RE: Will Steem succeed or commit suicide?
Where'd the money come to invest in the first place? Magic?
No, it came from working or from inheritance. Just because you earned money in the past though, that doesn't mean that any money you make in the future has also been earned.
And how is investment - taking calculated risks or paying someone to manage those risks for you - not earning the income you make?
Earned Income vs. Unearned Income
Did you think I was just making those terms up or something?
You put your currency on a risk hoping it pays off in a certain term. It's a risk. There's a chance you might lose it.
Is it though? What's the risk to a billionaire if they lose a $1m on a bad investment? There's no actual risk whatsoever. It's like me throwing a penny away.
Given your propensity for communism, I can see how you'd think that people don't deserve to keep what they make off of trades. If you want communism, go start a commune. Stop trying to ruin my platform.
It's not your platform and communes are not communism. I'm not a hippy and I'm not living in the the 20th century. Automated labour and Matrix like VR through brain-computer interfaces is the way to achieve communism. I don't need to do anything but wait a couple of decades. We'll all be god like entities at that point capable of creating anything we want just by thinking. All your wealth will be worthless and you'll have the same power as everybody else.
Let me know when you can create matter from nothing. I'm sure the Venus Project is going to make communism work this time.
What's the Venus Project got to with anything I just said and why would I need to be able to create matter out of nothing? Do you not know what VR or brain-computer interfaces are?
Let me guess: machines will be able to provide for use while we're plugged into the Matrix, right? Each according to his needs?
No, not each according to his needs. Each according to their wants. Beach side mansions may be limited in this world but they're not in VR. In VR everyone could have a beach side mansion - they could have their own planet if they want. You may not be able to go paragliding or mountain climbing in this world for whatever reason but you could do that whenever you wanted in VR.
If you're living in fully immersive and completely realistic VR, you don't need any physical possessions. You don't even need your body - just your brain. There have been numerous experiments over the last 150 years were severed heasd have been kept alive with a simple pump to feed the brain with the necessary fluids. So, why waste resources maintaining an obsolete body when you can just maintain the brain and fit it with a BCI?
Who maintains the brains? Where do those resources come from?
Machines obviously. Where do those resources come from? Machines obviously. Now, those machines could be AI controlled or they could be controlled directly by the brains with the BCIs. This has already been demonstrated as possible with people controlling telepresence robots over the Internet with just their thoughts.
So machines would harvest the scarce resources necessary to keep people alive. Who controls the machines that produce the other machines?
What scarce resources would they be? Scarce doesn't mean limited - it means that supply is limited in relation to demand. What resources does a brain need to survive and what resources would be required to maintain the equipment? You making assumptions that these things are scarce doesn't make them scarce. Especially when you factor in all the freed up resources from no longer having to produce commodity goods and provide physical services.
If AI can control machines and people can control machines with their thoughts using BCI, then why would it matter what those machines are designed to do? Both AI and people using BCIs could control them regardless of their functionality.
Look at it this way. You remove a brain and stick it in a plug and play maintenance tank. The tank contains a BCI, backup power and backup reservoir. This tank then plugs into a skyscraper. The skyscraper provides a fluid reservoir and pump system to feed the necessary fluid to the brain. It also provides access to enhanced computational and communication technologies. How many brains could you fit in such a skyscraper and what type of maintenance would be required to keep this system functional?