• @xenoclast@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    What if we don’t want infinite growth? What about stability? Or (gasp) a population reduction so we don’t destroy the planet. Have less babies. Feed the ones we have. Educate them.

    • @blackbirdbiryani@lemmy.world
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      1411 months ago

      Sure, easing into a deflating population over several hundred years is fine but tanking it and ending up with a society having to support a vastly older population ain’t easy either. Better for governments to provide positive reasons to have children but there’s zero chance of that.

      • @Bonskreeskreeskree@lemmy.world
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        511 months ago

        Our government has no issue going into debt for anything and everything they want, aside from social services. The whole concept of a younger generation having to take care of a growing older one means nothing to me. If they care, they can shift their priorities on reckless spending. If they don’t (they dont) then the population can take to the streets and demand they start caring.

      • @Rakonat@lemmy.world
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        411 months ago

        We’re going to run into a crisis within our life time whether we like it or not. Within 10-20 years, possibly longer if legislation somehow hampers it, pretty much the entire working class will be unemployable because machine labor will be cheaper and more readily available than any human. Yes, some people will still have jobs, but not the working class.

        Long before we have a crisis of too many elderly for the working to care and provide for, we are going to have a crisis of not enough jobs paying a liveable wage for one, let alone a family, because corporations are going to be able to replace large swathes of their workforces with machines that cost less to maintain per unit than minimum wage, so why would they ever hire a person?

        • @meyotch@slrpnk.net
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          011 months ago

          I just have to pont out, If you have to have a job, you are working class. It doesn’t matter if it’s a well-paying automation job, you are still working class.

          • @Rakonat@lemmy.world
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            -111 months ago

            Technically yes, as there are many definitions. But practically, no. Tthe commonly accepted and popular definitions break down with the working class being those without college degrees, those who’se living expenses and day to day expenses is most if not all of their income, where another common definition specifically list unskilled labourers, artisans, outworkers, and factory workers as working class.

        • @WoodScientist@lemmy.world
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          011 months ago

          I don’t buy this. What will really happen is that the value of anything AI can produce will drop to near zero, this freeing up money to spend on things only humans can provide. And if you think AI can literally do anything a human can? Well at that point, using that AI should be incredibly illegal, as you’re just enslaving a digital person.

          Maybe we’ll end up with a weird economy where everyone is employed as teachers, caretakers, mentors, life coaches, fitness instructors, physicians, and any other job that people really would prefer to interact with a human while interfacing with.

          Would you let your child be taught by an AI teacher? Not worried about what type of sociopathy that might introduce? No, there are many jobs, specifically those around the growth, development, maintenance, and improvement of human lives that will always be preferable to be done by actual humans. Humans can do the human work, and we can slough the drudgery off to the machines.

    • Zement
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      311 months ago

      Both arguments are valid. Less children, better education and growth perspectives = better humanity. And still there are some sick fucks down voting. Which shows how fucked we are.

    • @Snowclone@lemmy.world
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      111 months ago

      I personally think reproductive rights are human rights, every adult should have total personal control over their reproductive choices, I don’t think people who chose to have kids should be punished for the choice, and I don’t think people who do not wish to have children should be likewise punished for not doing so, nor forced in any way or manipulated into having children. I agree that there has to be a lot of improvement for kids who are here right now. That’s an important problem you have to solve first if you want to encourage your population to grow, the outcome must be good now.