Utopian future will not work

originally posted by: TerryDon79
a reply to: eNumbra

I completely disagree.

Currency/rewards are the only reason there is greed. Greed is just wanting more currency/rewards than you already have. Take them away and you literally want for nothing. But in doing so you compromise motivation to the point of chaos.

Then we disagree on some very basic elements of the human existence.

a reply to: Vechthaan

You're including currency. Take that away and think about how much people would want to work.

a reply to: eNumbra

Such as?

Greed is literally wanting more power, currency, food etc. With no currency/rewards and everything available to everyone it makes everyone is equal. That negates greed.

a reply to: TerryDon79


Sounds about right I think. You have to have negative. If there were no negative, we would have never evolved and learned anything as a species. A utopia would mean everything is positive. A utopia cannot exist as long as there is the balance (yin yang) between positive and negative. If any of that makes sense.

originally posted by: TerryDon79
a reply to: Boadicea

You kind of agreed with me there, you know?

Nope... didn't agree at all. You just snipped my sentence to make it seem so:

...we work to live... in a society which has monetized pretty much everything and demands that we serve others in order to survive ourselves.

We must "work to live" because of society and how we have allowed ourselves and our civilization to be ordered. And, specifically, we must work to earn money to live because those are the dynamics that we have created and that is now the world imposed upon us.

"People work to live". I agree. But take the need to work away (motivation) and people, generally, won't do it. (Yes, I know there are exemptions from my hypothetical rule)

Yes, there are many exceptions. I don't wash dishes because I enjoy it, but I do it because the next time I'm hungry I want clean dishes to eat off of. I don't wash my clothes because I enjoy it, but I do it so I can have clean clothes. The rewards have nothing to do with money... but it sure costs me money to achieve those goals.

Likewise, I don't do volunteer work because I especially enjoy the task at hand, but because I enjoy helping others in need... and because I like "paying forward" the many blessings I have received. No money needed -- except what I must donate/expend to achieve my goals.

No one desires little pieces of paper printed all pretty for what it is; they desire it for the power given it by mankind. In and of itself, those little pieces of paper aren't worth much at all. Take away the power and control granted by man, and people would still be motivated to strive and aspire and accomplish things -- it just wouldn't be for money.

originally posted by: iTruthSeeker
a reply to: TerryDon79


Sounds about right I think. You have to have negative. If there were no negative, we would have never evolved and learned anything as a species. A utopia would mean everything is positive. A utopia cannot exist as long as there is the balance (yin yang) between positive and negative. If any of that makes sense.

Makes complete sense to me.

Without the bad, how would we know what the good is. And vice versa.

a reply to: TerryDon79

I'm not including currency. A basic income is most easily described in monetary terms, because it's easier to say: "We'll give everyone a basic income" instead of "We'll give every citizen the monetary ability to provide for food, water, housing, leasure activities, ..."

Right now, we're using money, but a basic income isn't necessarily about money, it's about getting the means to survive each month. Money just, currently, happens to be the means. Focusing on the currency issue feels alot like strawmanning.


"You're including currency. Take that away and think about how much people would want to work. "

So, you've never doing a single house chore unless you get payed for it? You've never visited your elderly and cared for time without them paying you for it after? You've never helped a friend move without him paying you the hours it took?

(Most) people are inherently good and social, and the mere act of helping another human being is enough to validate the "work" it takes, I know it's true for me and most if not all of my friends and family. I've never asked money to help a friend or, nor asked money to go visit my granny.

I think you're not making the destinction between the different kinds of work there are. The examples I've listed above are inherently different from working 40 hours a week at a Burger King.

I think the motivation of a utopia is the goal of having a utopia, not actually being in one.

There's always something wrong, or something that could be better.

An actual utopia will never be achieved, and shouldn't be.

a reply to: Vechthaan

But I'm not talking about the little things. I'm talking about things that make the world run. Transport, food, tech, repairs, maintenance, cleaning and so on. The jobs people do, but if they had a choice, wouldn't.

originally posted by: gspat
I think the motivation of a utopia is the goal of having a utopia, not actually being in one.

There's always something wrong, or something that could be better.

An actual utopia will never be achieved, and shouldn't be.

That I can 100% agree on.

The idea is nice, but in practice it's unrealistic. Also, the goalposts on what a utopia is keep getting moved from person to person, generation to generation.

Hunger and the survival instinct are important to human desire and creativity.
Take those away and people become stagnant.
The Star Trek eutopia is impossible.

Everybody faces challenges of varying degrees throughout their lifetime. Challenges provide opportunities for mankind as a whole and individually to evolve more. Even within an Utopian society, one will find or create their own challenges. Survival has always been a motivating factor for all species. Money doesn't motivate, self preservation does. Money is just the current means in our society to do that. It is not needed though.

originally posted by: TerryDon79
a reply to: eNumbra

Such as?

What motivates people.

originally posted by: TerryDon79

originally posted by: iTruthSeeker
a reply to: TerryDon79


Sounds about right I think. You have to have negative. If there were no negative, we would have never evolved and learned anything as a species. A utopia would mean everything is positive. A utopia cannot exist as long as there is the balance (yin yang) between positive and negative. If any of that makes sense.

Makes complete sense to me.

Without the bad, how would we know what the good is. And vice versa.

Also, + and - are laws of the Universe, so even if every human were the best,good hearted people, we still have to play by the "laws".

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus

you say what you want about Picard, but he ran a tight disciplined ship. Although sometimes I find the quarantine procedures for new arrivals a bit lacking across all of StarFleet.

I have always agreed that Utopia is but a mere fantasy, but more so due to free will than motivation. There are millions today who are not motivated to do much of anything besides collected a welfare check and sit their plump rump down in front of a screen.

Free will is the true agitator. Unless all of humanity agree to a singular philosophy, there will be disagreement, which leads to frustration, then anger, followed by hatred and subsequently ... violence.

Every form of life is motivated to survive though and that includes humans.

a reply to: TerryDon79

But it's exactly the things that "make the world run" that are most easily automated. Factories, farms, transport, repairs, maintanance. The more mechanical a job is in nature, the more easy it is to automated. Robots are best at doing jobs which require strict paterns and regulations. And it's also these jobs that are concidered most deplorable. Like you said, noone really wants to work in a factory doing the same thing over and over again 4000 times a day...


But caring for your nanny, fixing your best friend's car, cleaning your house aren't something people would suddenly stop doing if they didn't have to. Would you litterealy just let your eldery starve on the spot if you didn't have to care for them anymore?

No, lol. You still would, everyone still would. The "jobs" that still need to be done will get done, because people enjoy doing these things. These jobs are inherently different from the jobs that "make the world run", which are most easily automatable.


Automating these jobs (which are estimated to be over 90% of current global work) will create massive unemployment. So we either have 2 choices: Don't automate these jobs or provide alternative means of income. (basic income, for example)

We've been doing the first choice for the larger part of the past 50 years. It's why we currently still have factories filled with workers standing besides robots doing the same job that are magnitudes more productive and alot cheaper. It's why economists and politicians are legitimately scared what will happen when self-driving cars hit the road. What happens to the milions of Americans who's income partially or fully relies on "transport of other human beings". Think public transportation employees, Uber drivers, taxi drivers, ...

But it doesn't end there. In pretty much every sector, we are, or have been, at the treshhold of complete automatisation, yet as long as we refuse to acknowledge the second option of providing alternate means of income, we'll keep cycling through periods of low wages, unemployment, government "creating jobs" (which doesnt make any goddamn sense, why would you ever want to create work?), ...

Thats why I believe a basic income is inevitable, and from what I've read on the interwebs, alot of economists agree.

Last Edit:

I gues technically there is a third choice to combat automation, one we also have been doing for a fair part of the past 50 years: creating new jobs. However, I would like stress that creating jobs is no solution as all this does is postpone the problem aswell as create new ones. The idea of "creating" work to provide income to people seems absured next to the idea of just giving people said income, without the need to first create the meaningless work, followed by people having to do this meaningless work...

On top of that, this meaningless, created, work is also prone to automatisation. I concider callcenters one of the staples in "creating jobs" that aren't really necessary, something which is now, ironically, also on the verge of being automated by -limited- Artificial Intelligence. So we've essentially gotten at the point where the "fake" jobs we create to keep people employed are now also being consumed by the same problem that created them in the first place.

originally posted by: eNumbra
You mean where OP decided to redefine utopia as "moneyless"?

That very same one. It is his thread so het gets to set up the Original Post the way he wants.

originally posted by: worldstarcountry
you say what you want about Picard, but he ran a tight disciplined ship. Although sometimes I find the quarantine procedures for new arrivals a bit lacking across all of StarFleet.

Yeah, but Four Lights never got in on with green alien space chicks.

I have always agreed that Utopia is but a mere fantasy, but more so due to free will than motivation. There are millions today who are not motivated to do much of anything besides collected a welfare check and sit their plump rump down in front of a screen.

Free will is the true agitator. Unless all of humanity agree to a singular philosophy, there will be disagreement, which leads to frustration, then anger, followed by hatred and subsequently ... violence.

Every form of life is motivated to survive though and that includes humans.

So it would appear we share a similar view on this that the concept of Utopia is more of a philosophical thought exercise and not something that humans can know as a reality.

I don't agree with this premise because I don't know anybody that gets satisfaction from money only from the things that they buy with money. So that ultimately it is not the money that is the motivator it is what the person is hoping to buy with the money

If people reduce life down to its basics we realize that life is about sensory experience and sensory experiences do not come about by money. Yes you can buy experiences with money but by the same token those experiences can exist apart from money.

I think it is possible to create a system that would have motivation and interest within it and not have any currency. If the system was set up so that everyone had a turn at any job they were qualified and able to do and we were all on a rotating schedule so that none of us stayed on any particular job for any extended length of time and we all work together to provide the things that we needed such as food shelter and clothing. I think it could be set up so that we actually looked forward to going to work.... It would be very different from the current system ...I do have a blueprint that is formed in my mind for such a system but I have not put it all down on paper yet.

The biggest hindrance that I can see is not the ability to create a system that would work and that would be satisfying and healthy for the earth and the people but to be able to have a group of people that could live together in harmony and not create problems amongst ourselves.

Problems such as adultery and other forms of trespasses against one another would create situations where people would not be content situations where envy and jealousy would still arise. ... I don't know how to get rid of those types of things.

a reply to: eNumbra
Guess we'll just have to agree to disagree.


a reply to: Vechthaan
And the jobs involved? Design, implementation, maintenance, upgrades etc. Think people would be happy to do all of that for nothing?