Can Economy Survive Climate Change & Automation?

Let’s go next to our caller from the three
one five area code. Who’s calling today from three one five. Hi David. This is Janice. I see a lot of stats about, uh, climate change
and automation. And I see that they, uh, the worst effects
of them happen to coincide around the same decades around the 2040s and 2050s. And I’m wondering, do you think that a liberal
democracy or Western civilization or whatever you call it, uh, how confident are you that
these things are gonna Survive? Uh, things like automation and climate change? Well, I think there’s a bigger question you’re
asking in general, which is it can feel for us right now in the middle of it, like liberal
democracy and the sort of type of geopolitical status quo that we have is just the way things
are going to be indefinitely. And then as soon as you just zoom out a little
bit, you see the impermanence of just about everything that has existed. And so my doubts about being able to say x
or y is going to survive beyond a particular point is that in general we just have a huge
bias towards believing that the way things are now are the way things are going to remain. It’s very hard for us to imagine how things
could be drastically different. But you know, like Rome fell eventually. And if history has taught us anything to the
extent that we know history, it’s that even things that seem permanent are not. So as far as climate change specifically,
there are a number of different theories and ideas about how quickly things are going to
happen, automation, et Cetera. The truth is we’re pretty damn bad as a species
at predicting what is going to be going on beyond like five years at least. Societaly now scientific predictions are different. Things move at a glacial pace, no pun intended. Um, but even still, I don’t, I think that
what we’re identifying now are trends and the specificity that is sometimes attributed
is maybe a little overzealous in terms of how good we are at predicting things because
there will be inflection points that continue to kind of like modify their trajectory. But I think with all of these questions there
are real, it’s a serious open question as to whether a humanity will survive as we know
it, beyond, you know, relatively modest periods of time. Well, I’m not worried so much about the survival
of the human race, just the, uh, I guess all the progress we’ve made in the past say 200
years. Yeah, they’re there. It’s completely reasonable to think that there
could be a significant backslide. There’s a lot of speculative fiction that
has explored ways in which it would happen, where we would effectively, as you’re saying,
go back to the way things were 150 or 200 years ago. And I mean, I just don’t know the, you know,
the, the reason that these questions are hard for me is like, I can just speculate, but
I just know that we’re terrible at this stuff at predicting the stuff. Like, I just don’t know. I don’t think we know. All right. Thank you. All right. Appreciate the phone call. Thank you so much.

Maurice Vega

58 Responses

  1. Can our planet sustain unchecked Capitalism? Every product has a very high turn over rate. Particularly fashion and mobile phone technology

  2. Unless there is a considerable change on the way we live our lives (personal vehicle use and food habits mainly) we are an endangered specie.

  3. Stories Progressives YouTubers won't touch.
    – Acquittal of Mateen Cleaves
    – Somalian gang bashing, jumping on, riding over and robbing man
    – Ex Footballer fake hate crime destroying two of his own restaurants.
    – Oberlin University

  4. This crony capitalist economy will continue to go, as long as the upper-class can profit from human suffering.

    Nothing will change, until the upper-class have to survive and endure the same justice system as the poor and working-class.

  5. Narcissicim, a collapsing economy, automation, climate change, a divided nation, and increasing international tensions. Oh boy, we are in for it. It's going to be one hell of a ride.

  6. What a dumb exchange of thought. Seriously the fact this is being discussed is absurd considering we're in the face of such dwindling odds for ideal survival during a critical period of time for real change. But ohhhhhhhhh SHIT what about the insurance companies and the the CEOs and the bought and paid for politicans running the show! WHAT ABOUT DA MONEY.


    GOOD IDEAS THAT HELP PEOPLE ARE GOOD IDEAS REGARDLESS OF WHERE THEY COME FROM. There has been a false divide between US citizens for too long!!! These people have been laughing at us for decades. Let's have the last laugh and lock them up for their crimes before it's too late to have the goddamn trials

  7. The left and right are both living a fantasy on climate change. The right flat out denies it because …insert random, dumb reason. And the left feels that a politician from the US is going to prevent or slow down a entire planet floating in the vacuum of space from doing what it has done for BILLIONS of years. I'm not sure which position is more retarded.

  8. For Automation you have to hope we are thinking wrongly like the original Luddites, for climate change if we do not mitigate it we are just total fucked, the only nation that will benefits on the entire planet is Russia as it opens up agricultural land for them, but that's it.

  9. Likelihood climate change will reduce
    the World's GDP per capita by;
    more than 0%: 71%

    more than 10%: 63%
    more than 20%: 51%

    more than 50%: 12%

    Even though GDP is a terrible measurement for well-being etc, it will obviously have an effect, without any doubt. And that is with mainstream climate change models. Yet, even those are debatable. Add to that automation on top of that. The conclusion is that some form of UBI is inevitable. And we need a trickle-up economy and major transition ASAP.

    But still, MSM, and even a large portion of progressive YouTube is championing the establishment-light candidate Warren. And bashing Yang & Tulsi. We need as many anti-establishment voices as possible, and it shouldn't be just Bernie. It is so foolish.

  10. Remember the "I, Robot" movie with Will Smith (it did not follow Asimov's book exactly but it was a wonderful movie, very well done). There was an undertone of the problem that robots pose to people. We really do not need some of the tech that has been coming out. But even though it is not really needed, people buy it anyway.

    I am also thinking of the kids movie WALL-E. Because everything was done for those people on the space station, they had forgotten how to do things themselves. They actually had to be saved and trained by some robots how to live on earth again as people, doing things on the own.

    I am muddled at the moment, sorry, not sure I am making my point clearly, but I do have a point: do not rely unnecessarily on robots and robotic devices. There are things you can and should do for yourself unless you are medically unable to do so. Do them. Before you find yourself unable to do anything.

  11. Dump trump and co . The pass has gone ,we need to look to building school for the kids .give them a better start in life . Take back every dime trump as robbed.

  12. Unless we get more progressive governments worldwide , humanity will be doomed.
    We are all to blame, but the people in power don't care .
    ALL the riches in the world won't buy them clean air or water.
    They may be able to survive a little longer , but eventually it will not help them.
    Do they not care about their children/grandchildren ???
    That is a frightening thought .

  13. In the 60s no one really predicted the profound effects computers would have on societies, so it's probably the case that no one now is going to predict future developments with any accuracy

  14. All we need to do is convince China, Russia, Africa, Brazil, India, Australia, USA, and a few other countries that climate change is a serious problem and something needs to drastically change. Once we've done that it's all smooth sailing.

  15. Automation isn't a bad thing in a unionized and worker owned socialist economy free of capitalism and the nature of such an economy would address the problem of climate.

  16. Taxing automation to fund 'food stamps' will help out of work Trumpists but they hate welfare, unless it is for corporations, so they will hand it back… nope.

  17. David- there is no getting out of this…so, activism has to be local and immediate. Do not hinge your hopium on the outcome. VOTE and lets make the changes needed 40 years ago…maybe we can go out with some dignity.

  18. No, not unless we collectively mobilize to mitigate the effects. And FAST. (with regards to climate change; I don't really think mass automation is terribly likely)

  19. Survived automation that lead to the country going from 95 percent ag to less than 2 percent. Survived the outsourcing and automation that has taken American manufacturing of refrigerators and toasters and computers.

  20. If Andrew yang has his way ya, Australia did an income payout for one fricken day and it allowed them to skip the 2008 financial crisis completely. Not to say he’s my top choice, but his economic policies are fairly proven.

  21. It can survive man made Climate Change, because it has as much effect on the climate as a flea fart in a wind storm. We DO need to be concerned with all the poisonous toxic metals being sprayed on us in combination with the microwaves and low frequencies they use in weather weapon Geoengineering. You F*CK with mother nature, and she will F*CK you back ten fold. Google search Mike Morales paradise fires or hurricanes. Hell just search weather weapons. It is well documented. The only people denying it is the Mockingbird Fake Media including FOX NEWS. They are no different.

  22. Since automation has become the accepted norm, this will only increase in time. And since climate change is also the accepted norm, this too will increase. Now will the US survive these changes? yes! But what state the US will be in is unknown. It's very possible that the US will become like many of the South American countries suffering from drought, wars, and in-fighting to the point that they too will become transient. Where will they go? Maybe to Canada, Australia, New Zealand or even Greenland. These are all possibilities. Just leave your guns behind.

  23. The worst effects of climate change won't be in the 2040s and 2050s. That'll possibly be the start of the bad part, but temperatures and sea levels will keep rising afterwards.

  24. My be question is why are people so scared of Automation? Its like being afraid of Cars because we no longer use horses. Things change and over history our roles have change. This is just another one. instead of human or animal labor. Automation and Autonomous technology will do the work. Finally freeing humanity from unwanted servitude. Our new role will always be ideas and problem solving. We create the ideas that improve our lives and we use our technology to make the ideas and solution a reality. People aren't scared of Automation. What people are afraid of you the loses of their Job and the loses of Income. But what i truly don't understand is why people believe MONEY would still need to exist if Automation has reached such a point that its displacing human labor and CAPABLE of doing the work. MONEY wouldn't need to be uses. We could simple reap the benefits of the labor performed by Automation and Autonomous technology. No more Bills, Debt, or Income Concerns. Not different than the fact that we no longer use horse as a daily means of transportation. "JUST BECAUSE SOMETHING EXISTED FOR ALONG TIME DOESN'T MEAN IT WILL CONTINUE TO BE RELEVANT IN THE FUTURE OR AS TECHNOLOGY PROGRESSES".

    If any of you have ever played PS4's "Detroit Become Human" how stupid are those people to continue using money when machines have reached such a level "Why would we create that kind of suffering for ourselves by continuing the uses of money when we know we aren't able to earn it. That would be STUPID and asking for CRIME, CIVIL UNREST, and POVERTY. Just change with the system and all will be fine.

  25. None of you are complaining that we no longer have to us Pay Phones. The fear of Automation and the Remove of the need to use money or submit yourselves to unwanted servitude is like being scared of your Cell Phone. The world is so messed of because to freaking many of you are living in a BOX automation is not the End its the Beginning new type of system. A truly free and beneficial to all people system.

  26. my honest answer is no. will we come up with a better economic and social structure or will the humanity not survive, i don't know. listening to your caller, i think you Americans still don't take the situation quite as seriously as you should.

  27. We human are just a bunch of pathetic animals who only think of "survival for the fittest", we never advance in philosophy and civilization despite being spoon-fed by great philosophers and great people, we always forget about the hardship of others and drown in our own comfort, we causes suffering of living beings so casually we didn't even think about, we human is a horrible species thinking about our "economy" instead of "life".

  28. Automation will solve climate crisis as more and more minds and efforts are freeing up from the production lines to help mitigate the crisis.

    However, an economy model runs on capitalism and consumerism impedes the development of automation as people need wages to sustain their daily needs, as technology moves onto a more sophisticated end, equipment and services got more expensive to the point which whoever tries them is basically doing a charity (which is not a problem when high end technology is not measured by a price tag).

    For us human to continue our existence, we must step out of our current way of life.

  29. The fck was this? Always pointing out others and their 'word salad', and David did the same damn thing. DO speculate, David! He called in for your OPINION, not for your magical future-seeing capabilities. Actually /say/ something.

    So I'll give it a try instead. It sounded like the caller was referring to 1) the trend of climate change and how it seems to be leading to the loss of many commodities, and likely jobs and lives too; and 2) the trend of automation and how it seems to be leading to a loss of jobs, a probable increase of supply, and a relative loss of demand as jobs and therefore wages are lost.

    Keep in mind, this is all coming from an absolute layman. My speculation, if we can't curb climate change, those commodities we're going to start to lose are the absolute essentials – drinking water, food, land to grow things and live on, which will likely lead to loss of life. The demand for these basics will rise, leading to rising price of them, leading to people needing to cut back on demand for less essential things, leading to loss of jobs in those industries, leading to less money in those families, leading to loss of life, leading to less demand for the basics, leading to lower prices on them… and eventually this rollercoaster will even out far in the future.

    From the other perspective, automation will continue to make jobs cheaper to automate than man, loss of jobs, less money in the families, can't afford basics, loss of life, less demand, lower prices, and so on… And once again, it will even out.

    But taking these two together, without government intervention mind you, the rollercoaster starting at 'loss of jobs' will be that much steeper, and I imagine would even out sooner. It won't be end-of-civilization levels of bad, but it'll likely be a harder hit than the dust bowl era was. Again, this is without intervention.

    If we can intervene with climate change, and I hope to hell we do, then we /might/ be able to slow and maybe even reverse the sea levels rising, and stop the loss of land and drinking water. We should be able to grow more hardy food crops, although the anti-GMO crowd are gonna have to starve or give in because "natural" food won't be able to grow much longer. Demand for food and water shouldn't get too out of hand, so job loss would be curbed as well, from the climate change aspect. Plus new industries should start to develop with the goals of reversing our effects on climate change and figuring out how to prevent us from reaching the brink again.

    If we can intervene in automation, perhaps not stop it, but rather redirect the human aspect into other areas of usefulness, create new jobs as the old ones close up, then perhaps the loss of jobs (people unable to be retasked) won't be so painful either.

    How though? That's far beyond me.

  30. At present, left-wingers and right-wingers collaborate in tearing the fabric of western culture apart. If they succeed, we will be split into smaller totalitarian regions similar to nazis or communists states a 100 years ago. The result is likely to be the same as in 1941-1945, only we have better weapons. Perhaps in some places, the elites will intervene and establish autocratic governements. The only way to save liberal democracy, is if the moderate right and the moderate left each can marginalize the extremists on their OWN side. The conservatives must stop the white nationalists and the liberals must stop the communists. But now that history is turning into myth, the lessons have been forgotten, and the errors of the past are being repeated.

Leave a Reply


Post comment