Not givin' up
this post was submitted on 11 Sep 2024
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This is what I think of when the optimists still think they can save humanity from its own greedy, short sighted, self-destructive nature as the world literally begins to burn by our own hands after a century of warning:
We're monkeys that are just smart enough to develop technologies we are still too bone dead stupid to wield responsibly. Unless we accidentally create a benevolent, hyperintelligent AGI in our pursuit of yet another tool for manipulation and greed that saves us from our own nature, extremely unlikely, this only ends one way. We are who we are and the tools we've fashioned have become dangerous enough to crush us under the weight of their capability, without one iota of temperance aka "maybe growth/metastasis should stop being our only goal" by anyone in power.
And somewhat ironically, the "our species can still turn it around! live in hope!" types are the same ones deadset against revolution to force those living large off destroying the planet to stop in a physical way. Something something cake, something something eat it too. This ain't a movie, for humanity to have a future, we'd need to starve this and the next couple generations and tear down the polluting supply chains to live with nature again (like all those humans that did live with nature until they were genocided so someone with a flag could steal the resources under their feet) and bring our species down from the overpopulation cancer we've become, but we won't entertain the reality that we can't support 8 billion people sustainably, we made a dire mistake attempting to, and the species needs to drastically, painfully downsize to have any future at all. So we will burn in the Earth's fever until homeostasis is restored.
"It's become appallingly clear that our technology has surpassed our humanity."
-Albert Einstein
But by all means, keep trying to eat that cotton candy. I just hope it makes you happy doing it so it isn't entirely without a point.
The fact that you think the only solution is an AI that you think will in any way work to make things better and not just be ignored is really telling of who you are and your tech absolutist nature.
I got raped by my mother as a kid and I don't think I have the disdain for people like you do.
And tech isn't necessarily a better option. Very clearly not helping this world right now and that search for god in a machine is as much the same as the people you look down upon for searching for god in the sky.
Things won't stay the same forever. It doesn't necessarily mean it is gonna get immediately better and it's gonna happen (with lots of ups and downs) however reality happens, but fate is for those who don't act.
And right now, what we have is the present.
Try living in it. It's happening whether or not you hate it.
I feel like it's the other way around. I feel like it's my people who are out there getting arrested and making fossil fuel execs upgrade their security detail, and it's the doomers who seem to complain endlessly about how much they hate the taste of shoe leather while somehow spending the most time down there.
Hey, before I accepted there was no hope, I was pushing for such things. I'm far from special in that. Inside every cynic is a disappointed idealist.
And if there were a serious movement that was advocating doing more than peacefully protesting a cow statue on Wall Street as the planet and species enemies laughed out their windows above them, I'll be there with bells on, as I imagine most current doomers would.
But the sun will sooner set in the east, and doing such things alone is just suicide with extra steps and just as helpful.
Honestly everything you're saying is effectively the most realistic understanding. I promise things are worse than most realize, and even worse, we're past the tipping point and have been for a long time too.
Being positive is utterly meaningless, and even worse it's harmful - don't prioritize your mental health over the reality because the prevents the selective pressure for change.
You must understand this is really that critical. We're already in for a far worse future than most understand, the question now is, well, do we do anything about it, and we won't until pretty much everyone understands how serious this is, and freaks out the requisite amount for change.