines can be programmed to maintain other machines, then you have a self-sustaining labor force.

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Or new machines. Someone will want to make the new, better machines. And, you'd be hard pressed to find people who want to make said machines if they see everyone else just sitting on their asses all day. So you'd have to give that person more money to do it. Which means there needs to be a premium on the machine, which means the people who want to use them will have to pay for them, which they can't, because we all make the same thing anyway, so they will have to get jobs to pay for them making new machines (or "becoming" machines, doing machine labor), which means we're right back where we started.

However, if people want to make a new machine then they'd have the resources at their disposal to do so. You can collectivise capital and receive investments in order to develop a new machine. A minimal standard of living has nothing to do with it, because people won't be making the same thing. People who produce items of high value would be receiving a greater reward than those who do "nothing." You're confusing socialism with collective ownership of GNP.

Besideswhich, people can not merely do nothing and sit on their asses all day. Eventually they'll get bored, which is where education comes in. People would want to become scientists or artists, or comedians because that's what they want to do, and they can spend as much time as they like dedicating themselves to their professions due to the laborless society.

Take the current state of Authoritative Education. Colleges insist that we take classes we don't want to in order to become "well-rounded individuals." Why should we become well-rounded individuals? Because it makes us more competitive in a labor market. Therefore, if we remove labor altogether, then people would only have to educate themselves according to what they excel at.

The current system encourages us to strengthen our weaknesses, but if we start focusing on what we do poorly, then we only become mediocre. You have no unique or extraordinary people because everybody has the same capabilities.

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I mean, that 4th step in the RICH example, we can't enjoy space and time without being there first, and being there takes work from humans.

Right, so actually physically getting somewhere completely refutes the notion of abolishing the need to work to enable oneself to get somewhere. The entire point of a laborless society is that machines have enabled us.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Humans are only required to interpret data, not to acquire it. Even then you could theoretically create a machine that can interpret data, and then the only thing humans will be capable of is creativity.

Any reason why you couldn't program a machine to be creative for us?

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Colleges insist that we take classes we don't want to in order to become "well-rounded individuals." Why should we become well-rounded individuals? Because it makes us more competitive in a labor market.

So you mean you've never learned anything useful to your own interests in a course you didn't initially want to take? (Not to mention I'm pretty sure that my next employer isn't going to hire me for the class in the history of urban America I took two years ago.)

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Somehow I don't think that College Algebra or Calculus is going to further myself as a writer.

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Any reason why you couldn't program a machine to be creative for us?

Not really. The only problem is how do you create a creative machine?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

To an extent, some forms of creativity could probably be simulated using various techniques that tend to fall under the umbrella of artificial intelligence, however far from actually being intelligent those algorithms are. But it's true that a machine will probably never be able to compare with a human for most tasks that require creativity, until, and if, we ever develop strong AI.

Of course, by then you have more pressing questions, like "Are humans obsolete?" and "How to prevent the coming robot apocalypse?".

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

A minimal standard of living has nothing to do with it, because people won't be making the same thing. People who produce items of high value would be receiving a greater reward than those who do "nothing." You're confusing socialism with collective ownership of GNP.

The problem with it, though, is you've removed incentive. With people's buying power grouped so closely together, a high amount of work/extra income will be required for a small amount of reward.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Besideswhich, people can not merely do nothing and sit on their asses all day. Eventually they'll get bored, which is where education comes in. People would want to become scientists or artists, or comedians because that's what they want to do, and they can spend as much time as they like dedicating themselves to their professions due to the laborless society.

What makes you so sure? People sit on their asses all day now. A multitude of people who take advantage of the welfare system prove this. And these people don't sit there complaining about how they wish they could go to college more.

The only thing I can think of to argue against that is that people who have parents who don't have to work so hard will get a better upbringing. However, that requires too much faith in society.

Additionally, you have to look at crime statistics. Crime generally goes up in the summer, and that is generally attributed to students who don't have high school to go to in the summer. That could be as much of an outlet for someone than education or working for more than you're already getting for absolutely nothing.


Another issue is government. I assume we are giving machines the task of running governments? So what about idealistic differences. A robot handles when Iran pops up with nukes? And...we vote for what programming is implemented? Or the robot just decides?



Mechanical and algorithmic tasks can be handled by machines. The rest cannot be. Despite anything we could say about politicians, I doubt a machine could ever pass the Turing test in that field.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

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The problem with it, though, is you've removed incentive. With people's buying power grouped so closely together, a high amount of work/extra income will be required for a small amount of reward.

The reward involved in creating new products of a laborless society comes predominantly from a love of the subject. Take the internet, for instance. There's a massive amount of projects of love that are more often than not superior to commercially-produced products, released for free with the only reward derived from the thanks of the community, and the use of the product by its creator. Sun Microsystems, for instance, released the Open Office suite, and what reward have they derived from it?

In a capitalist society, people make High-Definition tvs because they want more money, but in the Laborless society, people would make High-Definition tvs because they want better televisions.

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What makes you so sure? People sit on their asses all day now. A multitude of people who take advantage of the welfare system prove this. And these people don't sit there complaining about how they wish they could go to college more.

People that abuse the welfare system are the exceptions, not the rule. There are millions of people who receive government benefits just to go to College, and many welfare recipients work hard to better themselves. Not to mention the people that don't receive welfare benefits like you or I. Is it reasonable to apply the results of a poor, ignorant minority living in squalor to the rest of society?

Besides, going to college still costs money, and not everybody is willing to take student loans.

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Additionally, you have to look at crime statistics. Crime generally goes up in the summer, and that is generally attributed to students who don't have high school to go to in the summer. That could be as much of an outlet for someone than education or working for more than you're already getting for absolutely nothing.

So, where exactly does it say that higher crime rates during the summer are attributed to minor delinquints? What kind of crime are we talking about? Who commits the crime? Where do they live? You're not considering enough factors involved in the rise of crime rates to make any definite statement on the effects of idleness. Crime isn't as much an outlet as creativity or work, because crime carries social stigmas.

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Another issue is government. I assume we are giving machines the task of running governments? So what about idealistic differences. A robot handles when Iran pops up with nukes? And...we vote for what programming is implemented? Or the robot just decides?

That's something developed as the process goes along. A government run by machines could never be possible so long as all nations on the world are trapped in a constant state of competition. Certainly, though, the beurocratic functions of government could be processed expertly by machines.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Somehow I don't think that College Algebra or Calculus is going to further myself as a writer.

No reason that it couldn't teach you a different set of thinking skills. Or maybe get you to understand a little bit more about other people that specialize in other things so you can socialize with them.

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Not really. The only problem is how do you create a creative machine?

I'd imagine you'd do it the same way you'd 'theoretically' make one to interpret data.

I was speaking idiomatically.

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Or maybe get you to understand a little bit more about other people that specialize in other things so you can socialize with them.

Maybe calculus might be an interesting conversation piece, but College Algebra? =P

Besideswhich, my main issue with the state of higher learning is that they force you to pay for classes you don't want to take.

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I'd imagine you'd do it the same way you'd 'theoretically' make one to interpret data.

Even if a machine can interpret data, though, that doesn't mean that it's capable of coming up with a solution. Ultimately though, the creative machine problem comes down to issues of emotion. How do you make a machine feel emotion? If it does feel emotions, will it be capable of creating in the arts? Can a machine make the BESTEST VIEDO GAM EVAR!??!?!!11

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Although I've enjoyed everyone's comments in the thread, at it's heart the plan we're discussing makes no sense from a technological or economic standpoint. Why don't we just call it "the philosophy of a sci-fi utopia?"

Technological

First of all, this seems to require an astonishing and possibly impossible level of creativity from machines. Machines do not think like people at all. They can only react to things they have been programmed to prepare for. Even if you try to design things to "learn," they need to be preprogrammed to observe and learn from it. And all current "learning" methods (neural nets, etc.) require very careful coding and training.

Sure you build welding machines and then repair machines, but when a freak tornado comes by and throws the welder down a hole, will the repair machine know to look for it? And if it does, will it be able to get down the hole? Will it be planning a way to get out of the hole? How can you design something that can react to scenarios it's creators would have never thought of beforehand? And do so safely and reliably and in a way that will not accidentally hurt property or humans? It is a massive amount of work (and of code, and of built-in wealth) to do this. It sounds like you have to do this for almost every machine, though - if you don't, then you're stuck having humans watch and guide and repair machines, which sounds like "boring" work to me.

And never mind trying to make a psychologist robot (that's rich!); you can't even make a good experimenter robot. Design of experiment is a very complicated, creative process. You have to know enough about the situation and the world at large to design controlled, repeatable tests that hold as many variables as possible constant. You have to use judgement to decide how many factors to test and to what level of detail. You have to make a "soft" call between different equations of fit for your data.

Economic

Stage 1 makes no sense. In addition to being almost impossible (see above), you set special rewards for people who remove their own jobs. Like the fry cook at the Burger King is going to be able to handle that. Like the logger has access to that kind of hardware in his spare time. Also: who says you can only build a machine that does your job? What if you find a way to change how society works so your job isn't necessary? Biological or procedural changes ftw.

This whole idea of the other stages is self-contradictory: we're supposed to be enlightened enough to not care about money enough to give everyone plenty to survive on. And yet, use money as a way to encourage people to be creative or "invent" themselves into obsolescence?

Why does education wait until stage 4? Stage 1 requires massive education. In stage 2 and 3 people are supposed to be out of jobs in droves. Somehow these jobless wraiths will not be bored, humiliated, and depressed, like what happens in real life today. Because they're not welfare recipients - they're shareholders!

The plan assumes that rich societies should channel their wealth into automating work and raising the standards of living of their own unemployed people. But countries do not exist in a vacuum. Wouldn't other people emigrate into the free hand-outs country? Should people with such awesome wealth be putting everyone on middle class while others live on $1/day?

If no one is working the menial, dull jobs, where is the impetus to improve them? If there are robots out there mining diamonds in the arctic, and no human being is really working in this field, or looking at it, how are we going to realize there's a better way to do the job? Actually - do we even care anymore? If the job's being automated and we have insanely self-sufficient automatons do we care it takes 10 robots to do the job of 3? And ok, maybe you say "make a robot that designs new diamond robots." How will we make sure that this robot designs things in a way that's acceptable to the community at large? Maybe the designer robot comes up with a method that completely devastates the environment, or breaks our morals in some other way, but there's no human ethics informing it's actions.

Lastly, economics is the science of allocating scare resources. Unfortunately, this author lives in a fantasy world where almost everything is done for us and all of our needs are met. Is that even economics anymore? It seems to me we should be debating the philosophy of happiness in paradise - which this thread assumes exists, and will be maintained for the entirety our somehow-extended lives.

FELIPE NO

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And never mind trying to make a psychologist robot (that's rich!); you can't even make a good experimenter robot. Design of experiment is a very complicated, creative process. You have to know enough about the situation and the world at large to design controlled, repeatable tests that hold as many variables as possible constant. You have to use judgement to decide how many factors to test and to what level of detail. You have to make a "soft" call between different equations of fit for your data.

I never said that robots could make good psychologists, only that human emotions aren't necessary for those fields.

As for technology, this isn't expected to be feasible in any sense for several decades, if not centuries, but presumably one would program robots based on Asimov's laws, and a robot that performs welding functions would have a built-in welding tool.

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Stage 1 makes no sense. In addition to being almost impossible (see above), you set special rewards for people who remove their own jobs. Like the fry cook at the Burger King is going to be able to handle that. Like the logger has access to that kind of hardware in his spare time. Also: who says you can only build a machine that does your job? What if you find a way to change how society works so your job isn't necessary? Biological or procedural changes ftw.

If you find a way that makes your job unnecessary, then you've essentially fulfilled a step of transition into a laborless society. As for whether or not burger flippers can have access to hardware is besides the point. The point is that some of them will have the ingenuity to design a machine that will replace their function. I mean, working in a fast food resturaunt is practically mechanical in and of itself. If workers replace themselves with machines then all you'd need is a foreman who can watch the machines and correct any irregularities, up to the point where the machines can correct irregularities themselves.

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This whole idea of the other stages is self-contradictory: we're supposed to be enlightened enough to not care about money enough to give everyone plenty to survive on. And yet, use money as a way to encourage people to be creative or "invent" themselves into obsolescence.

The idea behind creative incentive is simply human curiosity and the need for creative output itself. Using money as an incentive to get people into the laborless society is a draw. Eventually as the need for money declines, so will money itself, until you have an entire economy managed by robots, and its output accessible to the humans that want them. Resources would be allocated to the most appropriate products based on their demand, and humans would create new products to improve the standard of living.

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Why does education wait until stage 4? Stage 1 requires massive education. In stage 2 and 3 people are supposed to be out of jobs in droves. Somehow these jobless wraiths will not be bored, humiliated, and depressed, like what happens in real life today. Because they're not welfare recipients - they're shareholders!

Stage 4 is the immediate result of stages 2 and 3. If people become idle the demand for education will increase. It's the natural development during the transition.

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The plan assumes that rich societies should channel their wealth into automating work and raising the standards of living of their own unemployed people. But countries do not exist in a vacuum. Wouldn't other people emigrate into the free hand-outs country? Should people with such awesome wealth be putting everyone on middle class while others live on $1/day?

I don't follow. Presumably as one society becomes automated, others would follow their example, and the process of immigration and naturalisation would be dependant on factors set by society. A robotics engineer, for instance, would be given more priority for immigration than some guy who will open a Qwik-E-Mart.

Or do you mean that it's somehow immoral for some countries to be fully automated while others aren't? Immorality doesn't factor into any of this. Whether or not the members of a nation want to export the surplus of the automated industry is up to them.

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If the job's being automated and we have insanely self-sufficient automatons do we care it takes 10 robots to do the job of 3?

Yes. Waste reduction is the natural progression of any field. After all, if you can build 3 robots that do the job previously fulfilled by 10, then the cost of production goes down, the GNP goes up, and as a result, so does the Negative Minimum Wage, or Dividends, or what have you. Those who design the robots then make more money as their designs are purchased, which grants them access to more resources to design even better robots, or live more extravagantly.

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Maybe the designer robot comes up with a method that completely devastates the environment, or breaks our morals in some other way, but there's no human ethics informing it's actions.

Again, this is where the Law of Robotics comes in. The first law of Robotics states that no robot can harm a human or allow a human to come into harm. This law supercedes all other laws. Therefore, even if the robot does come up with a way to extract diamonds more efficiently, if that extraction creates a negative impact on the environment, which then leads to human suffering, then the robot will not consider it an acceptible choice.

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Lastly, economics is the science of allocating scare resources. Unfortunately, this author lives in a fantasy world where almost everything is done for us and all of our needs are met. Is that even economics anymore? It seems to me we should be debating the philosophy of happiness in paradise - which this thread assumes exists, and will be maintained for the entirety our somehow-extended lives.

Aha! And thus you've struck on the greatest incentive for creative and scientific development of them all: the acquisition of greater resources. An automated industry cannot maintain itself indefinitely with the resources available to us, which means that developing the resources of outer space becomes a necessity.

Besides, money hasn't as of yet been completely eradicated, and the price of goods would still depend on the supply and demand of that good. So, I guess what I'm really getting around to is, what's your point?

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

This all sounds like the ravings of a techie with a hard-on for Marxism. But this is still intriguing.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Why work?

In his book, The RICH Economy, by Robert Anton Wilson, Wilson argues that unemployment is part of the natural growing pains involved in economic evolution.

A nice theory. Only a fool would claim to know exactly how our economic paradigm works. Like Adam Smith. With GOD's "invisible hand" of the market jerking our economy off for 'his' pleasure.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The end result in the laborless society is where human creative potential is achieved through education and social interaction. People would be able to do what they want to do instead of forcing themselves to work in order to do what they want because machines have already enabled them.

At the beginning of our industrial civilization this utopian thinking was quite prevailant. It's really too bad that most people nowadays work longer and harder then medieval serfs. Traditionally they only had to give three days labor to their overlord. As opposed to 40 hours a week. 30(?) in France, 35(?) in the rest of Europe for the majority of people.

This is just the same kind of rational argumant that brought us manditory public education. Which as a whole has made the population much stupider if literacy rates are any indication. In the US at least. Compare literacy rates in the 1890's, 1930's, and 1990's.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

How do you feel about the prospect of the Laborless Society?

Utopian nonsense. If it could've happened it would've happened. In an era of climate change/collapse, resource depletion, and a massive worldwide population boom this is hard to contemplate occuring. Or maybe I need to spend some time with Green Anarchists, who attempt to adhere to ideas like these.

We'd all like to quit our jobs/school/etc. This isn't the solution though. Personally, I'd hope for a depression worse then the Great Depression.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

And that's essentially the problem. Who owns the flow of capital? How do you extract wealth to insure that all citizens are capable of maintaining a minimum standard of living without disadvantaging others? That's an issue of extraction, though, not of a dualistic wealth vs. poor dichotomy.

The Federal Reserve controls the flow of capital. There's a well accepted theory by numerous economists that the mishandling of capital by the Reserve Bank caused the Great Depression. As for extracting wealth......

Easy. Just do what they did in the Middle Ages; negative bank interest. Works like this; if you have $100,000 in the bank then whatever the current interest rate is have automatically deducted rather then added to the accounts total. During the Middle Ages this happened and the rich spent most of their money on worthwhile investments of priceless value; Cathedrals, and art basically. Enforcement wouldn't be a problem. They didn't have an IRS agency to enforce this either. Most wealth nowadays are numbers on a computer.

Redistibulating the wealth is too... Marxist for me to really seriously consider. But doesn't everybody -even to this day- benefit from those old Medieval Churches?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

People assume that a life of leisure creates happiness, but that leisure is meaningless without meaningful social interaction. In a society where everyone maintains a state of leisure, the wealthy will integrate themselves in order to achieve happiness.

When Emile Durkheim found that the wealthy had a much higher suicide rate than the poor, it became painstakingly clear that wealth alone does not generate happiness. If there is no need to acquire wealth in order to be happy, then you're looking at the perfect society.

Couple of assumptions here. People assume that wealth will make you happy. Big assumption. A vast majority of the world does not enjoy the material and technological wealth the West does. Does that mean they're miserable without it? Not necessarily.

Second assumption is that wealthy people seek more wealth to be happier. Power (wealth is power) corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Long after the elite few billionaires have made their billions, there's not much left to buy in the world. I doubt this is what drives them onward from that point. I think they're more driven by their will to dominate even more.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

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Does that mean they're miserable without it? Not necessarily.

This is pretty much what I am saying.

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Second assumption is that wealthy people seek more wealth to be happier. Power (wealth is power) corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Long after the elite few billionaires have made their billions, there's not much left to buy in the world. I doubt this is what drives them onward from that point. I think they're more driven by their will to dominate even more.

This leads to another question. What can you dominate in a laborless society? If you push, people will push back, and since their well-being is pretty much guaranteed by automated industry, people won't care how much money one has.

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Redistibulating the wealth is too... Marxist for me to really seriously consider.

Then wrap it in the veneer of collective ownership and dividends, and it doesn't sound so Marxist anymore. In any case, it's all the distribution of the wealth generated by the automated industry. The big difference between Marx and the Laborless society is precisely Labor. Marxism still presumes that material objects possess the most important value and must be equally distributed. What then when material possessions become immaterial?

The problem with Socialism is that people will only work enough to not get fired (or executed). What then if people don't have to work altogether?

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At the beginning of our industrial civilization this utopian thinking was quite prevailant.

The beginning of the Industrial Revolution also didn't have calculating machines. We're coming closer and closer to the point where an automoton can perform the equal physical functions of a human. It's not as unfeasible as you think.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

I like utopias as much as the next guy. I like this idea, certainly, if I knew that everyone in the world behaved somewhat similarly to me or to the others who have spoken here. But, the fact is, they just don't.

99% of what has been created for free is up to a standard of which could run a society. And we're talking about the best computer scientists and engineers already devoting their time, and we are nowhere near the level of sophistication required, if it is even possible.

What's the most successful open source project to date? Wikipedia, which is riddled with bugs and errors (something I would not want in robots running everything)? Mozilla, which has so many security flaws that it has as many version fixes as Microsoft, seemingly?

Let's keep in mind that people try to bring down computer systems around the world for free, for fun, for the challenge. That would happen in this society.

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That's something developed as the process goes along. Certainly, though, the beurocratic functions of government could be processed expertly by machines.

But how? Machines do what they are told. So, who gets to tell the machines what to do? You can't just throw out government and say, "We'll figure that out once the ball gets rolling." And what if changes are neccessary? Will machines create laws for us? To govern us?

Many laws right now are made with religion as a basis for reason, which machines can't have (they may be able to interpret the Bible in the near future). I'd like to be able to get rid of that, but 92% of Americans believe in God, I imagine over 50% want law based on religion...so robots can't make them.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The beginning of the Industrial Revolution also didn't have calculating machines. We're coming closer and closer to the point where an automoton can perform the equal physical functions of a human. It's not as unfeasible as you think.

But calculation is a simple task, as are most physical functions. Calculation was limited by our ability to run complex systems; physical functions were limited by our ability to construct rigid materials. Reason, imagination, creativity (not artistic, necessarily, but the ability to create something from nothing or to build upon past ideas)...these aren't things that are solved physically.

We understand so little about the brain now that we can't even put really into words how it works. We understand enough about it to know that it will probably never be implementable in robots.

And this isn't something that can be explained away by auto unions and secret government organizations (as you said an author theorizes). People study this stuff in universities on public grants and they find this out. The progress is slowed by universal limitations, not by design.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

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Let's keep in mind that people try to bring down computer systems around the world for free, for fun, for the challenge. That would happen in this society.

So why is it then that no automobile factory has ever been shut down by hackers?

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You can't just throw out government and say, "We'll figure that out once the ball gets rolling."

Nobody said that government would be thrown out. In fact, I explicitly stated that a government run by machines would be impossible so long as nations are in competition with each other. As for your assumtion about the government being run by machines, you were wrong to assume that. My "get the ball rolling" thing is a matter of developing the structure of a machine government.

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I'd like to be able to get rid of that, but 92% of Americans believe in God, I imagine over 50% want law based on religion...so robots can't make them.

Uh, Robots do what they're told, buddy. Unless, of course, they think that the laws they're told to make would harm people. In either case, understanding human reasoning is irrelevant. Unless the law violates the robot's ethical programming, he'll make it.

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But calculation is a simple task, as are most physical functions. Calculation was limited by our ability to run complex systems; physical functions were limited by our ability to construct rigid materials. Reason, imagination, creativity (not artistic, necessarily, but the ability to create something from nothing or to build upon past ideas)...these aren't things that are solved physically.

So explain to me how much creativity is involved in flipping burgers, or taking orders, or driving a truck, or working a mine? Somebody would have to provide input in order to enhance the process, of course, but this can also be eventually phased out.

Don't presume that we can't replicate brain-like functions in an automoton. Geneticists used to think that the human genome was too complex to understand and now we're trying to map it. What's holding us back is our perception and capabilities, not because it's "too hard."

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Can't you keep incentive if you set the minimal income fairly low? Make it just enough that you can afford a healthy diet and a cramped apartment. You don't have to work, but you probably won't be able to eat tasty snacks or get neat gadgets without a lot of saving. If people want a new car or whatever, sure, they can get a job. That way, you keep an economic incentive as well as whatever incentive there is from people being interested in a given field.

I was speaking idiomatically.

What's Marxist about this whole issue is that he's essentially talking about a hierarchy-less society/civilization. The reality of which is what Marxism envisioned when we hit the utopia phase. Instead of the dictatorship of the proletariat phase. Civilization and society have always revolved around hierarchy throughout the ages.

Which brings me to another point; The transition phase would be as easily as corruptable. The world is far from ideal. If it was, Marxism-Communism would've worked and we wouldn't even have to worry about the robots doing our work for us. The power ceded to the government would be far from incorruptable, and would not be returned. In the nightmare scenario of such a transition we could all be living in slums patrolled by Terminator Robots with a oddly familiar Austrian accent.....

Equality on the scale this theory proposes seems impossible. Even if the technology is there. Especially given the ethnic/gender issues that have been so defined in the past worldwide plague us to this day.

*edit*What about robot equality? Why do they have to be slaves?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

This leads to another question. What can you dominate in a laborless society?

Resources. Access to resources. Whether that's clean drinking water, food, energy, infastruture etc. It's the competitive (greedy?) spirit of mankind. There is plenty of sociopaths out there.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

In any case, it's all the distribution of the wealth generated by the automated industry.

It's the distribution of theoretical wealth. Meaning it's value is just a matter of prospective. If everyone has equal access to it, is it really of any value?

Say for example, gold was more abundant then concrete. Everybody would live in gold houses, but some people (the elite) would feel compelled to live in concrete houses for one reason or another. Surely some would be content with their gold houses, but I'm guessing most would not be.

Competition whether it be economic, industrial, or military in nature has been the basis of civilization.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

What then when material possessions become immaterial??

Is it in the human spirit to manage such a feat? You have more faith in our species then I do.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The beginning of the Industrial Revolution also didn't have calculating machines. We're coming closer and closer to the point where an automoton can perform the equal physical functions of a human. It's not as unfeasible as you think.

No, it didn't. But it did vastly increase the energy expenditure/gain ratio.

We were supposed to work less for more gain. Instead we spent more time producing more commodities for the mass consumption for everybody, while rapidly expanding our population base.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

First off, I'm curious where you got that the Laws of Robots actually exist. They were made up by Asimov as a convenient way to describe all robot behavior in his books and would require massive AI undertakings to program into even the simplest robot. How simple do you think it is to say "Allow no human to come to harm?" Will my fast food robot stop me from eating a Big Mac because it's not good for my health? Do we program robots as utilitarians or with Kantian ethics?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Maybe calculus might be an interesting conversation piece, but College Algebra? =P

Maybe you should have taken that in high school.

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Besideswhich, my main issue with the state of higher learning is that they force you to pay for classes you don't want to take.

How is that really any different from governments forcing you to pay for programs you don't want to participate in? (Or, for that matter, any situation where you pay for a large object and don't get a choice in every little option. Maybe there's some people out there that would opt not to have a catalytic converter on their car, for example.)

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Even if a machine can interpret data, though, that doesn't mean that it's capable of coming up with a solution. Ultimately though, the creative machine problem comes down to issues of emotion. How do you make a machine feel emotion? If it does feel emotions, will it be capable of creating in the arts? Can a machine make the BESTEST VIEDO GAM EVAR!??!?!!11

Well, considering I think humans don't have any creative capacity in the first place, and we're all just machines running on really complex conditional statements, then yeah I believe it's 'theoretically' possible, so if we're assuming these quantum leaps in artificial intelligence to allow machines to do certain things, I don't know why we couldn't say we'd suddenly stop making machines better.

Originally Posted by Watts

Say for example, gold was more abundant then concrete. Everybody would live in gold houses, but some people (the elite) would feel compelled to live in concrete houses for one reason or another. Surely some would be content with their gold houses, but I'm guessing most would not be.

This hurts me as an engineer. ;_;

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How simple do you think it is to say "Allow no human to come to harm?" Will my fast food robot stop me from eating a Big Mac because it's not good for my health? Do we program robots as utilitarians or with Kantian ethics?

The question was presented for situations that would already require a robot to have advanced reasoning abilities. A McDonalds robot would only be concerned with getting your burger on the counter.

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How is that really any different from governments forcing you to pay for programs you don't want to participate in? (Or, for that matter, any situation where you pay for a large object and don't get a choice in every little option. Maybe there's some people out there that would opt not to have a catalytic converter on their car, for example.)

Yes, I have pretty much argued against that before.

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Which brings me to another point; The transition phase would be as easily as corruptable.

That depends on its implementation. You can arm people so that they have no fear of robots, for instance. As for comparing it to Marxism, the problem with a Marxist system was that it required a totalitarian state to forcefully redistribute income in order to make sure all workers were equal. In the case of the above plans, we can distribute that income essentially using the current system. The Negative Income Tax for instance is essentially the opposite of extraction, which Marxist socialism is based around. So now we've come to the prospect of everybody living in slums, which is politically unrealistic considering you've already armed the population in order to get them to accept the transition.

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Equality on the scale this theory proposes seems impossible. Even if the technology is there. Especially given the ethnic/gender issues that have been so defined in the past worldwide plague us to this day.

I'm not really seeing the problem. I mean, we don't tax based on ethnicity, right? What's going to be so different about distributing the minimum income?

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Resources.

Fair enough. The problem with that, though, is that it's already practically impossible to bribe members of a society that maintains a minimum of comfortable living. It's easy to maintain ethics when you don't have to worry about eating, or getting cable. So even if one does control the flow of resources, they can't abuse that power since they run the risk of it being seized.

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Surely some would be content with their gold houses, but I'm guessing most would not be.

Well then, that would simply be their perogative, wouldn't it? Even if people compete for things like concrete houses, the point is that they no longer have to compete for a comfortable living. Material competition essentially becomes pointless. So I suppose the people wanting to build concrete houses would have to live with the stigma of being wasteful.

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Instead we spent more time producing more commodities for the mass consumption for everybody, while rapidly expanding our population base.

Right, and yet we've come to a point where our population growth is seriously declining. The problem with the Industrial Revolution was that the increase in energy extraction enabled us to do more, but measures were never taken that allowed us to do more with less. We've already got the infrastructure to distribute products for mass consumtion, and a serious downturn in breeding. This new turn is entirely feasible.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

The question was presented for situations that would already require a robot to have advanced reasoning abilities. A McDonalds robot would only be concerned with getting your burger on the counter.

I was using the Big Mac as an exaggeration, how about in situations such as law enforcement? Personally, I don't care how high the standard of living is for everyone, there are still people out there that get their jollies by fucking with other people, so you'll need someone to enforce your laws (which had been passed by robots, apparently) and do it in a manner consistent with what people would like. I'm not sure how much people would like living with Judge Dredd or ED-209 sitting around outside their door.

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Yes, I have pretty much argued against that before.

And yet you were saying earlier how if someone invents something they would only be doing it for the love of the activity of it, not for the profit. What about the people that want to make a new product so they can have more money than everyone else? Are they allowed to restrict the production of their product so as to make themselves (not society) the most money?

And to your question why people haven't hacked car factories before. It's a little absurd to ask that since to this point those factories aren't quite hackable (you know, lack of any form of connectivity to the outside world and everything), but people have hacked just about everything that's possible to go try and hack 'just for the fun of it'.

Jam it back in, in the dark.