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Reducing poverty can actually lower energy demand, finds research:
[...] We found that households that do have access to clean fuels, safe water, basic education and adequate food—that is, those not in extreme poverty—can use as little as half the energy of the national average in their country.
This is important, as it goes directly against the argument that more resources and energy will be needed for people in the global south to escape extreme poverty. The biggest factor is the switch from traditional cooking fuels, like firewood or charcoal, to more efficient (and less polluting) electricity and gas.
In Zambia, Nepal and Vietnam, modern energy resources are extremely unfairly distributed—more so than income, general spending, or even spending on leisure. As a consequence, poorer households use more dirty energy than richer households, with ensuing health and gender impacts. Cooking with inefficient fuels consumes a lot of energy, and even more when water needs to be boiled before drinking.
(Score: 2) by MIRV888 on Sunday June 06 2021, @09:28AM (8 children)
I can't hear you over boston dynamics laughing.
What do you do with billions of people who are no longer needed to produce, assemble, and distribute goods?
You haven't even begun to see your 'narrative of failure'.
It's coming for the 1st world too.
Soon humans will no longer have to earn their right to exist.
There will be machines that do it for us.
What then?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday June 06 2021, @12:22PM (1 child)
It has to happen first before it's worth answering that question! When centuries of such automation have resulted in wealthier, more productive people, maybe it's time to see what is wrong with that narrative? The big one is that automation makes human labor more productive - resulting in an application of Jevons paradox [wikipedia.org].
Then go for a higher quality of work - assuming we're allowed to do so. I don't see the point of worrying about it when employers throughout the developed world are punished for employing people. Society clearly doesn't see it as a problem worth addressing. Fix the regulatory environment, then we'll be able to see what the effects of AI and other advanced automation are.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 06 2021, @04:32PM
It always ends up with more managers.
I work in science and there's barely a single actual scientist. It's mostly managers, rules, rule-enforcement managers and leadership committees. Then a thin, thin layer of science (down to 1 person here) and an assortment of the cheapest foreign, barely English speaking interns / students.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday June 06 2021, @08:13PM (5 children)
If the machines earn my right to exist for me, I'm going to start handing out wrenches and promoting responsible maintenance habits. If $elites try to take over the world with their drone army? I'll be laughing when they get murdered by all the peons they depend on to live.
The Russians managed to make the "west" look like clowns with just a bit of luck and lot of willingness to sacrifice for the greater good... What do you think happens when the 1% goes against the 99%?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday June 06 2021, @11:02PM (4 children)
Only if you don't pay attention to the many things that got sacrificed for the greater good like tens of millions of people lives, the freedom of a billion people, and incredible environmental damage like draining the Aral Sea.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 07 2021, @01:48AM (3 children)
I was referring to the infiltrations of western intelligence agencies and the other subversive tactics of the ComIntern, not praising any of the Russian governments. Many people in western countries put themselves into considerable risk in an attempt to subvert their governments for what they believed to be the greater good. No amount of robot weaponry will overturn the human math in the hypothetical situation above.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday June 07 2021, @03:19AM (2 children)
So not much, eh? Democracies don't get their strength from operational security.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 08 2021, @02:19PM (1 child)
But you have to admit they made the western intelligence agencies into laughingstocks... The entire structure was compromised, years of planning and effort all wasted because some idealists thought they could make a better future.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday June 08 2021, @03:40PM
Of course. But why are we treating intelligence agencies as a good measure of a country?
Or rather because you can't maintain the same level of secrecy in a democracy that you can maintain in a totalitarian government. There were plenty of idealists on the Soviet side. They caused problems too, but they didn't compromise USSR intelligence agencies.