a1exyz

i am doing something about it personally with the citizens climate lobby

Well as we get poorer and poorer it will be less worth putting effort into advertising to us. Im guessing AI will instead focus its effort on convincing rich people of various things.

There are a few clashing forces. One is the power of startups - what people love is what will prevail. It made macs and iphones grab marketshare back from "corporate" options like windows and palm pilot. Its what keeps tiktok running.

An opposing force is corporate momentum. Its unfortunately true that people are beholden to what companies create. If there are only a few phones available, you will have to pick. If there are only so many shows streaming, you'll probably end up watching the less disgusting of the options.

They are clashing. The ppl's sentiment is AI bad. But if tech keeps making it and pushing it long enough, ppl will get older, corporate initiatives will get sticky, and it will become ingrained. And once its ingrained, its gonna be here forever.

is clojure boring yet? Im considering using it for a web app.

I agree and think that this is a huge growing cultural expectation - "you have to live for your children". I don't think it used to be the case.

Well OK sure I get that that would be good for kids but you're also gonna limit the number of parents if that's the new normal.

Yes. But my understanding is that you have to be exceptional already - probably have a pHD and notoriety in some way so you won't be surprised when you get the offer anyways and already would have a strong opinion on it. Most of us don't have to worry about that decision.

I think I have unique insight on this. I used to prioritize "important" work especially things that improved the world (I didn't have a good metric though), and even more especially, something which was important for me specifically to do. The idea of Elon Musk starting SpaceX for instance, it really seems like something good which, if he didn't do it, wouldn't have happened. Thats what I wanted for myself.

However I think this is flawed. I have since realized that the world is too complex to control. It is not up to us to save it because there is no clear path to doing so and there never will be. Thinking there is usually leads to wasted time and opportunity cost of other actually important things you could be doing. The biggest thing you are missing out on is doing work that you love. Yes, love really is the most important option when deciding on what to work on, as opposed to value creation, unique skillsets, supply and demand, etc.

Remember that the world is nothing more than the sum of our experiences, the people we know, what we do every day when we wake up. Your choices every day create it, so by acting well you really are improving the world, every day! Doing what you love is improving the world - even if its working on ads. You have no idea what kinds of influence your actions really have so just do good work for yourself and your loved ones. Everything else takes care of itself and if it didn't, you wouldn't be smart or capable enough to do something about that anyways.

can you elaborate?

Where did the assumption that tech solves big problems come in? Consumer problems of course, but societal problems? Somehow people assumed that solving the problem of being bored on the train is a short jump from solving the problem of housing costs and its not.

Good startups are about making something that people will love. Not something that solves a global crisis.

Thinking of the latter instead of the former often results in "playing house" ideas that sound like startup ideas but aren't actually. At least this is what happens to me when I follow the thought process you are laying out.

My Dad did the coolest one for my fifth grade class that everyone still remembers. He showed us how binary addition in a calculator/computer works by giving us all 0 or 1 notecards. Then since the class is already arranged in a grid, each row is a single digit (8 bits). Then He gave input numbers and we raised our cards according to which bit we were an the person to the left of us.

Honnestly I don't remember the specifics but it was so awesome to see something as abstract as a computer/processor shown to us in a way we could understand and participate in. And the layout of the classroom just happens to be perfect for it.

go outside during lunch mang.

I think you're right but at least startups incentivize trying really really hard - as opposed to joining some big R&D firm. It challenges people to wrestle again and again with the ideas of value and what we want this world to be.

Trying and suffering leads to learning and progress.

Are you sure that human thought isn't basically brute-force bulldozing? Just because we don't feel like it is doesn't mean it is.

The time it takes us to learn something, the number of times we have to see/experience it could be akin to bulldozing couldn't it?

There are a lotttt of neurons in our brains that are constantly going off, perhaps comparable to the amount of transistors in a deep learning gpu if you account for the training time difference