In one corner of the internet, I hear about the decadent American Empire, and in another corner of the internet I hear about how AI advances are about to unleash infinite productivity. How do I square this circle? The only thing I can come up with is jackpot sort of scenario, inspired by William Gibson's "Peripheral", where amazing tech progress is controlled by a few oligarchs. Is there a future for open source AI? I don't know how to think about this, but I just can't sit comfortably with summary of the present situation as stagnation.
What do you mean by AI? If you mean the stuff coming out of OpenAI. A lot of that seems to be tools that will help automate already superfluous white collar labour. Hardly seems like any kind of real productivity gains to me? I personally think at the moment the AI bubble is more a drive to increase the demand for semi conductors, but that a different story.
I think productivity gains in AI are more to be seen in things like manufacturing, transportation. I am not sure if the gains have been realized. Perhaps more in Japan/China.
Interesting that you equate our current epoch to the long depression. In what way do you think we have entered our century's long depression? By the lack of class antagonism?
I've always wondered if a left-wing version of "Progress Studies" of the sort loved by the new crop of neolibs is possible/appropriate for our current stagnation
In one corner of the internet, I hear about the decadent American Empire, and in another corner of the internet I hear about how AI advances are about to unleash infinite productivity. How do I square this circle? The only thing I can come up with is jackpot sort of scenario, inspired by William Gibson's "Peripheral", where amazing tech progress is controlled by a few oligarchs. Is there a future for open source AI? I don't know how to think about this, but I just can't sit comfortably with summary of the present situation as stagnation.
What do you mean by AI? If you mean the stuff coming out of OpenAI. A lot of that seems to be tools that will help automate already superfluous white collar labour. Hardly seems like any kind of real productivity gains to me? I personally think at the moment the AI bubble is more a drive to increase the demand for semi conductors, but that a different story.
I think productivity gains in AI are more to be seen in things like manufacturing, transportation. I am not sure if the gains have been realized. Perhaps more in Japan/China.
Hey Ed, great post.
Interesting that you equate our current epoch to the long depression. In what way do you think we have entered our century's long depression? By the lack of class antagonism?
I've always wondered if a left-wing version of "Progress Studies" of the sort loved by the new crop of neolibs is possible/appropriate for our current stagnation