Yes, there’s a cute novelty to it. Yes, in a less-fucked society I
can see the utility and function. But boy, the fanclub for these things
is nuts.
I’m talking full-blown “this is the key to the post-scarcity
economy”. HOW?
u/PM_ME_YOUR_KANT7 pointsat 1461333678.000000
I know right? They gloss over the fact that in the first place, the
technology is nowhere near as advanced as they think. Google has
carefully neglected to mention that they don’t really work in bad
weather.
Even Negareddit was loaded with smarmy technophilia in response to me knocking the magic driverless car thing.
"You clearly do not know that 1.2 million people die in car accidents every year" which euphorically implies that Google's magic cars will replace each and every one of those cars, with no errors, because technology.
Google worship absolutely drives me up the wall. And anyway, the technology isn't even *that* new! I remember DARPA talking about their driverless cars at least ~10-15 years ago.
You and I seem to be pretty much on the same page. I hate this ideology that tech is the solution to everything. It's insane.
It's done a lot of damage as it is and of course the hivemind belief is that we ought to technology our way out of technology, no exceptions, not even considering the consequences.
Yeah, even electric car worship kind of irritates me, because it's usually very uninformed (and as a hydrogen devotee, I'm a little bitter about what I see as a vastly superior technology losing out).
So, yes, electric cars *are* better, don't get me wrong. While yes, they still ultimately rely on coal, a point source of pollution can be better contained than a bunch of exhaust pipes in cars. *However*, the battery problem is huge. For starters, people like to handwave away the problem with "oh we just need to throw more money at it, then we'll develop a battery with several orders of magnitude greater energy density." But the problem is that we *are* throwing money at the money at the problem, to the tune of billions of dollars, and have been for at least 50 years or so. And guess what, after lithium-ion, there hasn't been that much advancement in the technology that didn't have other negative downsides (like high operating temperature).
But there's the other aspect: Lithium is scarce, and the mining techniques are brutal and destructive. But hey, as long as there isn't smog in *my* city, who cares, right? It's the ultimate NIMBY.
I am fine with electric cars (provided the electricity source isn't just passing the buck and depending on fossil fuels anyway).
Too many technophiles think real-life works like a Civ game and dumping money and technology points into something will spit out a tech-tree improvement.
I'm pretty certain lithium (among other things) will be pretty necessary in those magic driverless cars.
Yeah, I don't have a problem with electric cars per se, just this salvific view of technology, as well as lack of understanding (or unwillingness to pay attention to) the drawbacks and challenges that exist for basically anything.
It's accelerationism and inevitabilism.
They see this shit as coming, and want to see it come sooner rather than later, impulsively ignoring all consequences because they want the cool tech toys they see in science fiction.
Millions of workers are employed in the transportation industry. It’s
one of the biggest sources of employment. Self driving trucks will have
huge economic consequences, and cause many people to go unemployed.
It will also lead to people not owning their own cars anymore,
because you can always order a cheap self driving taxi. This will also
have large effects on society, as car ownership is a pretty big part of
US culture.
And it could lead to much longer commute times, people living farther
from their jobs. Because commutes to work no longer have to be boring,
you can work in your car or whatever while it drives itself. This will
lead to more suburban sprawl and other effects.
I don’t know about “post scarcity economy”, but I do believe it will
have pretty big consequences.
I know right? They gloss over the fact that in the first place, the technology is nowhere near as advanced as they think. Google has carefully neglected to mention that they don’t really work in bad weather.
Millions of workers are employed in the transportation industry. It’s one of the biggest sources of employment. Self driving trucks will have huge economic consequences, and cause many people to go unemployed.
It will also lead to people not owning their own cars anymore, because you can always order a cheap self driving taxi. This will also have large effects on society, as car ownership is a pretty big part of US culture.
And it could lead to much longer commute times, people living farther from their jobs. Because commutes to work no longer have to be boring, you can work in your car or whatever while it drives itself. This will lead to more suburban sprawl and other effects.
I don’t know about “post scarcity economy”, but I do believe it will have pretty big consequences.