Techno Optimism, Explained

[@ycombinator]

What future technology are you most excited about?

[@osimijasur]

AI that generates new knowledge. Also, warp drive

[@timonroehrbacher]

Tesla Bot & AGI

[@WarrenMoyes]

Agri-Tech!😃

[@serendipity-108]

Embodied AGI for general-purpose tasks

[@thepostgradyear]

a replacement for fertilizer because getting half the world's food from calories we dig out of the ground and then kill soil (and other environments) with isn't a great long term solution on the scale of centuries - especially since the 3 main ingredients aren't distributed evenly and we might have a less globalized world at any time

[@M3talr3x]

You have a vested interest in appearing optimistic about the future, really what we've seen in the past fifteen years in tech is unprecedented consolidation and predatory behavior. The 19th century robber baron age seems quaint compared to the power that modern tech monopolies hold today.

[@nitinv8]

One important element that you missed talking about -- income disparity and concentration of power. because of technology leverage the power control has shifted to a few and I think that might be one of the reasons why people are becoming more pessimistic.

[@nbme-answers]

So invent the technology to shift it back

[@iamsuperflush]

​@@nbme-answerslol they kill anyone who tries

[@kevnev342]

@@iamsuperflush and that is why innovation may not be for you. To soft.

[@cherubin7th]

Start a Worker Coop.

[@michaelcjakob]

stop finding excuses and start building. That is the way.

[@bigstrongschemer9372]

So just assume infinite growth and infinite resources and that tech has positively affected everyone equally?

[@chapterme]

Chapters (Powered by ChapterMe) - 00:00 - Coming Up 00:13 - Intro: Optimistic about the future 00:27 - At YC, we know more about the failed startups 01:02 - Perspective: Why are we optimistic? 02:16 - Things have improved since the 90s 02:32 - 1. Availability of Information 03:39 - 2. Communications 04:42 - 3. Transportation 05:06 - 4. Health Care 05:46 - 5. Entertainment 06:26 - Seeing Progress: It wasn't immediately obvious 07:06 - Starlink: Internet from Space 07:37 - Cruise: Self-Driving Cars 09:14 - Renewable Energy 10:10 - Commuting in a Rocket: Reach anywhere in the world in 45 Minutes 10:56 - Moore's Rocket: How much cheaper to put something in space 11:42 - Why are people so pessimistic? 12:38 - Tradeoffs 13:21 - Pacing isn't consistent 14:04 - In Reflection: Optimistic Future 15:55 - Outro: Choose not to be one of those people

[@jiaaggarwal5873]

high school student here ty for these videos ❤

[@aminromero8599]

I'm a technologist by heart, love accelerated progress. Only exception is AGI / ASI, I want our species to keep existing.

[@mariusfacktor3597]

8:30 Self driving cars are still cars, and cars are inherently dangerous because they are heavy machinery moving at literal break-neck speeds through out public spaces off of any track. We've been trying to make cars safer for about a century. We still have 40,000 direct car deaths per year in the United States, and that doesn't include the even larger set of people who get maimed for permanently disfigured from cars. We know how to design cities safely. Look at Amsterdam. The way to do this is with less cars and traffic calming. The reason people dislike self driving cars is because they sell us the lie that this will solve car deaths. It will not. Only less cars and traffic calming will solve car deaths, and nothing is stopping us from doing that right now.

[@Carthodon]

This is a dumb take. Are trains safer than cars? Yes. But by this logic, however many train deaths there are will be prevented by having less trains. The fact is that technology can make pretty much anything safer at scale, technology has made trains safer and will continue to make them safer. Technology will also make cars safer especially given how if cars function on AI then they will approach trains in terms of safety. Imagine a future where every car communicated with every car and not only knew the precise location and speed but that they could be controlled as a group, with cars moving in the same direction for 5 minutes being linked by AI which would save on gas and make the set of cars function as basically one object. I by the way lived in the Netherlands and while I appreciate the lifestyle, do not have the opinion that every city should basically pursue the same transportation infrastructure in order to reach an optimum. The Netherlands is a small country that is relatively dense with extremely flat terrain, the US isn't.

[@MattBakken10]

Do you guys just not understand climate change, or do you not think about it or what. How do you think those rockets work? Havent seen any space elevators lately. That slingshot thing doesnt really seem to be working. So how are you getting to Tokyo in 45 minutes without rocket fuel? This is just an absurd opinion. Theres probably 30 things like this in this video. Honestly impressive how out of touch these guys are.

[@natarajanshanker5103]

This hits even harder from a third world country. Early 90s middle-class household: no phone, no internet, not even pagers yet. And then everything happened like a landslide over 15 years.

[@genericdeveloper3966]

Hopefully you learn from the West's mistakes and don't let your society degenerate like we did.

[@WhitneyDB]

Born in the 70s, you made me laugh out loud here 😂😎 ... Glad you guys keep doing these. Thank you..

[@ZelenaZmija]

I think pessimism comes from the fact that many people aren't living lives they like and either technology doesn't fix that or if it does it makes their pre-solution lives feel like a waste. Also, I think the idea of being happy is easy the problem is most people don't want to just be happy, they want to be happier than other people is very relevant. Many people do have a crab mentality of well if I can't have it the next best thing is no else can either.

[@sp123]

Technology is improving the ability to consume at the expense of every other life satisfaction metric

[@VSR03]

This episode reminds me of the quote by Henry David Thoreau "All good things are wild and free".

[@lucaspayne2546]

This is very condescending. Disregarding any concern, laughing at it, thinking it is just about "sure you can scroll for 2 hours before you go to bed, tech has crusts". The children of everybody are going to grow up with technology actively disconnecting them from all meaning in life, advertised as as modern and inevitable as an ATM or a car radio. Not even disconnected from any "deep" meaning, just disconnected from any meaning at all, any true enjoyment of anything.

[@sp123]

Right, technology is mostly increasing ability to consume at the cost of other parts of life. Gen Z and Gen A have lost ability to critically think as social media has turned their brains to mush

[@ambitious-vlad]

Have you considered a product a failure when it generates revenue and profit but not as investors expect it to be? And if yes, what is the percentage of such startups?

[@benjamingonzales2126]

I seeking an answer for this too

[@natarajanshanker5103]

The most exciting thing to me is how the education system is going to transform.

[@louis3195]

Pessimism is useful for those that talk. Optimism is useful for those that act

[@JamesDSchw]

I am optimistic, except for AGI/ASI; I do not see any evidence that our society and economy are anywhere near prepared for a technology so powerful as to deprecate human labor in such a general-purpose manner; the very notion of starting companies, building products, and even human innovation itself may prove as antiquated as not being able to call and access the Internet at the same time! It's a big assumption that AGI/ASI are imminent, but the notion of extinguishing the spark of human spirit to explore and innovate does not sit well with me.

[@MRApht]

Why would AGI extinguish "the spark of human spirit to explore and innovate"? Lets say there exists some kind of machine god that knows everything, that you can just ask for all the answers. You can still choose not to ask and explore yourself. And ask for help when you get stuck. Besides, there are no universal answers. Everything can be optimised to your local circumstances, you can do that with its help.

[@JamesDSchw]

@@MRApht Consider what motivates us to create. For some it's to make money; in an ASI world where the ASI does practically all work better, faster, and cheaper than humans, there will be no value to human labor, especially intellectual or creative labor. For others, it's the feeling of knowing your work/product/innovation will change the world, or even just make a positive difference in some aspect of it. Some of that might still exist on a very local/personal level, but the ability to build anything with near-zero barrier to entry, near-zero time, near-zero cost and with near-zero domain knowledge or work means people will make near-zero impact on the world. Rather, the ASI will be the only entity that matters. For still others, it is a matter of personal satisfaction; knowing that they discovered or invented or created something novel drives them forward. If the S in ASI truly lives up to its name, all the exciting discoveries and inventions and creations will be made not by humans but by the ASI itself. Put differently...if you knew that no matter how creative you were, how hard you worked, how intelligent you were, or how much of a difference you wanted to make; none of it would help you to make money, make an impact on the world, achieve anything new or differentiated, etc. - what remains to light that spark? That world sounds pretty awful to me.

[@ib_concept]

I had encarta when I got my first self bought computer. I got to learn like all geography, I now can tell all the countries where they at in the map, I think all of them even Saint Helena..

[@bluesque9687]

Why does it always feel like there is a lot of angst behind the laughter... or, if not that then they are certainly forced! But, I love the stuff you guys discuss... been following for a long time, the forced laughter notwithstanding!!

[@UdhayaPrakash]

Exactly. Laughing comes of like a smirk

[@RemotHuman]

How are most of these what's important in life?

[@Ari_diwan]

This tech optimism discussion episode should be a daily thing!!! like the good old daily soaps, Thank you so much for this! made my day!

[@winkletter]

I'm also optimistic about tech, but some of this is a bit tone deaf. Pessimists have valid concerns and not everyone experiences the benefits of technology equally. They're not children. They're adults just like you who have a different opinions.

[@serendipity-108]

We are literally Gods

[@user-hy2cv9dy6p]

Why not state those concerns instead of just telling us other people have different opinions. We all know that.

[@wise5674]

Ofcourse pessimists have valid concerns. Optimists have them too but we push through those while pessimists wallow in them.

[@matthewfurlani8647]

pessimist is an offensive term that optimists prescribe to realists. you are not going to commute 45 minutes to daily trips to Tokyo. the pollution alone would be tremendous. self driving cars are dangerous both technologically and more seriously, government policies will make you criminals for wanting to have control over the vehicle you're occupying. KZbin does nott allow you to post videos bout anything. these guys are ignoring blatantly reality and then bashing people that objecting to the subjects that they're ignoring. then pretending that you have to be an optimist in order to not only invent but revolutionize the world. these things are mutually exclusive. you cann be very realistic and invent great things, arguably great inventors are often not optimistic but rather persevere and have good drive to accomplish. bottom line, these guys are being very disrespectful and laughing while they're doing it

[@egalanos]

It was a straw man to equate technological progress to pessimism; I think the majority of people believe that technology will continue to progress as surely as VC wealth funds will continue to grow. The video didn't cover any of the *obvious* factors that could give rise to feelings pessimism such as growing concentration of power + wealth/inequality, rising political polarisation & extremism, weakening of democratic norms & institutions, continued loss of biodiversity, climate change, reduced economic opportunities for many, future AI/automation relegating most people to being economically superfluous. But at least everyone will have all the movies they could ever want to watch 🙄

[@vslaykovsky]

X is a problem, totally with you on that!

[@DesertStarSystems]

For the most part it's spot on, but there are some important nuances. Some tech can just be too much. The metaverse may be a good example of that. On the other hand, there will be lots of very useful tech. For example, legal or accounting by AI rather than $500 hourly rates seems well within reach and would be super valuable to many.

[@boukew]

Is this a re-upload?

[@ambitious-vlad]

Yeah, people's brains don't provide a perspective thinking by default. This is the skill that you need to learn throughout your life.

[@luna07007]

I think at least we can overcome death and disease in most 20years for all human, but I need help, do you have interest?

[@hggvod]

Loved this. This was an awesome discussion. Exactly what I've been thinking lately as well but not put into words like this.

[@crazieeez]

No. Only less than 1% of the population is optimistic about the future. The rest is living like slaves. Rich people get to live 34 years longer than poor people. That’s in the US. Unless we build a technology to lift the poor to be as rich as the rich people, most people are pessimistic about the future.

[@MrMajani]

Encrypted calls used to be spy tech that you only saw in action films, now it's on almost everyone's phones through WhatsApp

[@TrainWithPraveen]

This was great and I would consider myself an optimist too. But there is a sub-culture of tech which has done a lot of damage to the morale of the population. For example, Netflix was supposed to be an answer to "democratization" of the movie and TV industry but they have become just part of the establishment now. i.e. you cannot make a netflix movie without all the right credentials, connections and beliefs. So some of these companies start out to solve a problem but end up becoming the problem. There is some hope on this front. Good Eg. in the same industry IMO is KZbin where anyone can upload videos. Hope they stay that way.

[@anandkapdi4822]

13:40 shots were fired at Peter Thiel

[@hrahman3123]

The crust is one of the best parts of the pizza...

[@apnachaiwala4781]

Superb ❤

[@shahamnoorani]

This is a great, great video. Society needs to think about this more often.

[@MaximLevitskiy]

Hah ) I thought it would be a video about people who are too optimistic. It was my personal bias.😂

[@videowatching9576]

Beautifully said advocating for being an optimistic and a builder, while noting that insight that people don’t necessarily appreciate breakthroughs when they happen, thank you both! Makes reflecting on tremendous opportunities for generative ai fascinating in this context!

[@theRedGandalf]

Rockets are cool, but can we have fast electric trains as well?

[@luna07007]

I am not joking

[@luna07007]

I like you , and Adam also Elon, we can make it works at most 20years, in my opinion, put everlasting life in top priority, and you will have infinite opportunity and time to explore all you wanna do, isn’t it?

[@frontforumfocus]

woow amazing

[@puddles5501]

The last gasp of civil libertarianism.

[@aaronbornmann9835]

Why not discuss AI?

[@george_davituri]

🎷🎺🎹🎺🎷

[@genericdeveloper3966]

I'd rather dangerous freedom than comfortably slavery. Will never support self driving cars.

[@boringmanager9559]

So many people are not living lives they would like to (and absolutely could have), hence all the pessimism. And what drives me mad is how all the hedge and pension funds are sitting on tens of trillions of dollars and don't know where to put it but the development of humans is not even on the list. Macroeconomics tells us there's a lot of sense to invest in the early days of talented people and get money back as interest later. The closest thing we have is student loans (which is a failure, because of the wrong incentives). How come we don't have a tech solution to support that? I understand it's hard to start for a first time founder because of the long cycle and regulation, but where the F are all the second+ time founders? Investing in humans is nearly endless market, and we could use ML/AI algorithms to find talent better than most teachers can and the return on average is going to be higher than 99% of the stocks. Migration economics estimates global GDP would triple if each and every one of us just moved to a better skill-matched country

[@deeplearningpartnership]

Watch out for the downside guys.

[@jeffersonmachado5920]

Silly talk...

[@ashleygarber7102]

These guys are mad weird. Probably liberals.

[@fanaccount6600]

this comment shows the exact problem that was explained in this video about people seeing everything as politics

[@0x-lh1bc]

e/acc