Jeff Fink wrote:
What standard of living do you wish to apply to the rest of us?
I favor vastly improved standards of living by applying new
technology and common sense. See Arthur Clarke, "Profiles of the
Future" for details. Especially chapter 12. As I mentioned, I want
everyone to have unlimited amounts of filet mignon beef without
growth hormones or dangerous fats that is grown in a machine, instead
of a live cow. As I wrote in the last chapter of my book, I want
everyone to have a hundred times more energy than we now use, or a
million times more (deployed above the atmosphere to keep the waste
heat from harming the ecology.)
Should working hard to get ahead be a crime?
Probably yes. A misdemeanor at least.
Working hard is often the wrong answer. I see millions of people
slaving away at jobs that should be done by machines instead, or
should not be done in the first place. We would be better off if
people would work less, think more, invent more, and enjoy life more.
Henry Ford once hired an efficiency expert who spent a week at his
headquarters. The expert briefed Ford: "Everyone seems to be doing a
good job here and working hard . . . except that fellow down the
hall. Every time I look at him he is sitting there with his feet up
on the desk staring off into space." Ford said: "Leave him alone. He
once had his feet up on the desk that way when he thought of a way to
save me $10 million."
People had more leisure in when I was younger, and they accomplished
just as much. As Mauro Lacy pointed out, the food was better and air
was cleaner as well. All this overtime effort and 24-7 connected
efficiency just increases make-work.
Jeff Fink talks about "reduced prosperity." Frankly, modern people do
not know what prosperity is. They haven't experienced it. They think
having gobs of poor quality material goods and bad food is
"prosperity." Prosperity means living in a clean, quiet house
surrounded by pristine nature, with efficient long-lasting machines
that never bother you. It means eating superb food and wine,
breathing clean air, reading any book you want anytime, everyone
going to college for as many years as they like, seeing any movie in
high def, and never having to worry about being killed by some
lunatic driver on the highway. It means having top-notch medical care
with no waiting. We had that kind of prosperity in the past and I am
sure we will have it again in the future, if only we would stop
mindlessly slaving away and start innovating again.
- Jed
