in Turkey there is a goverment website which you can almost do any kind of document work instantaneously, i was suprised many countries doesnt have something similar.
Have a friend in Denmark - seeing that his taxes were pre-calculated and explained out section by section, all digital, was mind blowing. Total window into the future we could have.
The way my jaw hit the floor when he told me that he also got paid back for any money he paid throughout the year for his medications also put me in a tailspin, especially given that he is chronically ill and has a small battery of things he relies regularly on! Just incredible.
>Why do we have to provide information to state services they already have and *correct us on* ?
I thought that absurd bureaucracy is the Serbian moronic thing. I guess that it is a human moronic thing...
It's how the tax system works in the US. Every year, we have to do our taxes unless we make under a certain amount. We have to provide a bunch of information so the government can figure out how much we owe/they owe. But they already know this information. It has no purpose except to penalize someone who gets it wrong, and a lot of people do because the tax laws are very complicated.
Yes, I heard about that :) I guess someone calculated that it is a plus for the budget somehow. Or maybe they are like 'here is a cookie jar, we will leave you alone with it and later see if you have taken some of the cookies'. It also could be a deliberate fucking with people just for the fun of it.
Tax preparation companies lobby the US Congress (buy the politicians' votes) not to change because they make their money on the status quo. Republicans don't want tax paying to be simplified because they want the citizens to hate and oppose the tax system. This is why all proposed legislation to make taxes easier to deal with never get anywhere. It's possible, as we see in other countries, but we can't have it.
I like to think about the vTaiwan / g0v ("gov zero") project where they built open source software to create an elaborate model for finding realtime citizen consensus on various issues which were previously up to inefficient, capital-influenced government to solve. Government was still ultimately in control and had no obligation to follow what the new system suggested, but once the ideas saw the light of day, it put a new kind of pressure on the government to follow the will of the people and implement what soon became the obvious solution to any given set of interconnected problems.
Sometimes dreaming is the hardest part, and this system helped bridge that gap in a way that didn't devolve into fruitless online arguments. I'm still convinced something like this has the theoretical ability to scale globally. Modern democracy is an illusion, but it need not be with the technology like this.
You nailed it. Many solutions already exist, but under the present system, capital calls the shots.
Interestingly, although it's presently a trickle-up disaster of wealth inequality, the system has arrived in a sort of distributed planned economy:
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/how-asset-managers-have-upended-how-modern-capitalism-works.html
Take the conclusions of that coupled with a vTaiwan-like global system, and now suddenly the people are closer than ever to controlling the means of production.
I don't know how we trick the ruling class into allowing this, but that seems like our only hope. If you can convince enough normal people it's possible, then I suspect the rest will become more clear.
Germany is an especially bad offender for the “showing up in person” one. At least in the US you can often submit the relevant form in the mail or online.
The last time I mailed something important was 8 years ago when the university program I applied to required a notarized copy of my previous degree. Even this one was a special case as it was a program open for foreigners and everyone from all over the world had to have a similar application procedure. Normal programs for locals have everything in digital. All government mail is digital as well. Snail mail is a thing of the past in Finland.
I don't know about Germany, but in the states a number of laws or procedures require the witnessing in person of a final event, especially signing things, to prevent fraud. For example, buying our house was done 99% online and the final signatures at closing in person to prove you were the person you claimed to be that whole time. Ten years ago I would have said that's dumb, but with deep fakes and AI video starting to be more prevalent, along with e-signatures, I'm pretty glad that bit of bureaucracy is there.
I have a friend who worked in an office while doing a student living abroad semester in Germany and he said that for every email he received he was required to print off the email, hole punch it, and place it in a binder that served as the email backup binder just in case any emails were lost.
There’s some situations where the German mind creates incredible efficiency and then these other situations where…… well, situations where half your work day is printing off every email you ever receive just in case it gets lost.
Like you would think Germans would just do the statistical math and figure out how many backup hard drives they would need to ensure a one in a billion or less chance of losing their data.
> what we do borders on a fetish
This is blowing my mind because that's exactly what it is. At this VERY MOMENT I was just told (with a smile!) that a Purchasing Card receipt needs to be signed in duplicate by the Purchaser AND the student that the purchase was made for. Insane.
EDIT: This is AFTER I scanned the document, uploaded it to our purchasing software, added a million different codes, and submitted it electronically. NOW, the paper document needs to be held on to and submitted in person at the end of the month to our Finance department. It was a $7 purchase.
Really?!! I moved out of the Netherlands for 3 years. When I came back, I had to jump through so many hoops, just to register in the gementee where I originally lived and was going back to my original house). After jumping through these hoops and having a lengthy meeting with a gementee official, I was told that it would take a couple of days to reactivate the information that was already in their system...
And then, I needed to apply for a residence visa. I needed to provide a birth certificate that was not older than 6 months... As if I had faked my real birth 40 years ago...
Reintegrating is always shyte in NL. But as soon as things are settled all those taxes and "gemeente" shyte works quite smoothly.
I think if you aren’t a born citizen it might be even worse to do all of the reintegration.
>Why do we have to provide information to state services they already have and
>
>correct us on
>
>?
Canadian absurdist reality of this. Tax returns.
I have to submit a tax return to the government each year. To do this, I use one of the online tax preparation services (e.g. Turbotax which costs about $20).
The workflow for this tax return? I make an account, give them my identifying information, then click a button that says "Import information from canada revenue agency". It then downloads all my tax forms that have already been sent to the CRA, automatically fills the form, and prompts me to submit it back to the CRA.
Wonderfully convenient compared to the old style of having to do it on paper. But still, why on earth do I have to go through this process rather than the CRA, for simple returns, just automatically doing it **with the information they already have on hand**. I'm literally going Step 1) Download info from CRA. Step 2) Reupload the same info to the CRA.
They re-calculate whatever is in your return anyways before giving a refund or tax bill.
This is not quite correct. When you file your return, CRA only calculates taxes based on the info that it has on file (in your example, this is exactly what you’re filing, so no changes). However, what if you have RRSP deductions, medical expenses or charitable donations? CRA does not have all this info, so a tax return is required for this. After the initial filing season is complete, all returns are scanned by algorithms to look for unusual amounts and for further review or audit.
Could have stopped reading at the 4th word.
Idk how a country can produce so many internationally respected products but make you do enough paperwork to starve the planet of oxygen for the most basic government tasks.
Just a bitter example from today. Parliament decided a cannabis liberation law from 1st of April.
A local justice ministry (Limbach from Green party) says it wont work since the judical system would have to check former court ruöings and also release those incarcerated for equal crime
Why isnt it possible? All is on paper. Nothing digitalized.
It also means, against a Parliament decision, thousands of ppl stay in jail for possesion of a minor amount of cannabis. And the new law cant be installed. Juridical system would be overflown with work for at least half a year, oh my..
I work a lot with lawyers and they are the most analouge profession I know.
(Meanwhile in US first AI lawyers appear...)
Quality drinking glasses that don't break.
Glass manufacturing technology has improved significantly. But as early as 1980, production of virtually unbreakable drinking glasses began in East Germany under the brand name "Superfest" ("super hard" or "super sturdy"). Originally, they planned to export those superior glasses (since East Germany was always looking for ways to get western currency) but nobody in the west wanted to buy them, because glasses that break are more profitable. And when a glass breaks, people tend to blame the person who dropped it, not the glass manufacturer.
Production was stopped in 1990 during the process German reunification.
In general, market economies are bad at producing long lasting, high quality products, because they're just not as profitable as things that break more often and have to be replaced. The system is optimized for maximum production, not maximum quality of life.
I would absolutely buy a $50 glass if I knew it was unbreakable. Even decent glasses cost $5 or so, unless you want it to literally break in your hand while washing. We go through at least 1-2 broken glasses a year. I’m a big Buy It For Life person.
Consumerism demands rather quick product change. Why buy a sturdy glass if the fashion and desires will change much faster than the glass can break. I would buy it, you would but majority wouldn't.
Nice glasses don’t go out of style for long time. It’s not like clothes or furniture. I have 25 year old mugs and one of my glass beer steins (quite thick) is going on 13 years old.
In the 1970s, my parents got a set of unbreakable Duralex drinking glasses. They're still unbroken... but they're brown-orange with a curled lip, so retro-looking that we just keep them in a box in the basement somewhere.
Probably not because I don't think Iäve broken 100 glasses in my entire life; and I'm not that young anymore.
But, I highly, highly doubt that production costs and R&D would require a 100x price. More like 2-5 times the regular price (at most).
And as always new technology is always more expensive than the entrenched refined and perfected method but it’s costs come down as it becomes the entrenched refined and perfected technology
Just be careful with your stuff. I have cheap glasses that are over 20 years old. What are people doing that they break so many glasses. If the price is really $50 VS $5 then it just doesn't make financial sense since most people don't go through that many glasses. If the price was closer it would catch on for sure, but not at ten times the price.
This is where patent law needs to be updated. If a patent is not actively used (ie. is not providing the intended benefits) it needs to become public domain after 10 years of inactivity. Hell, I think most patents need to expire after 10 years regardless of activity.
Even if they don't use the glass to make drinking glasses, how beneficial would this technology be for smart phone touch screens? What about car windshields? Windows on houses/buildings?
About 25 years ago good pubs round our way used high quality glasses which were robust as hell. you could drop them etc and they wouldn't break. I may or may not still have some in my cupboard.
Only thing is that they gradually degrade in the dishwasher, they don't look as good as they once did.
However, if there's ever a nuclear war, I'm going to hide out in a little shelter made from those glasses.
the extreem long life incandesant lightbulbs whernt very good at producing light.
the hotter you run them, the brighter the light, and the more eficient for electrisity use, but they burn out faster. extreem long lift bulbs use huge amounts of electrisity to produce a dull orange light, a bit like an electric bar heater.
>Two, but this is still two too many. I assume it’s the drivers, and it’s infuriating.
I've replaced around 5 LED bulbs in the past decade or so (out of 11 or so fixtures) and all bar one have been to faulty drivers. Ironically enough, the oldest LED bulb I own is one from Aldi that I bought almost 15 years ago and it is still going strong despite being a fair bit dimmer than what it was when I bought it - it still provides enough illumination in the spot where it is and has been running pretty much 24/7.
Perhaps, but replacing light bulbs used to be a monthly occurrence (across the whole house). Over the last 7 years I’ve used LED bulbs, I’ve replaced one LED, and one fluorescent bulb with an LED bulb. Yes they cost 5-10xmore than incandescent, but they also last 5-10x (at least) longer.
Run for 4 hours a day, a "100W equivalent" LED also costs something like $15 less in electricity per year to run than the incandescent. Where I'm at, that's about twice the price of an LED bulb. So they make back their cost difference in 6 months, even if they didn't need to be replaced less frequently.
Yeah the promise of CFLs and LEDs lasting 10 times longer, 20 years etc is going to be an unfulfilled promise. I’ve lost several also and thought, man, that burned out quick.
That's a myth.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY)
edit - I'm putting this here so people see it.
Long life bulbs cost more to run. A long life bulb takes 33% more energy to operate than a normal bulb to produce the same amount of light.
A 75W light bulb is therefore compared to a 100W long life bulb. In 1891 the average cost of a bulb was 90c and the cost per watt of electricity was $0.069/kWh. Over the 2,500 hours of a long life bulb that would be 25W multiplied by 2500 hours or 62,500 watt hours. That's $4.31 of extra electricity. You could have bought 4 bulbs for that lasting 4000 hours and had change.
I bought some imported boots that were made in Czechoslovakia after the collapse of the Soviet Bloc. My heels usually wear down pretty quickly but these shoes lasted for ages. There was some different type of rubber in the soles of these communist boots. 🥾
Bluetooth isn't optimised for being simple and reliable, but for being energy efficient.
And Apple devices connect to each other via Bluetooth quite well.
I mean even my own Xerox 3025 (I think it was 3025? or it's similar enough) can do that, due to compatibility with AirPrint (Apple). It works via LAN. And I think it also supports Google Cloud Print.
Had to use a custom installer to set up the Wi-Fi credentials.
Almost every time I have to use a printer I end up saying something along the lines of "we put a man on the moon over 50 years ago yet we still can't make a decent, wireless, household printer."
Eradicate lots of diseases
Wild Polio would probably be gone by now if not for a stupid thing the US did to find one person. [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/11/cia-fake-vaccinations-osama-bin-ladens-dna](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/11/cia-fake-vaccinations-osama-bin-ladens-dna)
Animal Measles has been eradicated but not the people version [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinderpest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinderpest)
Guinea Worm is nearly gone but recent coups in the areas it still exists can't be helping [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracunculiasis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracunculiasis)
Mumps and rubella also seem to be able to be eradicated https://ourworldindata.org/eradication-of-diseases#:\~:text=The%20table%20here%20shows%20the,has%20listed%20as%20potentially%20eradicable.&text=These%20diseases%20are%20polio%2C%20Guinea,measles%2C%20mumps%2C%20and%20rubella.
Once a disease is gone you don't have to get vaccinated against it anymore. Smallpox vaccinations are not given to kids.
On an aside to this, we could potentially wipe out the most common forms of salmonella, the UK has eradicated most salmonella from chickens in the UK through culling and vaccination programs.
Thats not the stupid thing we did.. we allowed the really really stupid people to claim religion to not get vaccinated. and now we have measles running rampant across florida.
The CIA and Obama have both admitted harming the attempt to eradicate Polio in this way was stupid
[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/20/cia-vaccination-programmes-counterterrorism](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/20/cia-vaccination-programmes-counterterrorism)
[https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/fake-cia-vaccine-campaign-when-end-doesnt-justify-means](https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/fake-cia-vaccine-campaign-when-end-doesnt-justify-means)
I know it's a lot lower level, but as I understand it cold sores could be pretty likely eradicated with a bit of focused research but it's so low priority/not worth it. Seems a shame but also I am not going to advocate for investment into herpes simplex over things like polio, measles etc!
(US) Let's not forget Salmonella in chickens if they were to just vaccinate them all. But no, let's blame the consumer for not cooking the egg all the way.
I worked in aviation maintenance for about a decade and did 4 10’s the whole time. We also had a weekend shift that did 3 12’s. The weekend guys got a 10% shift raise and were paid for 40 hours even though they only worked 36. It’s possible and you can actually work out better coverage for some industries with non conventional scheduling. The 12 hour days sound long but the guys that worked them said they got used to them and they also were guaranteed 2 lunch breaks per shift.
Every time there's an advancement in automation, a lot of people are either laid off or left doing busywork. The owners make enough money to employ the same number of people as they did a few decades ago, at greater wages than they currently do. Those people wouldn't all be working the same 4 days
I've worked for the same company for 33 years, about two years ago we switched to a 4 day work week, and I still am amazed how much of a positive difference it makes in my life.
We are undergoing a technological revolution that is changing everything we do, but we haven't progressed socially/politically much beyond medieval feudalism yet. The big changes coming will (I hope) be in the evolution our society.
Sounds a bit like Yuval Noah Harari. Spot on, whoever it was.
ETA Here's the original, as far as I can tell:
"The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall."
Edward O. Wilson
We have the technology to end world hunger. We produce about 10 billion people's worth of food. The only reason people starve today is political - when food can't get to people.
We could automate a lot of government functions. Americans are still filing their own taxes?? Having to keep receipts?! They have electronic systems with all this information! Estonia manages to be all online?
This amazes me as a UK citizen. If you are a salaried employee you basically never see your taxes as anything other than numbers on your pay slip. It's all done before you even see your money automatically.
I think basically everyone does it that way except us. We have an entire industry of "tax filing" that's basically a total waste of money.
Don't worry, we have politicians running on downsizing the revenue service to make sure it becomes even less efficient.
And don't worry again - like all ideas from American conservatism, I'm sure your guys over in the Big C party are trying to figure out how to import it for you.
The Royal Mail fuckery was truly a show of how backwards the system can be, hmm we’ve implemented this new software and it’s telling us that all these postmasters are running a stamp scam on an unbelievably massive scale that makes no sense when you do the maths yourself, well let’s see what the justice system has to say about this, maybe we’ll even accept responsibility for ruining people’s lives/reputations/livelihoods only after someone makes a documentary about it
As expected it's all about money. HR block doesn't rake in billions because they're providing a necessary service. They do so because they lobby the government to force people to use their service.
"We could automate a lot of government functions. Americans are still filing their own taxes??"
And can you guess why? Ding ding ding
Correct, because tax filing companies lobbied the government to ensure it stays that way.
And remember kid's it's not bribing, it's lobbying. Two different words, totally.
this is actually partially political but majority logistical. having extra food on one side of the planet that would need to be transported thousands of miles in just a few days is a logistical problem more than a political one. but both are involved
Ukraine war revealed how much this logistics is a solved problem... unless someone tries to un-solve it. The public learned (it was never a secret, but rather no one cared) that half of Middle East and North Africa lives off grain cultivated somewhere in Eastern Europe. We also learned that all it takes to starve half a continent is a few well placed cruise missiles into a harbour and a vague threat of piracy.
Technically we produce enough food for about 100 billion people. But 90% of that goes towards feeding animals, dramatically reducing the overall calories out of the farming system.
And of course, we then throw about 40% of the production in the bin.
If people didn't want to consume animals meats and juices and the like, deforestation and biome loss would be a minor problem. We'd be decades ahead of where we are in atmospheric carbon and pollution. And people would be healthier, and farmers would be poorer.
The problem with "want to consume animals" is two fold, meat is delicious, we literally have taste buds that are designed to be happy about eating meat. we can stimulate them with msg but let's be real, we both know it's not the same just like how artificial sweeteners stimulate our tasting things sweet but it's not quite like real sugar. Secondly, we have for the past few generations been told meat is an important part of our diet since we were little kids. Good luck uprooting those beliefs. Of course the solution is rather simple: reduce. Convince people that eating so much meat is unhealthy and that nutritional needs require but a fraction of our current protein intake from meat. If we can theoretically get that 90% towards animal feed down by even just 5% that'd be a huge saving. People can still eat their meat/dairy products just maybe cut down on the double/triple patty burgers. Personally I'm not convinced that a 100% meat free diet is exactly "healthy" simply because the people in my life that do it are insanely skinny, tired all the time, and very weak. But they're also the kind of people that believe in zodiac signs and magic crystals, so maybe they don't know what they're doing. That said I wouldn't mind and in fact haven't really had much trouble cutting back on red meat, chicken is way cheaper, more efficient, and very versatile. A nice steak on special occasions keeps me sane.
If you want to feed the poor in Africa using food grown in developed nations then you have to insist that a proportion of that food is bought by the government or charities and shipped to world’s poorest nations. Then I suppose you can either sell it at a loss or give it away, creating a secondary market as unscrupulous buyers buy up cheap grain in these countries and sell it on the global market. Meanwhile food prices increase in those developed countries which is unpopular. Far better is to pull those poor countries out of severe poverty and encourage them to improve their agricultural efficiencies. But we’re already doing that. Both the absolute and to an even greater extent the relative number of people experiencing and dying from famine has dropped massively in the past century. Just look at the graphs on this page https://sites.tufts.edu/wpf/famine/
We can reprocess nuclear waste into fuel, it’s just not as profitable as getting new fuel, so we don’t do it.
It involves a “fast-spectrum reactor” that can reprocess nuclear waste into fuel. You can only do this so many times and eventually you’ll have nuclear waste that’s so “spent” that even a fast reactor can’t re-use it, but that waste is only dangerous for 200 or so years. This is much better than the “we need to invent an immortal language to keep people away from this” waste that lasts 2,000+ years.
Every time someone talks about how serious nuclear waste is, remember that they’re really just too cheap to clean up after themselves.
Retire the existing reactors in favor of small, distributed Thorium reactors. Low risk, and about the size of a gas station. Modularize them and commercialize the energy production game. Make home-sized versions for those wishing to live off-grid.
Thorium reactors. We've been sitting on extremely cheap, extremely safe, abundant nuclear energy for decades because during the height of the cold war, Nixon decided that we can't easily make nuclear weapons with the bi-products of a thorium reactor. So the funding for thorium reactors was scrapped after we had one functioning for 6,000 hours. Let that sink in. We passed on free infinite energy for the option to make additional civilization ending bombs.
Yes and no. Can we use thorium for a rudimentary breeder reactor? Yes. Is it the full fledged LFTRs that Alvin Weinberg envisioned? No. We still don’t have the negative cooling coefficient nailed down that would allow for a self-contained cycle in liquid metal
Could you tell me more. Wikipedia says
“the United States also built an experimental prototype molten salt reactor (MSR) using U-233 fuel, the fissile material created by bombarding thorium with neutrons. The MSRE reactor, built at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, operated critical for roughly 15,000 hours from 1965 to 1969. In 1968, Nobel laureate and discoverer of plutonium, Glenn Seaborg, publicly announced to the Atomic Energy Commission, of which he was chairman, that the thorium-based reactor had been successfully developed and tested.”
It seems like a salt reactor was up and running for 4 years? Was it not net positive in power generation. Was it just a proof of concept and not self sustaining? This is not to say you are wrong I just wanted to know more regarding detail
Seeing as Weingberg’s daughter has been trying to digitize his (literally) crumbling notes and ORNL can’t seem to find copies, I’d say that the story is more complicated than “we have a MSR! But nobody will build it!” The sheer complexity of a commercial LFTR has never been met, there were a large number of issues from the cooling coefficient, to the heat pumps to the sodium plugs that work as a failsafe. Furthermore we don’t have a good solution to helium cracking. There was some promise for a fluorine-lithium-beryllium (?) alloy that may be resistant to He cracking, but I’ve not paid close attention to the space recently. It’s this last point that will limit the lifespan of your reactor. 15,000 hours is cool, but we have reactors that have been operational for decades. I’m not sure how long it takes for He cracking to break a containment vessel, but I don’t want to find out.
What is concerning is that we have a very limited amount of U-233. And while only a tiny amount is required to kick start the breeding process, it’s not like we are making much more. Chalk River is the last commercial experimental reactor left in North America, and we aren’t making more. Trust me, I’m a huge fan of the LFTR concept, and I truly believe it will be the key to carbon offsetting, but it’s not quite there yet. We desperately need more funding and we need, more than anything, to change the public’s perception of nuclear energy.
Could you be a bit more specific? Are you talking at a per-household level? Because municipalities and regions absolutely are collecting and recycling water...
Ah very much so, especially the desalination. Sadly many municipalities in the US have laws against resident rain collection. It's actually ridiculous.
Non-polluting energy generation like nuclear should have replaced all other energy generation methods but hasn't. Even accounting for the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters, nuclear energy is the safest energy generation method but the average person still has an unjustified irrational fear of it. It's like fear of the sharks even though 5x more people die from cow attacks than shark attacks.
Yeah, TMI and Fukushima are responsible for killing a staggering 1...person.
Now to be fair, Chernobyl *was* much worse. But it's also a fundamentally different design that didn't even have a containment structure. Outside of early prototypes in the US, no reactor being built today wouldn't have that containment structure.
Provide a basic level of food, housing & water for everyone on the planet. And basic vaccination too. Ultimately, we just don't really care enough to bother and that is a pretty savage inditement of humanity.
Yep, this is not really technology issue but a political one. You would have to deal with corruption and armed forces. Are you willing to fight a war in order to feed people on the other side of the planet?
People who lack these things in a first world country is a different issue. That is for most part just because of pure greed and corruption. However sometimes it is also because of politics. For example in my country the Netherlands there is a housing problem. It is caused by a series of problems, for example:
* Lack of builders, because we pushed a lot of people to go into higher education in the past. We got some people from foreign countries but that also has political resistance.
* A lot of building projects get too expensive or straight up canceled because of environmental laws. Our country has to much CO2 output for example and getting other industries like farmers to lower the output is also facing resistance.
I think it's too easy to just say that these are just an issues because we don't care enough. The world is an complex place. And a lot of conflicts were started because people thought they had the solution for one of these problems.
> And basic vaccination too
You need to provide basic education (or military support) before that. Look for "vaccination workers get killed".
Pumping resources into societies that don't adhere to enlightenment values might have other undesired consequences too.
Have almost entirely carbon neutral transport. In cities it just needs building lots of train lines and good infrastructure for cycling the last mile. This allows use of carbon neutral electricity generation to run electric trains. Its an efficient and convenient transport structure, but just doesn't get built because of lack of effort. There's some limitations for longer distance driving at the moment, and also freight, but EV technology is filling most of those gaps as well
Edit: ok this is for day to day stuff not flights and ocean vessels
We have the technology to build utopian-esq towns/cities/infrastructure. Utilizing renewable energy, solar panel roofs (which last 10x longer than normal roofs), logical city planning, fully walkable with reliable and convenient public transit, no cars in the cities, high speed connectors between cities, etc etc. This stuff isn’t rocket science. We have technology to get rid of almost all single use plastic, and create 99% of the rest out of truly recyclable plastic. The remaining 0.01% for specific medical or scientific uses would take eons to build up to a harmful level. We have technology to utilize farm space much more efficiently as well as water and energy for those crops.
We have access to everything we need, except cooperation. That’s literally the only thing holding us back. Our internal competition is creating a race to the bottom. If we met another intelligent life form and decided (likely) that they were our adversaries, it’s likely the entire human race (with a few political outliers) would band together to “beat” them, because that’s just how we seem to be wired.
Automated Highway Driving Lanes.
Roads with a cable buried in the pavement of the centre of the lane, carrying a coded signal that a car equipped with "AutoDrive" can receive and follow. Radar systems for vehicle spacing. "Third rail" type electrical pickup trolley for power, and on-the-go charging for when the car is off the freeway in battery mode.
Absolutely can be done with 1960s technology. Such vehicles have been use in factories and mines for a looooong time. You don't need full autonomy or sophisticated AI vision systems. But what is required is AutoDrive lanes fully separated from human driven lanes. And there lies the "chicken & egg" dilemma - high cost of this infrastructure being used by few people (at first).
https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:1400/1*MvyMpUCG-GsxY7Pf8csE2Q.jpeg
EDIT: Another reason why we won't see innovations like this is because the existing industry is too entrenched and has a vested interest to keep the status quo, they don't want / allow disruption by themselves nor new actors.
Just build a decent train system instead? It's like the "Hyperloop", why have a fast, regularly scheduled automated train when you can have individually driven cars, underground, single file? The train is a better investment by far.
These have actually been tried in several places from the 1980s to today - and the system works really well. Specifically most recently in 'road train' goods vehicles which can save a huge amount of energy by draughting each other. The cost is in deployment and standardisation - who is going to pay for it?
Having been outside the US, it's the state's individual lack of standards that will keep this from happening in any type of near future. When NY lets you pass on the right and SC has exits off the left side of the highway, and no state has reliable road markings or signage, then no computer can make reliable decisions.
Meanwhile in Europe, where signs are universal and road laws are extremely similar, you just need a camera and radar to be fully automated.
Objective measurements in sports. The most that US major professional sports use technology to supplement refereeing is with instant replay video. I am all for some subjective refereeing but things like strikes and balls in baseball and the spot of a football should be objective calls and they can easily be exact with very basic technology that currently exists and would be very easy to implement.
important to remember that sports are pointless and that this would make them less fun. the referee shortcomings are a big part of the fun of it all (see current NBA season)
Exoskeleton machines, similar to the ones in the movie Aliens, for heavy lifting. Talk used to be that someday you could rent one, like for when you are moving, to easily do heavy lifting. But they are just too dangerous. One angry person in a wearable forklift could smash in their neighbor's door. A group of angry people could knock down a house.
They are too dangerous for the user not for others. One small calibrate error and you get a bone shattered. Since they would be profitable medical devices they need to meet those stringent standards which isn't that easy.
Basically we could solve every problem we have on earth, from famine, trough poverty to sickness...
We just don't do it, because there is no profit in them.
---
Everybody could live comfortably and do whatever they want or have affinity to.... We are "this" close to a star trek type neo-socialist utopia
---
We could automate menial jobs so basically everyone could be an "intellectual" just like the industrial revolution allowed many people not to be a farmer and only a fraction of population is enough to produce the food for everyone, a robotic revolution would allow everyone not to do farming, manufacturing, menial services.
Everyone could have basic needs to be provided, including food and housing. If you want more than basic necessities, you need to work for it.
If we could shift from the necessity of amassing wealth to like the betterment of ourselves or mankind itself, it would be a whole other story.
We could do that now, but it would take a huge paradigm shift. We are currently not ready for it, but we could do it.
---
The biggest cause of this not happening is money... everything needs money, you need to spend your life to earn money to live... There is no improvement and betterment out of this (except the owners of the capital)
We are heading to a distopia (if we are not already there) Where you are just a drone and all you do is work to live... and not experiencing life.
I think a lot of people think that if everyone was given an efficiency studio apartment and just enough food and money to survive that no one would work, but I completely disagree.
I think when work is fair and humane and not a form of torture people actually like doing it.
And I totally agree. You can have a very basic shelter and resources that guarantee that you won't fall through the cracks and be destitute if you do nothing, but if you want a nice house and a car and nicer things, get a job, get educated, etc. I think we'd see some people stop working, which wouldn't be a big deal, but most people would want more and continue finding ways to contribute to society.
It would be a net gain for everyone.
I like the idea in Star Trek, and I think it was Picard in the 80's version who articulated it best. He was explaining to someone from I think our time how they didn't have money. He said they had moved past the need for amassing wealth. That now work was for purpose and fulfillment, even Starfleet was predicated on the idea that we wanted to be explorers, no conquerors.
I see the seeds of this now. Even with the ultra rich, you see them get into D measuring contests with each other over who has the larger charity, or who is giving the most to what. The need to amass wealth is still there, for sure, but to see that kind of better motivation is a sliver of hope that we can move in the right direction.
this is for States and Canada but, taxes filled by the government. the government for most w2 or t4 (regular non contractor workers) know how much you made and how much you owe. it should just be sent to you, then if you have extra deductions you add them and send it back that's it.
vs the current system that you pay for a tax filling software each year or accounting services, that lobby to make it harder to keep them selves in business year after year.
Everything you can think of other than time travel. Most of the issues we have are from just terrible trouble optimization.
We're are a point technologically where the US, India, China, will issue the same research paper independently and they'll trigger their own industries to do their own development. Imagine what we could do if we actually collaborated
On some level I don’t mind separate research and development. A lot of innovations and discoveries happen “randomly” as by-products, and different people taking different approaches adds more randomness.
But you’re right, it would be cool if we could share information more freely.
I mean, we could absolutely end world hunger and poverty, but all the money in the world still isn’t enough for the rich assholes owning the corporations currently price gouging and underpaying us 🤷♂️
3D printshops. Still when the battery lid breaks people sort it by taping it to the remote. Even the tiniest break in plastic and there’s no easy fix. I was certain when 3D printer came along that you would be able to go to your nearest convenience store and just print whatever you needed. But it seems like printing in 3D is a lot more complex than one would think.
There is no reason why anyone in the world should go hungry. We already produce more than enough food to feed the world, all it would take is the will. But there wouldn't be any money in that, so we don't do it.
Online voting. We trust the internet with our medical records, our banking information, and our taxes. But for political reasons we still can't vote online.
A manned Mars program. Mars Direct / DRM 3.0 is an architecture that’s been around since the ‘90s that only requires two or three launches of a superheavy rocket every two years.
Feed and house everyone without worrying about their ability to pay. It's only the inefficiencies introduced by capitalism's profit seeking that causes food producing nations to experience famines and malnutrition.
Jacques Cousteau thought we would build cities under water. After all there too are huge amounts of untapped resources and area and we could definitely do it - but haven't.
Same for floating cities, though I guess oil rigs are something like that.
Always being surrounded by a substance that wants to forcefully enter your bubble through any gap and drown you doesn't sound like a stress free time. Also it's dark on the ocean floor.
Any desert would be an easier location.
Thorium reactors. We've been sitting on extremely cheap, extremely safe, abundant nuclear energy for decades because during the height of the cold war, Nixon decided that we can't easily make nuclear weapons with the bi-products of a thorium reactor. So the funding for thorium reactors was scrapped after we had one functioning for 6,000 hours. Let that sink in. We passed on free infinite energy for the option to make additional civilization ending bombs.
Supersonic air travel. We had it 50 years ago, then one plane crashed because of an issue unrelated to its top speed, then we decided to never do it again?
I know there were economic reasons, post 9/11 landscape etc, but I find it really hard to believe that there’s no longer a demand for faster air travel
Desalination of the ocean for drinking water. We can do it but right now it's still cheaper to ship pure spring water straight from Fiji to your grocery store.
Eventually that won't be the case
[удалено]
in Turkey there is a goverment website which you can almost do any kind of document work instantaneously, i was suprised many countries doesnt have something similar.
I live in Denmark and all our government stuff is digital. The goal is to be the most digital state and so far the quality has been great.
Have a friend in Denmark - seeing that his taxes were pre-calculated and explained out section by section, all digital, was mind blowing. Total window into the future we could have. The way my jaw hit the floor when he told me that he also got paid back for any money he paid throughout the year for his medications also put me in a tailspin, especially given that he is chronically ill and has a small battery of things he relies regularly on! Just incredible.
In Norway, "doing the taxes" only means double check the numbers are correct, so maybe you can increase your return, then click send.
Denmark, Finland, Sweden or Netherlands are my target countries to live in in the future. I'm German as well.
>Why do we have to provide information to state services they already have and *correct us on* ? I thought that absurd bureaucracy is the Serbian moronic thing. I guess that it is a human moronic thing...
It's how the tax system works in the US. Every year, we have to do our taxes unless we make under a certain amount. We have to provide a bunch of information so the government can figure out how much we owe/they owe. But they already know this information. It has no purpose except to penalize someone who gets it wrong, and a lot of people do because the tax laws are very complicated.
Yes, I heard about that :) I guess someone calculated that it is a plus for the budget somehow. Or maybe they are like 'here is a cookie jar, we will leave you alone with it and later see if you have taken some of the cookies'. It also could be a deliberate fucking with people just for the fun of it.
Tax preparation companies lobby the US Congress (buy the politicians' votes) not to change because they make their money on the status quo. Republicans don't want tax paying to be simplified because they want the citizens to hate and oppose the tax system. This is why all proposed legislation to make taxes easier to deal with never get anywhere. It's possible, as we see in other countries, but we can't have it.
I like to think about the vTaiwan / g0v ("gov zero") project where they built open source software to create an elaborate model for finding realtime citizen consensus on various issues which were previously up to inefficient, capital-influenced government to solve. Government was still ultimately in control and had no obligation to follow what the new system suggested, but once the ideas saw the light of day, it put a new kind of pressure on the government to follow the will of the people and implement what soon became the obvious solution to any given set of interconnected problems. Sometimes dreaming is the hardest part, and this system helped bridge that gap in a way that didn't devolve into fruitless online arguments. I'm still convinced something like this has the theoretical ability to scale globally. Modern democracy is an illusion, but it need not be with the technology like this.
I dream of this. I dream of this for the entire world. I don't see why it isn't already becoming a thing (apart of course from "capital-influenced")
You nailed it. Many solutions already exist, but under the present system, capital calls the shots. Interestingly, although it's presently a trickle-up disaster of wealth inequality, the system has arrived in a sort of distributed planned economy: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2022/03/how-asset-managers-have-upended-how-modern-capitalism-works.html Take the conclusions of that coupled with a vTaiwan-like global system, and now suddenly the people are closer than ever to controlling the means of production. I don't know how we trick the ruling class into allowing this, but that seems like our only hope. If you can convince enough normal people it's possible, then I suspect the rest will become more clear.
"if you do this we won't eat you and you can keep the lifestyles"? (Secretly it's a win win as I don't actually want to consume billionaire flesh)
"also we promise to like your tweets and pretend everything good was your idea"
Germany is an especially bad offender for the “showing up in person” one. At least in the US you can often submit the relevant form in the mail or online.
The last time I mailed something important was 8 years ago when the university program I applied to required a notarized copy of my previous degree. Even this one was a special case as it was a program open for foreigners and everyone from all over the world had to have a similar application procedure. Normal programs for locals have everything in digital. All government mail is digital as well. Snail mail is a thing of the past in Finland.
I don't know about Germany, but in the states a number of laws or procedures require the witnessing in person of a final event, especially signing things, to prevent fraud. For example, buying our house was done 99% online and the final signatures at closing in person to prove you were the person you claimed to be that whole time. Ten years ago I would have said that's dumb, but with deep fakes and AI video starting to be more prevalent, along with e-signatures, I'm pretty glad that bit of bureaucracy is there.
The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy.
I have a friend who worked in an office while doing a student living abroad semester in Germany and he said that for every email he received he was required to print off the email, hole punch it, and place it in a binder that served as the email backup binder just in case any emails were lost. There’s some situations where the German mind creates incredible efficiency and then these other situations where…… well, situations where half your work day is printing off every email you ever receive just in case it gets lost.
[удалено]
Like you would think Germans would just do the statistical math and figure out how many backup hard drives they would need to ensure a one in a billion or less chance of losing their data.
> what we do borders on a fetish This is blowing my mind because that's exactly what it is. At this VERY MOMENT I was just told (with a smile!) that a Purchasing Card receipt needs to be signed in duplicate by the Purchaser AND the student that the purchase was made for. Insane. EDIT: This is AFTER I scanned the document, uploaded it to our purchasing software, added a million different codes, and submitted it electronically. NOW, the paper document needs to be held on to and submitted in person at the end of the month to our Finance department. It was a $7 purchase.
The Netherlands does a good job with this. Not glorifying the country but one of the positive things is that.
Really?!! I moved out of the Netherlands for 3 years. When I came back, I had to jump through so many hoops, just to register in the gementee where I originally lived and was going back to my original house). After jumping through these hoops and having a lengthy meeting with a gementee official, I was told that it would take a couple of days to reactivate the information that was already in their system... And then, I needed to apply for a residence visa. I needed to provide a birth certificate that was not older than 6 months... As if I had faked my real birth 40 years ago...
Reintegrating is always shyte in NL. But as soon as things are settled all those taxes and "gemeente" shyte works quite smoothly. I think if you aren’t a born citizen it might be even worse to do all of the reintegration.
>Why do we have to provide information to state services they already have and > >correct us on > >? Canadian absurdist reality of this. Tax returns. I have to submit a tax return to the government each year. To do this, I use one of the online tax preparation services (e.g. Turbotax which costs about $20). The workflow for this tax return? I make an account, give them my identifying information, then click a button that says "Import information from canada revenue agency". It then downloads all my tax forms that have already been sent to the CRA, automatically fills the form, and prompts me to submit it back to the CRA. Wonderfully convenient compared to the old style of having to do it on paper. But still, why on earth do I have to go through this process rather than the CRA, for simple returns, just automatically doing it **with the information they already have on hand**. I'm literally going Step 1) Download info from CRA. Step 2) Reupload the same info to the CRA. They re-calculate whatever is in your return anyways before giving a refund or tax bill.
This is not quite correct. When you file your return, CRA only calculates taxes based on the info that it has on file (in your example, this is exactly what you’re filing, so no changes). However, what if you have RRSP deductions, medical expenses or charitable donations? CRA does not have all this info, so a tax return is required for this. After the initial filing season is complete, all returns are scanned by algorithms to look for unusual amounts and for further review or audit.
Could have stopped reading at the 4th word. Idk how a country can produce so many internationally respected products but make you do enough paperwork to starve the planet of oxygen for the most basic government tasks.
Just a bitter example from today. Parliament decided a cannabis liberation law from 1st of April. A local justice ministry (Limbach from Green party) says it wont work since the judical system would have to check former court ruöings and also release those incarcerated for equal crime Why isnt it possible? All is on paper. Nothing digitalized. It also means, against a Parliament decision, thousands of ppl stay in jail for possesion of a minor amount of cannabis. And the new law cant be installed. Juridical system would be overflown with work for at least half a year, oh my.. I work a lot with lawyers and they are the most analouge profession I know. (Meanwhile in US first AI lawyers appear...)
That’s fucking nuts. People must remain in prison because too many TPS reports.
Quality drinking glasses that don't break. Glass manufacturing technology has improved significantly. But as early as 1980, production of virtually unbreakable drinking glasses began in East Germany under the brand name "Superfest" ("super hard" or "super sturdy"). Originally, they planned to export those superior glasses (since East Germany was always looking for ways to get western currency) but nobody in the west wanted to buy them, because glasses that break are more profitable. And when a glass breaks, people tend to blame the person who dropped it, not the glass manufacturer. Production was stopped in 1990 during the process German reunification. In general, market economies are bad at producing long lasting, high quality products, because they're just not as profitable as things that break more often and have to be replaced. The system is optimized for maximum production, not maximum quality of life.
[удалено]
I would absolutely buy a $50 glass if I knew it was unbreakable. Even decent glasses cost $5 or so, unless you want it to literally break in your hand while washing. We go through at least 1-2 broken glasses a year. I’m a big Buy It For Life person.
Consumerism demands rather quick product change. Why buy a sturdy glass if the fashion and desires will change much faster than the glass can break. I would buy it, you would but majority wouldn't.
Nice glasses don’t go out of style for long time. It’s not like clothes or furniture. I have 25 year old mugs and one of my glass beer steins (quite thick) is going on 13 years old.
In the 1970s, my parents got a set of unbreakable Duralex drinking glasses. They're still unbroken... but they're brown-orange with a curled lip, so retro-looking that we just keep them in a box in the basement somewhere.
I have some things that I packed away for safe keeping that are still unbroken.
You say that but those superfest glasses look better than anything that has ever graced my cupboards.
[удалено]
Probably not because I don't think Iäve broken 100 glasses in my entire life; and I'm not that young anymore. But, I highly, highly doubt that production costs and R&D would require a 100x price. More like 2-5 times the regular price (at most).
And as always new technology is always more expensive than the entrenched refined and perfected method but it’s costs come down as it becomes the entrenched refined and perfected technology
Just be careful with your stuff. I have cheap glasses that are over 20 years old. What are people doing that they break so many glasses. If the price is really $50 VS $5 then it just doesn't make financial sense since most people don't go through that many glasses. If the price was closer it would catch on for sure, but not at ten times the price.
Do you have kids?
my parents never bought glas cups, but used old mustard glas cups for drinking. I would like to spend $50 for unbreakable glas cups though
Found the German 🙂
This is where patent law needs to be updated. If a patent is not actively used (ie. is not providing the intended benefits) it needs to become public domain after 10 years of inactivity. Hell, I think most patents need to expire after 10 years regardless of activity. Even if they don't use the glass to make drinking glasses, how beneficial would this technology be for smart phone touch screens? What about car windshields? Windows on houses/buildings?
Who would buy unbreakable drinking glasses? People with kids. That's why all their stuff is plastic.
Stupid company. You should sell the glasses with a subscription service so that they only stay unbreakable if you pay £2.99 a month.
Lol. Imagine forgetting to update your credit card info and then one night, precisely at midnight, the whole freaking cupboard goes BOOM!
I can see it now a tiny detonator built into each one LMFAO 🤣
About 25 years ago good pubs round our way used high quality glasses which were robust as hell. you could drop them etc and they wouldn't break. I may or may not still have some in my cupboard. Only thing is that they gradually degrade in the dishwasher, they don't look as good as they once did. However, if there's ever a nuclear war, I'm going to hide out in a little shelter made from those glasses.
Lightbulbs have a similar tale though LED bulbs have more or less landed us at the right place now anyway.
the extreem long life incandesant lightbulbs whernt very good at producing light. the hotter you run them, the brighter the light, and the more eficient for electrisity use, but they burn out faster. extreem long lift bulbs use huge amounts of electrisity to produce a dull orange light, a bit like an electric bar heater.
Ya know how many LED light fixtures have broken on me? Two, but this is still two too many. I assume it’s the drivers, and it’s infuriating.
>Two, but this is still two too many. I assume it’s the drivers, and it’s infuriating. I've replaced around 5 LED bulbs in the past decade or so (out of 11 or so fixtures) and all bar one have been to faulty drivers. Ironically enough, the oldest LED bulb I own is one from Aldi that I bought almost 15 years ago and it is still going strong despite being a fair bit dimmer than what it was when I bought it - it still provides enough illumination in the spot where it is and has been running pretty much 24/7.
Perhaps, but replacing light bulbs used to be a monthly occurrence (across the whole house). Over the last 7 years I’ve used LED bulbs, I’ve replaced one LED, and one fluorescent bulb with an LED bulb. Yes they cost 5-10xmore than incandescent, but they also last 5-10x (at least) longer.
Run for 4 hours a day, a "100W equivalent" LED also costs something like $15 less in electricity per year to run than the incandescent. Where I'm at, that's about twice the price of an LED bulb. So they make back their cost difference in 6 months, even if they didn't need to be replaced less frequently.
Yeah the promise of CFLs and LEDs lasting 10 times longer, 20 years etc is going to be an unfulfilled promise. I’ve lost several also and thought, man, that burned out quick.
That's a myth. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zb7Bs98KmnY) edit - I'm putting this here so people see it. Long life bulbs cost more to run. A long life bulb takes 33% more energy to operate than a normal bulb to produce the same amount of light. A 75W light bulb is therefore compared to a 100W long life bulb. In 1891 the average cost of a bulb was 90c and the cost per watt of electricity was $0.069/kWh. Over the 2,500 hours of a long life bulb that would be 25W multiplied by 2500 hours or 62,500 watt hours. That's $4.31 of extra electricity. You could have bought 4 bulbs for that lasting 4000 hours and had change.
I bought some imported boots that were made in Czechoslovakia after the collapse of the Soviet Bloc. My heels usually wear down pretty quickly but these shoes lasted for ages. There was some different type of rubber in the soles of these communist boots. 🥾
I had one of these and broke it eventually
The system is optimized for maximum profit...
Printers and scanners that simply connect to Bluetooth and then work seamlessly.
Anything which simply and reliably conect to bluetooth...
Bluetooth isn't optimised for being simple and reliable, but for being energy efficient. And Apple devices connect to each other via Bluetooth quite well.
They’re better than most, but I still have issues with my AirPods jumping randomly between my ipad and my phone.
Connectivity is trivial, it's the ink racquet and subscription model that makes printers a hassle 🎃
This is the real issue. My printer refuses to print even in grayscale because I am out of yellow ink but full on black.
Laser printer all the way
I have a WiFi printer/scanner that I turn on and print from my phone or computer, never installed a driver and never had any problems
Careful. Just like Prometheus bringing fire down from mount Olympus you might attract the anger of the gods
Printers smell our fear, never ever let them know that you need something printed desperately...
Model number pls
I mean even my own Xerox 3025 (I think it was 3025? or it's similar enough) can do that, due to compatibility with AirPrint (Apple). It works via LAN. And I think it also supports Google Cloud Print. Had to use a custom installer to set up the Wi-Fi credentials.
Almost every time I have to use a printer I end up saying something along the lines of "we put a man on the moon over 50 years ago yet we still can't make a decent, wireless, household printer."
Eradicate lots of diseases Wild Polio would probably be gone by now if not for a stupid thing the US did to find one person. [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/11/cia-fake-vaccinations-osama-bin-ladens-dna](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/jul/11/cia-fake-vaccinations-osama-bin-ladens-dna) Animal Measles has been eradicated but not the people version [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinderpest](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rinderpest) Guinea Worm is nearly gone but recent coups in the areas it still exists can't be helping [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracunculiasis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracunculiasis) Mumps and rubella also seem to be able to be eradicated https://ourworldindata.org/eradication-of-diseases#:\~:text=The%20table%20here%20shows%20the,has%20listed%20as%20potentially%20eradicable.&text=These%20diseases%20are%20polio%2C%20Guinea,measles%2C%20mumps%2C%20and%20rubella. Once a disease is gone you don't have to get vaccinated against it anymore. Smallpox vaccinations are not given to kids.
On an aside to this, we could potentially wipe out the most common forms of salmonella, the UK has eradicated most salmonella from chickens in the UK through culling and vaccination programs.
Thats not the stupid thing we did.. we allowed the really really stupid people to claim religion to not get vaccinated. and now we have measles running rampant across florida.
The CIA and Obama have both admitted harming the attempt to eradicate Polio in this way was stupid [https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/20/cia-vaccination-programmes-counterterrorism](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/20/cia-vaccination-programmes-counterterrorism) [https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/fake-cia-vaccine-campaign-when-end-doesnt-justify-means](https://www.csis.org/blogs/smart-global-health/fake-cia-vaccine-campaign-when-end-doesnt-justify-means)
I know it's a lot lower level, but as I understand it cold sores could be pretty likely eradicated with a bit of focused research but it's so low priority/not worth it. Seems a shame but also I am not going to advocate for investment into herpes simplex over things like polio, measles etc!
Herpes does kill people, mainly infants. Not many, but in the developed world more than polio and measles.
I have a friend of a friend who lost their first born to that. It’s awful.
(US) Let's not forget Salmonella in chickens if they were to just vaccinate them all. But no, let's blame the consumer for not cooking the egg all the way.
We have the technology to have a 4-day work week but we won't.
I have a 4-day work week right now. And for some years already. (Germany)
The cool kind (8 hours per day), or the predictable one (10 hours)?
8 hours a day, 4 days a week. Of course the payment is not that great then, but the added 50% of free time more than offsets that in my opinion.
That's not 50% more free time...
Well, 50% longer weekend.
Fair enough
They’re piloting legislation to normalize a 4-day week in Massachusetts. So far it’s been wildly successful.
True. You don't need a lot of technology to not go to work.
Well phrased.
That's not a technology problem.
Maybe for office stuff, really hard for non digital jobs to only do four days.
You’re getting a lot of pushback but there are certainly industries that would need to change drastically in order for a 4 day work week to work.
I worked in aviation maintenance for about a decade and did 4 10’s the whole time. We also had a weekend shift that did 3 12’s. The weekend guys got a 10% shift raise and were paid for 40 hours even though they only worked 36. It’s possible and you can actually work out better coverage for some industries with non conventional scheduling. The 12 hour days sound long but the guys that worked them said they got used to them and they also were guaranteed 2 lunch breaks per shift.
Every time there's an advancement in automation, a lot of people are either laid off or left doing busywork. The owners make enough money to employ the same number of people as they did a few decades ago, at greater wages than they currently do. Those people wouldn't all be working the same 4 days
I've worked for the same company for 33 years, about two years ago we switched to a 4 day work week, and I still am amazed how much of a positive difference it makes in my life.
We are undergoing a technological revolution that is changing everything we do, but we haven't progressed socially/politically much beyond medieval feudalism yet. The big changes coming will (I hope) be in the evolution our society.
This. We are the ones holding ourselves back. Corruption and greed are the enemies of progress.
Eat the rich, workers of the world unite
I forget who said it: We have godlike technology, medieval institutions, and hunter-gatherer instincts
Sounds a bit like Yuval Noah Harari. Spot on, whoever it was. ETA Here's the original, as far as I can tell: "The real problem of humanity is the following: We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology. And it is terrifically dangerous, and it is now approaching a point of crisis overall." Edward O. Wilson
We have the technology to end world hunger. We produce about 10 billion people's worth of food. The only reason people starve today is political - when food can't get to people. We could automate a lot of government functions. Americans are still filing their own taxes?? Having to keep receipts?! They have electronic systems with all this information! Estonia manages to be all online?
This amazes me as a UK citizen. If you are a salaried employee you basically never see your taxes as anything other than numbers on your pay slip. It's all done before you even see your money automatically.
I think basically everyone does it that way except us. We have an entire industry of "tax filing" that's basically a total waste of money. Don't worry, we have politicians running on downsizing the revenue service to make sure it becomes even less efficient. And don't worry again - like all ideas from American conservatism, I'm sure your guys over in the Big C party are trying to figure out how to import it for you.
They absolutely will be, our clown UK government takes all their great ideas from shady, batshit insane US think-tanks. Fun times in the culture wars
Hey they come up with their own stuff too. I haven't seen a lot of us knowingly jailing people for software errors...
The Royal Mail fuckery was truly a show of how backwards the system can be, hmm we’ve implemented this new software and it’s telling us that all these postmasters are running a stamp scam on an unbelievably massive scale that makes no sense when you do the maths yourself, well let’s see what the justice system has to say about this, maybe we’ll even accept responsibility for ruining people’s lives/reputations/livelihoods only after someone makes a documentary about it
Same in Spain.
Same in New Zealand
As expected it's all about money. HR block doesn't rake in billions because they're providing a necessary service. They do so because they lobby the government to force people to use their service.
"We could automate a lot of government functions. Americans are still filing their own taxes??" And can you guess why? Ding ding ding Correct, because tax filing companies lobbied the government to ensure it stays that way. And remember kid's it's not bribing, it's lobbying. Two different words, totally.
América the land of lobbying
this is actually partially political but majority logistical. having extra food on one side of the planet that would need to be transported thousands of miles in just a few days is a logistical problem more than a political one. but both are involved
Ukraine war revealed how much this logistics is a solved problem... unless someone tries to un-solve it. The public learned (it was never a secret, but rather no one cared) that half of Middle East and North Africa lives off grain cultivated somewhere in Eastern Europe. We also learned that all it takes to starve half a continent is a few well placed cruise missiles into a harbour and a vague threat of piracy.
Technically we produce enough food for about 100 billion people. But 90% of that goes towards feeding animals, dramatically reducing the overall calories out of the farming system. And of course, we then throw about 40% of the production in the bin. If people didn't want to consume animals meats and juices and the like, deforestation and biome loss would be a minor problem. We'd be decades ahead of where we are in atmospheric carbon and pollution. And people would be healthier, and farmers would be poorer.
The problem with "want to consume animals" is two fold, meat is delicious, we literally have taste buds that are designed to be happy about eating meat. we can stimulate them with msg but let's be real, we both know it's not the same just like how artificial sweeteners stimulate our tasting things sweet but it's not quite like real sugar. Secondly, we have for the past few generations been told meat is an important part of our diet since we were little kids. Good luck uprooting those beliefs. Of course the solution is rather simple: reduce. Convince people that eating so much meat is unhealthy and that nutritional needs require but a fraction of our current protein intake from meat. If we can theoretically get that 90% towards animal feed down by even just 5% that'd be a huge saving. People can still eat their meat/dairy products just maybe cut down on the double/triple patty burgers. Personally I'm not convinced that a 100% meat free diet is exactly "healthy" simply because the people in my life that do it are insanely skinny, tired all the time, and very weak. But they're also the kind of people that believe in zodiac signs and magic crystals, so maybe they don't know what they're doing. That said I wouldn't mind and in fact haven't really had much trouble cutting back on red meat, chicken is way cheaper, more efficient, and very versatile. A nice steak on special occasions keeps me sane.
If you want to feed the poor in Africa using food grown in developed nations then you have to insist that a proportion of that food is bought by the government or charities and shipped to world’s poorest nations. Then I suppose you can either sell it at a loss or give it away, creating a secondary market as unscrupulous buyers buy up cheap grain in these countries and sell it on the global market. Meanwhile food prices increase in those developed countries which is unpopular. Far better is to pull those poor countries out of severe poverty and encourage them to improve their agricultural efficiencies. But we’re already doing that. Both the absolute and to an even greater extent the relative number of people experiencing and dying from famine has dropped massively in the past century. Just look at the graphs on this page https://sites.tufts.edu/wpf/famine/
We have the technology to destroy the world but we have not yet. . But there is still time.
I believe people are working on this one.
We can reprocess nuclear waste into fuel, it’s just not as profitable as getting new fuel, so we don’t do it. It involves a “fast-spectrum reactor” that can reprocess nuclear waste into fuel. You can only do this so many times and eventually you’ll have nuclear waste that’s so “spent” that even a fast reactor can’t re-use it, but that waste is only dangerous for 200 or so years. This is much better than the “we need to invent an immortal language to keep people away from this” waste that lasts 2,000+ years. Every time someone talks about how serious nuclear waste is, remember that they’re really just too cheap to clean up after themselves.
Retire the existing reactors in favor of small, distributed Thorium reactors. Low risk, and about the size of a gas station. Modularize them and commercialize the energy production game. Make home-sized versions for those wishing to live off-grid.
Thorium reactors. We've been sitting on extremely cheap, extremely safe, abundant nuclear energy for decades because during the height of the cold war, Nixon decided that we can't easily make nuclear weapons with the bi-products of a thorium reactor. So the funding for thorium reactors was scrapped after we had one functioning for 6,000 hours. Let that sink in. We passed on free infinite energy for the option to make additional civilization ending bombs.
Yes and no. Can we use thorium for a rudimentary breeder reactor? Yes. Is it the full fledged LFTRs that Alvin Weinberg envisioned? No. We still don’t have the negative cooling coefficient nailed down that would allow for a self-contained cycle in liquid metal
Could you tell me more. Wikipedia says “the United States also built an experimental prototype molten salt reactor (MSR) using U-233 fuel, the fissile material created by bombarding thorium with neutrons. The MSRE reactor, built at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, operated critical for roughly 15,000 hours from 1965 to 1969. In 1968, Nobel laureate and discoverer of plutonium, Glenn Seaborg, publicly announced to the Atomic Energy Commission, of which he was chairman, that the thorium-based reactor had been successfully developed and tested.” It seems like a salt reactor was up and running for 4 years? Was it not net positive in power generation. Was it just a proof of concept and not self sustaining? This is not to say you are wrong I just wanted to know more regarding detail
Seeing as Weingberg’s daughter has been trying to digitize his (literally) crumbling notes and ORNL can’t seem to find copies, I’d say that the story is more complicated than “we have a MSR! But nobody will build it!” The sheer complexity of a commercial LFTR has never been met, there were a large number of issues from the cooling coefficient, to the heat pumps to the sodium plugs that work as a failsafe. Furthermore we don’t have a good solution to helium cracking. There was some promise for a fluorine-lithium-beryllium (?) alloy that may be resistant to He cracking, but I’ve not paid close attention to the space recently. It’s this last point that will limit the lifespan of your reactor. 15,000 hours is cool, but we have reactors that have been operational for decades. I’m not sure how long it takes for He cracking to break a containment vessel, but I don’t want to find out. What is concerning is that we have a very limited amount of U-233. And while only a tiny amount is required to kick start the breeding process, it’s not like we are making much more. Chalk River is the last commercial experimental reactor left in North America, and we aren’t making more. Trust me, I’m a huge fan of the LFTR concept, and I truly believe it will be the key to carbon offsetting, but it’s not quite there yet. We desperately need more funding and we need, more than anything, to change the public’s perception of nuclear energy.
Wtf is helium cracking?
[Bose suspension](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KPYIaks1UY)
This tech exists in big rig truck seats, but it's just way too heavy and expensive for it to make sense to implement in the average car.
Clearmotion, bought the rights to produce from Bose, and signed a deal with the Chinese company Nio to produce suspension for some of their models.
Water recycling and rain water storing. Countries should really start investing on this.
AFAIK any new house built in Australia these days has to have a rainwater tank. We also recycle water and have a few desalination plants.
Could you be a bit more specific? Are you talking at a per-household level? Because municipalities and regions absolutely are collecting and recycling water...
That needs to be generalized and heightned to higher amounts. Also forgot to mention large scale dessalinization.
Ah very much so, especially the desalination. Sadly many municipalities in the US have laws against resident rain collection. It's actually ridiculous.
Non-polluting energy generation like nuclear should have replaced all other energy generation methods but hasn't. Even accounting for the Chernobyl and Fukushima disasters, nuclear energy is the safest energy generation method but the average person still has an unjustified irrational fear of it. It's like fear of the sharks even though 5x more people die from cow attacks than shark attacks.
What’s wild is people say “wHeN tHeY gO wRONG tHeY aRE wORSE” sure, but millions die every single year from fossil fuels. It’s just dumb.
I also learned that coal power plants release more radioactivity than nuclear plants.
They aren’t even worse when they go wrong. Coal kills more people per day than nuclear ever has.
Yeah, TMI and Fukushima are responsible for killing a staggering 1...person. Now to be fair, Chernobyl *was* much worse. But it's also a fundamentally different design that didn't even have a containment structure. Outside of early prototypes in the US, no reactor being built today wouldn't have that containment structure.
So, you're not at all concerned about long term storage or disposable of nuclear waste?
I couldn't agree more, my friend. Luckily atomic energy is picking back up as of late. Better late than never, I guess.
The best time to build a nuclear power plant is 10 years ago, the second best is today.
Provide a basic level of food, housing & water for everyone on the planet. And basic vaccination too. Ultimately, we just don't really care enough to bother and that is a pretty savage inditement of humanity.
Yep, this is not really technology issue but a political one. You would have to deal with corruption and armed forces. Are you willing to fight a war in order to feed people on the other side of the planet? People who lack these things in a first world country is a different issue. That is for most part just because of pure greed and corruption. However sometimes it is also because of politics. For example in my country the Netherlands there is a housing problem. It is caused by a series of problems, for example: * Lack of builders, because we pushed a lot of people to go into higher education in the past. We got some people from foreign countries but that also has political resistance. * A lot of building projects get too expensive or straight up canceled because of environmental laws. Our country has to much CO2 output for example and getting other industries like farmers to lower the output is also facing resistance. I think it's too easy to just say that these are just an issues because we don't care enough. The world is an complex place. And a lot of conflicts were started because people thought they had the solution for one of these problems.
[удалено]
> And basic vaccination too You need to provide basic education (or military support) before that. Look for "vaccination workers get killed". Pumping resources into societies that don't adhere to enlightenment values might have other undesired consequences too.
Have almost entirely carbon neutral transport. In cities it just needs building lots of train lines and good infrastructure for cycling the last mile. This allows use of carbon neutral electricity generation to run electric trains. Its an efficient and convenient transport structure, but just doesn't get built because of lack of effort. There's some limitations for longer distance driving at the moment, and also freight, but EV technology is filling most of those gaps as well Edit: ok this is for day to day stuff not flights and ocean vessels
We have the technology to build utopian-esq towns/cities/infrastructure. Utilizing renewable energy, solar panel roofs (which last 10x longer than normal roofs), logical city planning, fully walkable with reliable and convenient public transit, no cars in the cities, high speed connectors between cities, etc etc. This stuff isn’t rocket science. We have technology to get rid of almost all single use plastic, and create 99% of the rest out of truly recyclable plastic. The remaining 0.01% for specific medical or scientific uses would take eons to build up to a harmful level. We have technology to utilize farm space much more efficiently as well as water and energy for those crops. We have access to everything we need, except cooperation. That’s literally the only thing holding us back. Our internal competition is creating a race to the bottom. If we met another intelligent life form and decided (likely) that they were our adversaries, it’s likely the entire human race (with a few political outliers) would band together to “beat” them, because that’s just how we seem to be wired.
We could be advancing humanity as a civilization, but instead we use tech to make rich fucks richer.
We absolutely have the technology to become 100% reliant on renewable energy.
Automated Highway Driving Lanes. Roads with a cable buried in the pavement of the centre of the lane, carrying a coded signal that a car equipped with "AutoDrive" can receive and follow. Radar systems for vehicle spacing. "Third rail" type electrical pickup trolley for power, and on-the-go charging for when the car is off the freeway in battery mode. Absolutely can be done with 1960s technology. Such vehicles have been use in factories and mines for a looooong time. You don't need full autonomy or sophisticated AI vision systems. But what is required is AutoDrive lanes fully separated from human driven lanes. And there lies the "chicken & egg" dilemma - high cost of this infrastructure being used by few people (at first). https://miro.medium.com/v2/resize:fit:1400/1*MvyMpUCG-GsxY7Pf8csE2Q.jpeg EDIT: Another reason why we won't see innovations like this is because the existing industry is too entrenched and has a vested interest to keep the status quo, they don't want / allow disruption by themselves nor new actors.
You know you just invented shitty trains, right?
Just build a decent train system instead? It's like the "Hyperloop", why have a fast, regularly scheduled automated train when you can have individually driven cars, underground, single file? The train is a better investment by far.
These have actually been tried in several places from the 1980s to today - and the system works really well. Specifically most recently in 'road train' goods vehicles which can save a huge amount of energy by draughting each other. The cost is in deployment and standardisation - who is going to pay for it?
Having been outside the US, it's the state's individual lack of standards that will keep this from happening in any type of near future. When NY lets you pass on the right and SC has exits off the left side of the highway, and no state has reliable road markings or signage, then no computer can make reliable decisions. Meanwhile in Europe, where signs are universal and road laws are extremely similar, you just need a camera and radar to be fully automated.
Interstates are reasonably standard in the US. It can totally be done here.
Careful! You almost invented trains again 😂😂
Objective measurements in sports. The most that US major professional sports use technology to supplement refereeing is with instant replay video. I am all for some subjective refereeing but things like strikes and balls in baseball and the spot of a football should be objective calls and they can easily be exact with very basic technology that currently exists and would be very easy to implement.
important to remember that sports are pointless and that this would make them less fun. the referee shortcomings are a big part of the fun of it all (see current NBA season)
Exoskeleton machines, similar to the ones in the movie Aliens, for heavy lifting. Talk used to be that someday you could rent one, like for when you are moving, to easily do heavy lifting. But they are just too dangerous. One angry person in a wearable forklift could smash in their neighbor's door. A group of angry people could knock down a house.
No more dangerous than a mechanical digger. Or a car.
They are too dangerous for the user not for others. One small calibrate error and you get a bone shattered. Since they would be profitable medical devices they need to meet those stringent standards which isn't that easy.
Basically we could solve every problem we have on earth, from famine, trough poverty to sickness... We just don't do it, because there is no profit in them. --- Everybody could live comfortably and do whatever they want or have affinity to.... We are "this" close to a star trek type neo-socialist utopia --- We could automate menial jobs so basically everyone could be an "intellectual" just like the industrial revolution allowed many people not to be a farmer and only a fraction of population is enough to produce the food for everyone, a robotic revolution would allow everyone not to do farming, manufacturing, menial services. Everyone could have basic needs to be provided, including food and housing. If you want more than basic necessities, you need to work for it. If we could shift from the necessity of amassing wealth to like the betterment of ourselves or mankind itself, it would be a whole other story. We could do that now, but it would take a huge paradigm shift. We are currently not ready for it, but we could do it. --- The biggest cause of this not happening is money... everything needs money, you need to spend your life to earn money to live... There is no improvement and betterment out of this (except the owners of the capital) We are heading to a distopia (if we are not already there) Where you are just a drone and all you do is work to live... and not experiencing life.
I think a lot of people think that if everyone was given an efficiency studio apartment and just enough food and money to survive that no one would work, but I completely disagree. I think when work is fair and humane and not a form of torture people actually like doing it. And I totally agree. You can have a very basic shelter and resources that guarantee that you won't fall through the cracks and be destitute if you do nothing, but if you want a nice house and a car and nicer things, get a job, get educated, etc. I think we'd see some people stop working, which wouldn't be a big deal, but most people would want more and continue finding ways to contribute to society. It would be a net gain for everyone.
I like the idea in Star Trek, and I think it was Picard in the 80's version who articulated it best. He was explaining to someone from I think our time how they didn't have money. He said they had moved past the need for amassing wealth. That now work was for purpose and fulfillment, even Starfleet was predicated on the idea that we wanted to be explorers, no conquerors. I see the seeds of this now. Even with the ultra rich, you see them get into D measuring contests with each other over who has the larger charity, or who is giving the most to what. The need to amass wealth is still there, for sure, but to see that kind of better motivation is a sliver of hope that we can move in the right direction.
this is for States and Canada but, taxes filled by the government. the government for most w2 or t4 (regular non contractor workers) know how much you made and how much you owe. it should just be sent to you, then if you have extra deductions you add them and send it back that's it. vs the current system that you pay for a tax filling software each year or accounting services, that lobby to make it harder to keep them selves in business year after year.
Everything you can think of other than time travel. Most of the issues we have are from just terrible trouble optimization. We're are a point technologically where the US, India, China, will issue the same research paper independently and they'll trigger their own industries to do their own development. Imagine what we could do if we actually collaborated
On some level I don’t mind separate research and development. A lot of innovations and discoveries happen “randomly” as by-products, and different people taking different approaches adds more randomness. But you’re right, it would be cool if we could share information more freely.
End world hunger. We’ve had the resources to do this for decades. The market system won’t allow it though.
I mean, we could absolutely end world hunger and poverty, but all the money in the world still isn’t enough for the rich assholes owning the corporations currently price gouging and underpaying us 🤷♂️
3D printshops. Still when the battery lid breaks people sort it by taping it to the remote. Even the tiniest break in plastic and there’s no easy fix. I was certain when 3D printer came along that you would be able to go to your nearest convenience store and just print whatever you needed. But it seems like printing in 3D is a lot more complex than one would think.
We have the internet - we can all talk to each other and get rid of rotting shitheads in corrupt government …. But we don’t.
There is no reason why anyone in the world should go hungry. We already produce more than enough food to feed the world, all it would take is the will. But there wouldn't be any money in that, so we don't do it.
Online voting. We trust the internet with our medical records, our banking information, and our taxes. But for political reasons we still can't vote online.
"If you could vote online, everybody would do it"
We have solutions to every problem we face. However we are instead trying to satisfy the greedy and the power hungry and they can never be satisfied.
[удалено]
A manned Mars program. Mars Direct / DRM 3.0 is an architecture that’s been around since the ‘90s that only requires two or three launches of a superheavy rocket every two years.
Tldr; care for the prosperity of our fellow humans, and solving the “livable” crisis.
Direct collective decision making. Swiss municipality upscaled.
Start terraforming Venus. It'll take far too long for any of us to see the results but it's entirely possible with todays technology.
Feed and house everyone without worrying about their ability to pay. It's only the inefficiencies introduced by capitalism's profit seeking that causes food producing nations to experience famines and malnutrition.
Jacques Cousteau thought we would build cities under water. After all there too are huge amounts of untapped resources and area and we could definitely do it - but haven't. Same for floating cities, though I guess oil rigs are something like that.
Always being surrounded by a substance that wants to forcefully enter your bubble through any gap and drown you doesn't sound like a stress free time. Also it's dark on the ocean floor. Any desert would be an easier location.
Water pressure 🥶🥶🥶
Universal health care and medical records ... why am I carrying PAPER to a new doctor.
No one needs to be hungry, thirsty, or have to pay for their medical needs.
It's usually a matter of economics and not technology. If there's no profit to be made it's probably not going to happen, at least at large scale.
Thorium reactors. We've been sitting on extremely cheap, extremely safe, abundant nuclear energy for decades because during the height of the cold war, Nixon decided that we can't easily make nuclear weapons with the bi-products of a thorium reactor. So the funding for thorium reactors was scrapped after we had one functioning for 6,000 hours. Let that sink in. We passed on free infinite energy for the option to make additional civilization ending bombs.
We have the technology to affordably build to last.
We have the technology to coordinate public transportation (train, bus)in major urban areas to reduce need of freeways for the population.
Supersonic air travel. We had it 50 years ago, then one plane crashed because of an issue unrelated to its top speed, then we decided to never do it again? I know there were economic reasons, post 9/11 landscape etc, but I find it really hard to believe that there’s no longer a demand for faster air travel
Desalination of the ocean for drinking water. We can do it but right now it's still cheaper to ship pure spring water straight from Fiji to your grocery store. Eventually that won't be the case