General Purpose Humanoid Robotics: It begins...

[Marou]

http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-19637175

A humanoid robot designed to work safely alongside people on factory production lines has been unveiled in the US.

Priced at $22,000 (£13,500), Baxter will go on sale in October.
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It's inevitable that software and robotics will take most all jobs; entertainers, engineers, software devs, and repair technicians sticking around the longest. So, the question becomes how does the economy pan out in this scenario? The economy can't add jobs fast enough to keep up with how fast people like me are automating (even complex) tasks to eliminate human workers, or achieve much higher production without adding staff. It's white collar jobs I put a damper on, but things like this remove blue collar jobs.

Socialism doesn't work because complete control brings complete corruption every single time. Things fall apart when only a small percentage of the population is employed, but we're rapidly moving to a place where a small percentage of the workforce can produce enough to meet all demand. Our current world economy stands on the brink and will assuredly topple during our lifetimes; if not from malfeasance just from the momentum of technology. So what is our model for moving forward after that?

How does one have an equitable society in this very near future?

[Zavon]

War and unrest on a massive enough scale solve your problems.

Honestly though? Who knows. We've never been here before and we are bound to make tons of mistakes.

[Random Havoc]

I think concerns like these are generally overstated. While I understand the draw of these worries, I think we have plenty of historic analogs that suggest human ingenuity is able to overcome the obstacles that new technology and the resulting social reorganization entail. While it is true that the timeline is compressed by technology, I think our ability to react is equally sped up by the same technology.

In short the ‘Nerd Rapture’ (the Singularity) will save us.

Failing that we could always press reset ala ‘Revolution’ (new series about ‘turning off’ electricity functionality). In the same vein that I am sure that I would be one of the 5% surviving a zombie apocalypse, a reset would be FUN!!!

[Zavon]

I don't know that I agree Random. I kind of feel like the gaps in science and understanding are moving too fast for the common man to keep up.

Sam Harris is fond of stating that 40% of Americans believe the rapture will occur in the next 50 years or so.

I feel it may be overstated, but something is going to have to give, rigjt?

[Draconian]

Every generation in every era has expected the end of the world/society as they know it in their lifetime.

This is a psychological issue more than it is a technological one, IMO.

[Marou]

Every generation in every era has expected the end of the world/society as they know it in their lifetime.

This is a psychological issue more than it is a technological one, IMO.

Every generation has seen their way of life and circumstances change drastically during their lifetime. The 70's with the civil rights movement and Vietnam, the 40's and world war 2, the teens and world war 1, the civil war...the industrial revolution, I think you get the point.

Every generation has witnessed the world culture and economics change in huge ways. It's by no means the end of the world, there is plenty of precedent that things will go on. Every 30-40 years throughout history huge changes happen. We're about due for the next wave. The next wave will be society dealing with the fact that it doesn't need full employment.

[Zavon]

Every generation in every era has expected the end of the world/society as they know it in their lifetime.

This is a psychological issue more than it is a technological one, IMO.

Yes, but the point is that no other society in the history of man has been faced with the problems our advances have brought (as marou stated p. Therefore, I am questioning Randoms assertion that we will just adapt without much difficulty.

Edit: I guess what I'm trying to say is what people seem to see as reasonable isn't matching the standards of advancement. Things the scientfic community has accepted and built upon for decades are still being questioned by the stupid.

So we are in essence finding ourselves in a situation where human ignorance is more dangerous than it ever has been, and it has no shown no signs of slowing down.

[Random Havoc]

Yes, but the point is that no other society in the history of man has been faced with the problems our advances have brought

The exact assertion that previous generations maintained about their challenges.

Sam Harris is fond of stating that 40% of Americans believe the rapture will occur in the next 50 years or so....but something is going to have to give, rigjt?

By and large, I don't think the 'unthinking' masses have much say in the matter, progress has always been in the hands of the thinkers and doers, the rest of society just hobbles along until they catch up with the evolving cultural gestalt. I think the same technology that presents the challenge will allow the 'unthinking' masses to more readily assimilate, of course there may be social friction, but I think we will manage.

[Zavon]

I wish I felt as optimistic as you.

[Boxy Brown]

I hope the world resets. It's people like me who know how to hunt, trap, skin and prepare game, prepare clean water, identify plant life, build shit, and generally survive in the wilderness that will be having a grand old time while the rest of the people riot and kill each other.

Plus I know how to distill whiskey and make wine and beer, so anyone who wants to come survive and party with me when the reset happens is more than welcome.

[VKhaun]

I agree with Drac. People are too keen to see the end of days when they see the end of what they know.

There could certainly end up being a generation that's not sure what to do with themselves and lots of people could feel lost without the 'normal' jobs that have been shown to them and their parents and grandparents, but in the long run people not working in factories doing the same thing over and over, does not mean those human beings will wither and die doing nothing until they starve lol. They will find something to do.

[Norska]

I hope the world resets. It's people like me who know how to hunt, trap, skin and prepare game, prepare clean water, identify plant life, build shit, and generally survive in the wilderness that will be having a grand old time while the rest of the people riot and kill each other.

Plus I know how to distill whiskey and make wine and beer, so anyone who wants to come survive and party with me when the reset happens is more than welcome.

I will grow you some of the best motherfucking weed ever.

The end times is gonna fucking rock.

Edit: I suppose I should add in some substance to this post. Frankly, I'm not to worried, my job is secure. As long as people keep being people, mental health will still be here. I mean, this might even help my job. Imagine all the fucked up families were daddy lost his job to the robot, son thinks his father is pathetic and idolizes doers, not leaches of the system, wife wants a real man that can support the family through actual work etc etc. Yeah, I'll still be here.

That said, I fall somewhere in between Random and Zavon. I think we'll move along like we always have, but I also think the toll and changes will be more severe than anything else we've experienced, and thus the cost physically and psychologically will be much larger. Essentially we are going to have a collapse of the current economic system focused on production. We already make enough food to feed the world, add in billions laid off from factory jobs that no longer need a human and it is a recipe for disaster. People are going to want that food, those selling it are going to want "money" from a group that no longer has it. Par for the course, the US and other first world countries will have it easiest all thanks to an unintended consequence of our current economic practices... we've been moving away from a production based economy for decades now.

And that's just one side of it. I think we are eventually moving towards a system where our basic needs will be met entirely through robotics. Construction, production, farming... all of it done by robotic hands, providing for humanity. Hell, eventually we'll see maintenance bots for the other bots. This doesn't mean we'll be "out of jobs" it just means we'll have to replace and remove some of the fields we usually think about as jobs. No longer would warehousing be a job, it would just be an automated facet of society. We no longer have people cleaning out the shit from the street gutters because of those newfangled pipes, but no one even thinks about that as a job.

But, like I said, the change over will be rocky. People don't like thinking that what they've done with their life, what they've learned, is no longer useful or needed. They don't like being told to "learn something new and get a job for that". People enjoy the status quo. They enjoy the safety that provides psychologically. Even if they did, the forced change over will still be rocky. How do you pay your family when you need to go through 4 more years of school in order to get a new job, and everything else is automated and what little jobs you do qualify for have incredibly competition. It will also be very tough on the poor, the divide will widen even more. Eventually I think the divide will collapse though, as I view these as transitionary problems. As things become more and more automated, prices should fall drastically. Eventually poverty will be a thing of ages past.

Well, if we could move past greed that is.

[Random Havoc]

Here is one man's vision of the effects of society dealing with the fact that it doesn't need full employment;



"(It has been shown) conclusively that, by the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world. If… the scientific organization…had been preserved, and the hours of the week had been cut down to four, all would have been well.

Modern technique has made it possible to diminish enormously the amount of labor required to secure the necessaries of life for everyone.

In a world where no one is compelled to work more than four hours a day, every person possessed of scientific curiosity will be able to indulge it, and every painter will be able to paint without starving, however excellent his pictures may be. Young writers will not be obliged to draw attention to themselves by sensational pot-boilers, with a view to acquiring the economic independence needed for monumental works, for which, when the time at last comes, they will have lost the taste and capacity. Men who, in their professional work, have become interested in some phase of economics or government, will be able to develop their ideas without the academic detachment that makes the work of university economists often seem lacking in reality. Medical men will have the time to learn about the progress of medicine, teachers will not be exasperatedly struggling to teach by routine methods things which they learnt in their youth, which may, in the interval, have been proved to be untrue.

Above all, there will be happiness and joy of life, instead of frayed nerves, weariness, and dyspepsia. The work exacted will be enough to make leisure delightful, but not enough to produce exhaustion. Since men will not be tired in their spare time, they will not demand only such amusements as are passive and vapid. At least one per cent will probably devote the time not spent in professional work to pursuits of some public importance, and, since they will not depend upon these pursuits for their livelihood, their originality will be unhampered, and there will be no need to conform to the standards set by elderly pundits.

But it is not only in these exceptional cases that the advantages of leisure will appear. Ordinary men and women, having the opportunity of a happy life, will become more kindly and less persecuting and less inclined to view others with suspicion. The taste for war will die out, partly for this reason, and partly because it will involve long and severe work for all. Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish forever.” - In Praise of Idleness, Bertrand Russell



Hmm, might be a little utopistic...but than again Bertrand Russell was no mental light weight.

[Marou]

Here is one man's vision of the effects of society dealing with the fact that it doesn't need full employment;



"(It has been shown) conclusively that, by the scientific organization of production, it is possible to keep modern populations in fair comfort on a small part of the working capacity of the modern world. If… the scientific organization…had been preserved, and the hours of the week had been cut down to four, all would have been well.

Modern technique has made it possible to diminish enormously the amount of labor required to secure the necessaries of life for everyone.

In a world where no one is compelled to work more than four hours a day, every person possessed of scientific curiosity will be able to indulge it, and every painter will be able to paint without starving, however excellent his pictures may be. Young writers will not be obliged to draw attention to themselves by sensational pot-boilers, with a view to acquiring the economic independence needed for monumental works, for which, when the time at last comes, they will have lost the taste and capacity. Men who, in their professional work, have become interested in some phase of economics or government, will be able to develop their ideas without the academic detachment that makes the work of university economists often seem lacking in reality. Medical men will have the time to learn about the progress of medicine, teachers will not be exasperatedly struggling to teach by routine methods things which they learnt in their youth, which may, in the interval, have been proved to be untrue.

Above all, there will be happiness and joy of life, instead of frayed nerves, weariness, and dyspepsia. The work exacted will be enough to make leisure delightful, but not enough to produce exhaustion. Since men will not be tired in their spare time, they will not demand only such amusements as are passive and vapid. At least one per cent will probably devote the time not spent in professional work to pursuits of some public importance, and, since they will not depend upon these pursuits for their livelihood, their originality will be unhampered, and there will be no need to conform to the standards set by elderly pundits.

But it is not only in these exceptional cases that the advantages of leisure will appear. Ordinary men and women, having the opportunity of a happy life, will become more kindly and less persecuting and less inclined to view others with suspicion. The taste for war will die out, partly for this reason, and partly because it will involve long and severe work for all. Good nature is, of all moral qualities, the one that the world needs most, and good nature is the result of ease and security, not of a life of arduous struggle. Modern methods of production have given us the possibility of ease and security for all; we have chosen, instead, to have overwork for some and starvation for others. Hitherto we have continued to be as energetic as we were before there were machines; in this we have been foolish, but there is no reason to go on being foolish forever.” - In Praise of Idleness, Bertrand Russell



Hmm, might be a little utopistic...but than again Bertrand Russell was no mental light weight.

The hopelessly naive part of that picture is that it assumes resources would be equally distributed amongst the population, that there is an entity capable of managing that without becoming corrupt, that people don't become psychologically twisted when they have excessive free time, and that people are motivated to do things they don't need to do. Which brings me back to my concern. A world where 10% of the people need to work is a world with mass death, social unrest, wars, illiteracy, ultratheism, and rebellion, to say nothing of depravity. We need a massive push towards space *now* because space exploitation is the best long term hedge against us destroying ourselves through boredom and undirected competitive energy.

If a large percentage of people feel purposeless and wrong with the world today, it's because they are a cog in a machine; yet at least the survival aspect depletes their energy and offers them opportunities for meaningful competition. If there is no real reason for competition and most people are functionally useless cattle, the lengths to which people will go to feel alive in 50 years will put our most macabre acts of today to shame.

We are a predatory species, massive amounts of free time will lead to us preying on each other in new and exciting ways unless that energy is directed somewhere more benign and/or productive.

[Random Havoc]

I can’t deny that some of what was encapsulated in the picture Russell painted is somewhat naive (he was after all a socialist). However, I think your view is overly jaded. I think in reality that we will probably come to rest somewhere between the two extremes.

I think the complexities of how this will occur, and how it will be maintained, are so massive that any prediction of the resolution is futile, but that it has many analogies to the past that have worked themselves out.

Although I admit I could be wrong, and this time it could lead to total societal collapse. I will put my money on working it out, I think my Pascalian wager the most profitable in the short run.

[Zavon]

This thread is just in time for the new judge dredd film.

[ofrm1]

The hopelessly naive part of that picture is that it assumes resources would be equally distributed amongst the population, that there is an entity capable of managing that without becoming corrupt, that people don't become psychologically twisted when they have excessive free time, and that people are motivated to do things they don't need to do. Which brings me back to my concern. A world where 10% of the people need to work is a world with mass death, social unrest, wars, illiteracy, ultratheism, and rebellion, to say nothing of depravity. We need a massive push towards space *now* because space exploitation is the best long term hedge against us destroying ourselves through boredom and undirected competitive energy.

The true irony of your criticism is that it is inevitably levied against every prediction made about massive social change. Nothing is new here. All you're doing is assuming the absolute worst will occur when there is little evidence to support it.

This type of innovation will not be the last of its kind. It was also not unexpected. This is simply another push toward the next step in dialectical materialism. From tribes and bands, to slave states, feudalism, capitalism and eventually socialism. There is every reason to believe that the system will continue in the direction it has been and no reason to think that the world will come to an end because we are incapable of finding things to do in spare time.

Further, your criticism that people will be incapable of dealing with excessive time has been bandied about by scarcity economists and sociologists for decades now. In the society that is to come, however, scarcity is no longer an issue when automation has been fully realized.

If a large percentage of people feel purposeless and wrong with the world today, it's because they are a cog in a machine; yet at least the survival aspect depletes their energy and offers them opportunities for meaningful competition. If there is no real reason for competition and most people are functionally useless cattle, the lengths to which people will go to feel alive in 50 years will put our most macabre acts of today to shame.

No, it's because they don't have leisure which is the point Russell is making. They work to live and they live to work. When you remove that burden, the dysfunctional nature of the working class begins to vanish. It's simply a matter of time. The system currently in place is developing more and more inherent contradictions within it due to technological advancement and evolving social attitudes requiring a more comprehensive system to control it.

We are a predatory species, massive amounts of free time will lead to us preying on each other in new and exciting ways unless that energy is directed somewhere more benign and/or productive.

And it will. The energy will be directed toward living a life of leisure and providing contributions to society rather than working to live. This is what a removal of the burden of labor provides. The roadblocks that exist are technological roadblocks in areas like resource consumption, automation. Political roadblocks will become less problematic as the system continues to decay.

but than again Bertrand Russell was no mental light weight.

Bertrand Russell was the greatest philosopher of the 20th century. John Rawls is probably second.

[Marou]

No, it's because they don't have leisure which is the point Russell is making. They work to live and they live to work. When you remove that burden, the dysfunctional nature of the working class begins to vanish. It's simply a matter of time.

Tell me again how your average factory worker or office manager has a more dysfunctional lifestyle than your average debutante. The debutante is a concrete example of what people turn into when they live a life without competitive or survival related motivations. The adjectives that come to mind are spoiled, ignorant, rotten, worthless.

The system currently in place is developing more and more inherent contradictions within it due to technological advancement and evolving social attitudes requiring a more comprehensive system to control it.

Control by a handful of elite sounds an awful lot like feudalism, that didn't work out great.

And it will. The energy will be directed toward living a life of leisure and providing contributions to society rather than working to live.

So, since you claim human nature is inherently benevolent; How much of your leisure time during summer breaks back in your school days provided contributions to society, and how many were spent jerking off in the basement or doing other activities society would frown upon? Drugs perhaps? Chasing women? How much of your vacation time as an adult has been spent contributing to society?

This is what a removal of the burden of labor provides. The roadblocks that exist are technological roadblocks in areas like resource consumption, automation. Political roadblocks will become less problematic as the system continues to decay.

Bertrand Russell was the greatest philosopher of the 20th century. John Rawls is probably second.

Hopeless romantics. We are apex predators. The further disconnected we are from the hunter/gatherer nature that defines us biologically, the more dysfunctional we become. In order to have humans that would be happy and functional in a society of complete control with no competition, you'd have to breed them special through eugenics or genetic engineering.

[Random Havoc]

Hopeless romantics. We are apex predators. The further disconnected we are from the hunter/gatherer nature that defines us biologically, the more dysfunctional we become. In order to have humans that would be happy and functional in a society of complete control with no competition, you'd have to breed them special through eugenics or genetic engineering.

As I said earlier, it is impossible to predict how this is all going to work out, but we have faced this in the past, and strategies have emerged to compensate for our divergence from our evolutional predilections.

It is possible, for instance, that gamification could be used to funnel some of our natural tendencies into socially desirable channels. It is already used, to some degree, in compensating for a certain loss of meaning that emerging science and technology advancements have brought about. I can certainly see how it could be adapted to fulfill a sense of purpose that at one time was filled by full time work, with its inherent competition related motivations.

That is one idea, I am sure there will be many more that spring up organically as the culture evolves, compensating for a society that does not require full employment. But there is no telling what they will be.

[ofrm1]

Tell me again how your average factory worker or office manager has a more dysfunctional lifestyle than your average debutante. The debutante is a concrete example of what people turn into when they live a life without competitive or survival related motivations. The adjectives that come to mind are spoiled, ignorant, rotten, worthless.

The average debutante has security to the basic necessities of life without worrying about laboring over them or even thinking about them. The example you presented is a particularly horrible one as it not only draws a false equivalency between well-to-do know nothings and the hypothetical average person in a post-scarcity society being highly educated, but is also entirely anachronistic when compared to the society we are heading towards. You're just arguing about dysfunctional issues inherent within the current system which I've already dismissed as a colossal failure by this point. The difference is is that I've understood that they are products from earlier ages of society and you haven't.

Control by a handful of elite sounds an awful lot like feudalism, that didn't work out great.

Either this is a strawman or you don't know what socialism is. Either way, my point about dialectical materialism stands.

So, since you claim human nature is inherently benevolent; How much of your leisure time during summer breaks back in your school days provided contributions to society, and how many were spent jerking off in the basement or doing other activities society would frown upon? Drugs perhaps? Chasing women? How much of your vacation time as an adult has been spent contributing to society?

Once again, you make a false equivalency between the lack of contribution in a society that is already plagued with dysfunctional wage slaves and a society where leisure can be achieved by everyone.

Here's a tip. Don't ever point to a point of time in the past and use it as evidence against a future society which is free of those burdens. You will always be comparing apples and oranges.

Hopeless romantics. We are apex predators. The further disconnected we are from the hunter/gatherer nature that defines us biologically, the more dysfunctional we become. In order to have humans that would be happy and functional in a society of complete control with no competition, you'd have to breed them special through eugenics or genetic engineering.

The funny thing is is that I really don't have to do anything to defend my position as it's a historical point. I'm merely pointing to the fact that as society as moved through these societal dialectics, they have invariably shifted toward more education and more equality and that the next step in our "evolution" is socialism. The rise of the conception of the liberal state and the force of law renders any semblance of a point you make about us being predators moot. People will fall in line when society tells them to. Because the alternative is far more unacceptable.


Hopeless misanthrope. See, I can do it too. When you actually decide to debate the merits of what I'm saying instead of following the company line of dismissing all opposing viewpoints as naive, let me know.

[Bragi]

Ofrm1, that was brilliant. Are you a flavor of social scientist?

[ofrm1]

Not really. Just a fan of the era of thought that derived sociology and truly modern political science. The 19th century was a watershed century for philosophy and sociology. In that century, we Get Weber, Durkheim and (in my opinion, most importantly) Marx. I have a huge admiration for 19th century thought as it laid the groundwork for the capitalist, and ultimately, the modernist project that we currently enjoy.

So really, just a philosophy buff with Marxist leanings.

[Marou]

Hopeless misanthrope. See, I can do it too. When you actually decide to debate the merits of what I'm saying instead of following the company line of dismissing all opposing viewpoints as naive, let me know.

To have socialism function on a large scale you need an authoritarian government that allocates resource units across the entire population, combined with zero privacy. To believe people given complete information and resource control can be trusted isn't just stupid, it ignores the entirety of human history. This being the case the result of socialism is a corrupt government that is very intrusive, featuring vastly unequal resource allocation, and general misery for everyone involved except the administrators of the system. Anyone who disagrees with the way the government does things is crazy or a terrorist and disappears into a secret prison somewhere. This isn't speculation, it's the reality of the world.

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So, since capitalism is headed for a cliff, and socialism doesn't work, what will? That's what I wanted to get at. Not hashish flavored pipe dreams about how things might be if everyone wanted to hug dolphins and share their shit with the bigot down the street that they can't stand.

[ofrm1]

To have socialism function on a large scale you need an authoritarian government that allocates resource units across the entire population, combined with zero privacy.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Congratulations. You've effectively swallowed the exact same propaganda and mindless alarmism that has been advanced ad nauseum by the United States for the past 60 years in response to marxism-leninism. Socialism does not require an authoritarian government in the slightest. The reason why you think it does is because you've only been exposed; practically speaking; to one form of socialism which is an interpretation of marxism known as leninism which was further interpreted by revolutionaries like Stalin into what is known as marxism-leninism which is later taken and further revised by mao to reflect maoism. All of these failed because they rely upon the original interpretation of marxism (leninism) which vastly alters Marx's original formulation of the theory.

The fundamental mistake that you're making, and effectively all critics of socialism make is that you're confusing public ownership and common ownership. Public ownership is the allocation of bringing industry into the government's hands. Common ownership is the allocation of the means of production into the hands of those who created it. This is what Marx means when he refers to the ultimate goal as "the proletarians owning the means of production."

A little history is needed to thoroughly explain this point.

The issue is that visionaries like Lenin take Marx's actual position and distort it to apply to Russia. Russia, at the time of Lenin, was not a prime target for socialism at all due to it's thoroughly stagnant economy that was maintained through subsistence farming. As I've stated before, Marx theorized socialism being the next step of dialectical materialism from capitalism; or in other words, a country that is already well established with industry and a powerful market economy. Russia was essentially on the same economic tier as feudalism. Further, Marx refers to socialism being defined chiefly as "the dictatorship of the proletariat" which means precisely what it says. Lenin instead established a bolshevik party which eventually turned into the communist party when it took control of the USSR by Joseph Stalin. Stalin then molded this party into a totalitarian dictatorship that is just one more revolutionary step in the gloriously horrifying jacobin tradition. Stalinism, the Great leap forward, and the Communist party of Kampuchea all share one pivotal thing in common. A terrible interpretation of Marx's ideology.

Make no mistake. The socialism you're referring to is about as far removed from true socialism that Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels envisioned it as possible. True socialism and communism have never been tried because the necessary education and technological innovations have not existed for the system to thrive. As capitalism continues in its march toward progress, these obstacles are fast disappearing and ultimately is fueling it's own demise.

So, since capitalism is headed for a cliff, and socialism doesn't work, what will? That's what I wanted to get at. Not hashish flavored pipe dreams about how things might be if everyone wanted to hug dolphins and share their shit with the bigot down the street that they can't stand.

Your question is predicated on an assumption that isn't supported by evidence. The claim that socialism doesn't work isn't an untestable claim, but is very testable. The only issue is that every time it has been has resulted in a massive deviation from the original formulation.

A practical example of your misconception is this. Mixing phosphorus and oxygen together only results in a violent reaction when you're using white phosphorus due to it's inherent instability. You're effectively saying that because we've tried white phosphorus and it wasn't stable, then a mixture of red phosphorus and oxygen also will be unstable and there's no point in trying it. What I'm saying is we have good reason to believe that red phosphorus will be stable when mixed with oxygen so go actually test it and follow the instructions for mixing red phosphorus and oxygen verbatim instead of changing them because you have this intuition that they won't.

[Marou]

Your whole argument is without merit, if you have any common sense.

No rational person feels compelled to create anything if other people are just going to take it away from them. In order for people to know someone has something, you need surveillance, and to take it away you need force.

I am not compelled to spend my life writing software to catch fraud, automate knowledge driven tasks, and mine statistical information by altruism, but by material gain and survival. The mistaken assumption that socialism relies upon is that all workers are equally vital to an enterprise and thus should be equally rewarded by it's successes. This is completely wrong. People are as valuable as the scarcity of their skills and the efforts they expend to utilize them. A world in which the guy who sits in the lobby during closed hours and plays video games (security guard) has a defacto ownership in the business he is "guarding" is a twisted world. A world where nothing gets done because there is no point in doing anything.

Capitalism rewards people that can and are willing to do tedious and difficult things. This is why most all open source software that doesn't have corporations involved in supporting it is a bug-ridden piece of shit. Proving the idea is fun, debugging it and making a slick UI are not. People don't do hard things when there is no reward for it. However, most people also aren't very capable. When machines and software supercede the capabilities of the majority of the population the capitalistic system falls apart.