On Mon, 2012-05-07 at 09:30 -0700, Anthony Jackson wrote: > On 5/2/2012 1:12 PM, Johannes Trimmel wrote: > > > That would most likely be a post scarity ecconomy, what removes a lot > > of reasons for conflicts. > > There isn't really such a thing as a post scarcity economy. There's just > economies that are post certain historical understandings of scarcity. > By medieval standards the modern US is a post scarcity economy, just > about everyone can afford food and clothing.
Yeah. Human psychology does not look for survival basics. It looks for a comparison to find its place in the social order. So if the rich people own 100 planets each and the richest have their own Dyson spheres, that means people with only one planet are middle class and the poor people get just a red giant with a half-mined out asteroid belt. The fact that their AI managed auto-factories produce anything they desire and they can live in any type of virtual world does not change that they are dirt poor compared to the Gates, Hilton and House of Saud families. They are unlikely to be invited to parties. This may or may not bother most of the "poor" people, but it will bother some of them. And to add to that, nothing would stop people from reproducing up to the limits of survival over time. Even if you have mass/energy total conversion, you will only be able to feed so many people because there is a limited amount of mass in the universe. Or, because humans like to have power or because they like to provide for others, I can see TL16 humans using virtual computer environments or bioengineering to create new beings dependent on them. The temptation to play God. If badly treated or badly designed these new beings might rebel and set out to rid the universe of humanity. This desire for power and control will also lead to conflict between humans. Say that you don't agree with how the planet next door deals with created intelligences: they give them too much freedom; or not enough freedom. Or perhaps they have legalized murder. Or they have blood sports. Or they're using an alternate-universe power-draw technology that is destroying the alternate universes and all their inhabitants. Or they use a warp drive that is super-fast, but is slowly destroying YOUR universe. It would be an overwhelming temptation to use your resources to build a battle fleet and go FIX it so those other WRONG people do it the RIGHT way. YOUR way. Lots of reasons for conflicts. -- Knowledge Is Power Power Corrupts Study Hard Be Evil _______________________________________________ GurpsNet-L mailing list <[email protected]> http://mail.sjgames.com/mailman/listinfo/gurpsnet-l
