Doesn't that exchange occur in the leaves?

I don't understand the concern raised by the article's comment here. Most technology starts out as expensive and thus only available to the wealthy. Wealthy people literally subsidize many technologies for the rest of us.

Is this a call for subsidies for everyone from day 1 of treatment availability? Is it even possible to scale these treatments up that quickly?

Money doesn't not mean anything. It's an exchange medium for productivity. It has to come from somewhere. Maybe we'll have a army of slave robots, along with the slave we all need in our Apple factory and cobalt mines in Africa

Why should we be especially concerned about CRISPR based variants?

We should be concerned bc this technology could potentially create a new class of human. The ultra rich could alter genetics to produce offspring that are predisposed to genius IQ, immunity to disease, height and strength advantages, and a whole slew of other “desirable traits”. While the rich already receive better healthcare they are still stuck with the genes that they inherited, both good and bad.

There is unrest in the forest […]

For they passed a noble law

And the trees are all kept equal

By hatchet, axe, and saw

Well, that was disturbing. Totally doable and most likely will happen sometime in the future, especially so since the natural CO2 scrubbers of Earth (Amazon & congo rainforest come to mind) are being deforested for $$$ gain.

Always love to quote the late great George Carlin: "The Earth is fine, the people are fucked, but the earth will be fine."

If UBI kicks in, it will be because unemployment is reaching catastrophic levels. So UBI may act as a counter to the ensuing deflation.

But in a future where tech has taken away most jobs, tech will also be able to mass produce housing, food and transportation for pennies on today's dollar. Another counter to inflation.

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Every single inventive, artistic and even entrepreneurial person out there who is not the scion of a high middle class or richer family will be free to scratch his or her itch without fear of falling so far that he or she becomes homeless or unable to feed his or her children.

Plenty of people around with lots of want and capability to make things but either those things aren't rewarded with lots of momey by present day society or they're great at doing but not at selling.

I wouldn't at all be surprised if Universal income gives birth to a new Golden Age, assuming the present day "winners" (through the great achievment of popping-out from the right vagina) let it happen.

Here's more then:

Historical data of the Nasdaq 100 index

The index returned an average annual return of 15.13% between July 2007 and February 2023 .

That's an empirical fact, not conjecture.

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If my basic needs and wants were met, I would absolutely stop working. I'm hoping to retire in about 6-7 years and then never work again. Some people in my same situation are already talking about how they'll get another job to 'keep busy'.

I'll keep busy, but I'm not going to work. I can be plenty busy by reading, playing video games, watching Netflix, spending time with pets, and sleeping in on weekdays.

That's exactly what I would do with a guaranteed income that covers my basic needs. Now, $700 a month would not be that. That honestly would not really change my life at all, though I know it would for many people.

But it wouldn't erase my need to work in order to support myself financially, even though I have no inherent interest nor desire to work.

/r/singularity

I'm gonna keep typing because of futurology's stupid comment character limit. This could've been said in one word but here I am.

By this kind of logic, everyone having a job or being on social security should be responsible for MASSIVE inflation.

At some point you have to realize we've long since left the ranch when it comes to the labor theory of value. In this world it's somewhere between an energy ration and a magical imaginary number driven up by a combination of rent seeking and speculation.

Well this was an awesome comment. Thank you for the realistic dystopian imagery, but it hurts a little too much

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Stargate Atlantis!

It will never be able to pull more energy out than enough to detect.

It wouldn’t surprise me if they forced the energy to exist so it could be done. The universe is weird like that. Without them trying to do something they wouldn’t find any energy there, but if they tried to find something they will.

Why would they keep us around, keep letting us reproduce, pay us for existing, if AI can do all the work and they literally don’t need us??

Why would they just go hide in their bunkers, release some sort of bio or chemical weapon, get the population down to a very small amount, disperse us around the globe to whatever cities they may want humans in, and then pat themselves on the back for solving climate change while they go back to living their lives of luxury with AI doing all the things they once needed us for?

What incentive do they have to give us UBI if AI can replace almost all of us? Why do people think that the super rich are going to take care of us once we’re no longer useful?

it's actually so goddamn funny to think people actually write stuff like this in earnest

talking about skynet and "unaugmented humans" like we're on some deus ex bullshit LMAO

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some people will and some people wont. If you have no skills or your profession is automated and you can't get into an active occupation then you will probably rely on ubi. For everyone else, life goes on and they continue working and being a class above those on ubi.

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In a mixed capitalist economy, there is no such thing as universal income. There is an old age pension system called social security, but that's for senior citizens who are no longer in the job market. If you are under age 66, your income level is up to you and you alone. If you ever find a universal income, you are living in a utopian fantasy land where unicorns are farting rainbows.