AGI is coming

[Leo Gura]

17 hours ago, Buck Edwards said:

Like? 

Study the tactics employed by rich business people. They cheat people for a living. That's why they are paid the big bucks. It's not for working hard.

Elon Musk refused to even pay the rent for Twitter headquarters. That's how much of a cheap bastard he is.

Edited February 29, 2024 by Leo Gura

[Bobby_2021]

 

16 minutes ago, Leo Gura said:

Lol

Corporations buy the government.

And whose fault is that? Maybe try not putting the government on sale? 

[LSD-Rumi]

@Leo Gura Thanks for pointing out this perspective. I will dig immensely in what happens behind the scences regarding these billionaires.

I think most people feel they are not worthy enough to criticize billionaires who are perceived as intelligent, visionary or even god-like in some way which make those figures more self absorbed and end up feeding the cycle. 

[Girzo]

29 minutes ago, Bobby_2021 said:

And whose fault is that? Maybe try not putting the government on sale? 

Company towns existed before the rise of modern social liberal democracies and I can tell you they were not pleasant places to live. https://medium.com/@elliotmashhadi/the-dark-history-of-company-towns-abandoned-ghost-towns-0ebe11deeae1

Companies operating in the capitalist system are pretty much expected to cut corners without regulations. Why would they do that? To have more capital, so they can invest and gain more capital without being productive. Being a rentier, the wet dream of every capitalist.

[Girzo]

14 minutes ago, LSD-Rumi said:

I think most people feel they are not worthy enough to criticize billionaires who are perceived as intelligent, visionary or even god-like in some way which make those figures more self absorbed and end up feeding the cycle.

You might enjoy a book called "Let My People Go Surfing" by Yvon Chouinard, who actually is an intelligent billionaire. A pretty honest at that, admitting that overall the existence of his company (Patagonia) is detrimental to the environment and not helpful, even though they do many things that hurt potential profit. They can do that only thanks to that Chouinard keeps the company in his family private hands, if he didn't the company would need to maximize the value for shareholders as all publicly traded companies have to do.

Another interesting book to read that is partially on the topic of billionaires is Peter Joseph's "The New Human Rights Movement: Reinventing the Economy to End Oppression"

Or Anand Giridharadas' "Winners Take All.

[LSD-Rumi]

@Girzo Those look very interesting, Thanks!

[Whitney Edwards]

1 hour ago, Leo Gura said:

Elon Musk refused to even pay the rent for Twitter headquarters. That's how much of a cheap bastard he is.

I'm surprised people worship that. What's wrong with humanity? These people shouldn't be our heroes. 

Our heroes should be someone honest, compassionate, truthful and morally integrous. 

[Bobby_2021]

18 hours ago, Girzo said:

Company towns existed before the rise of modern social liberal democracies and I can tell you they were not pleasant places to live. https://medium.com/@elliotmashhadi/the-dark-history-of-company-towns-abandoned-ghost-towns-0ebe11deeae1

Companies operating in the capitalist system are pretty much expected to cut corners without regulations. Why would they do that? To have more capital, so they can invest and gain more capital without being productive. Being a rentier, the wet dream of every capitalist.

It's out of possibility that we regress back to some 1800s capitalist hellhole.

The modern capitalism has changed so much that they are pro regulation. The mega corporations want more regulations not less.

And Govt is the one who is entrusted to not let corporations oppress the people.

But somehow everyone likes to blame corporates when it's corrupt govt officials that take bribes and oppress people.

All problems with the corporations comes from govt not doing it's job well. Simple as that. 

[Girzo]

@Bobby_2021 I have no problem with your argument, just with the jump you do at the end. "All problems with corporations come from the government."

It sounds like an ideological positition. And I am not even sure what ideology you are arguing for.

Do you wamt less regulation, more regulation, or different regulations than the ones currently enacted?

[thenondualtankie]

Allow me to respond to you @Bobby_2021.

Currently the prime objective of government is for corporations to run effectively. The whole point of government is the effective creation of economic value. Literally nothing else matters from the POV of society, especially at our current level of development. Hence government is literally just a tool for corporations to dominate the world. Because that's currently the most efficient way of creating economic value.

So to say that it's just government to be blamed is stupid IMO. The government's main job is to represent corporations, which it does very effectively.

[Bobby_2021]

3 hours ago, Girzo said:

@Bobby_2021 I have no problem with your argument, just with the jump you do at the end. "All problems with corporations come from the government."

It sounds like an ideological positition. And I am not even sure what ideology you are arguing for.

Do you wamt less regulation, more regulation, or different regulations than the ones currently enacted?

Less regulation for small businesses and more regulations for giant corporations.

The problem is when giant corporations lobby the government to bring more regulation for the small businesses as a means to drive out competition and increase the barrier of entry. I am taking the example of corporations in the tech, IT and services space. 

 If government is doing a shitty job in enforcing laws, then it the fault of the government. I do agree that you need strong laws against insider trading and stock buybacks. But that falls under the responsibility of the government. 

3 hours ago, thenondualtankie said:

Allow me to respond to you @Bobby_2021.

Currently the prime objective of government is for corporations to run effectively. The whole point of government is the effective creation of economic value. Literally nothing else matters from the POV of society, especially at our current level of development. Hence government is literally just a tool for corporations to dominate the world. Because that's currently the most efficient way of creating economic value.

So to say that it's just government to be blamed is stupid IMO. The government's main job is to represent corporations, which it does very effectively.

Absolutely. But you are forgetting that small businesses are much more efficient in producing value far more than these giant corporations. Government is not doing a good job of representing them. Monopoly will eventually result in less value added to the economy so the government has to support all the businesses to ensure a level playing field. The government sets the rules of the game. So it a corporation is abusing their power it is because the government intended to be it that way.

So, the government is killing the small business in favor of big corporations.  Like you said, the government should represent all of them equally as a means to amplify the economy and maximize the value added into the economy. So, the government is doing the actual abuse. 

The do this by adding more legal fees and overregulating small businesses and threatening to close them down for not paying some stupid fee wherever. 

[thenondualtankie]

If small businesses were more efficient at producing economic value than mega corporations, then we wouldn't have mega corporations in the first place.

Mega corporations are highly effective at creating economic value.

[LordFall]

@thenondualtankie I would argue mostly the point of government is more physical security than anything economical. If anything when they get too economical is when we start to see issues. 

[Girzo]

6 hours ago, Bobby_2021 said:

Absolutely. But you are forgetting that small businesses are much more efficient in producing value far more than these giant corporations.

Not necessarily.

I think you are making many assumptions that are not grounded in data. But they could be. With some examples, some scientific papers.

I am just not convinced by your way of arguing by assertively and repeatedly stating your opinion. Without the empirical grounding, you know.

[Yimpa]

@Girzo How do you feel about AI as it pertains to your day to day life? 

[erik8lrl]

Microsoft controlling behind OpenAI is bad. 

Edited March 2, 2024 by erik8lrl

[Bobby_2021]

10 hours ago, Girzo said:

Not necessarily.

I think you are making many assumptions that are not grounded in data. But they could be. With some examples, some scientific papers.

I am just not convinced by your way of arguing by assertively and repeatedly stating your opinion. Without the empirical grounding, you know.

This particular point being true isn't even relevant.

The government should not oppress small business regardless of whether they are efficient or not. All big corporations started off in someone garage. They are not going to grow and disrupt if government is going to oppress them. 

[Bobby_2021]

13 hours ago, thenondualtankie said:

If small businesses were more efficient at producing economic value than mega corporations, then we wouldn't have mega corporations in the first place.

Mega corporations are highly effective at creating economic value.

The point is efficiency. Not efficacy per say. Big corporations have plenty of red tape and decision makers to go through to get something done.

That's not the case with smal business, especially if they are run by talented individuals. 

[Girzo]

1 hour ago, Bobby_2021 said:

All big corporations started off in someone garage.

Not really. You make LOTS of assumptions that aren't true.

New big corporations start as venture capital investments and not garage projects. Old are often by products of old money or financed by governements.

Just because there's Apple and Amazon it doesn't mean it's the default story.

[thenondualtankie]

14 hours ago, LordFall said:

@thenondualtankie I would argue mostly the point of government is more physical security than anything economical. If anything when they get too economical is when we start to see issues. 

The role of government is much more than just providing physical security. It's to make sure society runs effectively. The point of society is to build material wealth (this holds true until we have superabundance). That means the point of government is to maximize the building of material wealth. This involves everything the government does, including the justice system, education, military (so yes physical security), whatever.

If there were no justice in a capitalist system, then some companies would have an unfair advantage over others. This means that the disadvantaged companies cannot produce as much value. The result is less overall value production than if all companies had a level playing field. That's why you need things like the prevention of false advertising (as well as a huge range of other laws that make capitalism more fair). Because otherwise, companies providing real value by not doing false advertising are disadvantaged. This is bad for society.

Education increases the amount of value that individuals can provide to society. That's the only reason it exists.

And then of course we have private property protection (as well as other forms of physical protection) as you mentioned. But there's a lot more to government than just this.

Edited March 2, 2024 by thenondualtankie