Midnight Pub

What happens to the Third World when the First World no longer needs it?

~tetris

Some thoughts based on very few data points

::::3D printing is getting very convenient::::

Observation: At my workplace, we've been printing our own parts since Covid due to the supply shortages, and we have not switched back. My SO's group is experimenting with printing their own drug capsules.

Prediction: We're steadily weaning ourselves off from large companies who are fronts for sweatshops in the third world.

::::Local/Used/Recycle Ads are getting better than Amazon::::

Observation: Amazon's sole advantage is that it ships stuff fast, but the quality of what you find and price of the stuff that you find isn't that much cheaper than buying stuff second hand from a site such as Ebay, where you typically filter by location. My SO who favours more higher quality products, goes for Etsy, which is only a little more expensive than Amazon and has more locally sourced stuff.

Prediction: Ordering household products from the third world will begin to only make sense for suppliers who buy in bulk (e.g. Alibaba), with everyone else relying on local networks.

::::AI is getting very good::::

Observation: With Imagen and DALL-E producing some truly fantastic results for text-to-image generation, and Chatbots such as LaMDA being touted as "truly sentient"[1], the need for call centre operators or other outsourced customer support diminishes.

Prediction: Call centres and other jobs that made the third world rich via computers will dry up.

::::Food wars means more emphasis on local produce::::

Observation: The instability in food networks caused by the ongoing Ukraine conflict has meant higher food prices, which has driven me and my SO towards growing our own indoor veg and buying from farmers markets.

Prediction: Third world farming might begin to diminish until its only used to feed cattle, with fruit and veg for consumers coming from more local sources

::::Meat is becoming less important::::

Observation: in the first world, there is a steadily increasing trend towards going meat-free (vegetarian, vegan, etc). The soy and other produce used to clear large tracts of land in the third world goes largely towards feeding cattle.

Prediction: As meat demand wavers, so will the need for extensive farming. That means less farmers in the third world.

::::Energy is becoming more decentralized::::

Observation: Solar panels are getting cheaper and more efficient every year, and with the roll out of EVs that can power a house for a week on a single engine, who even needs the grid? Plus with the instability of gas due to conflicts, it makes more sense for big investors to invest in something stable such as wind and solar.

Prediction: Countries will begin to rely less on each other for energy.

Discussion

Well, what happens to the third world when the first world no longer needs to exploit it?

Will [mb]illions of people die due to lack of jobs?
Will governments step in and establish brutal but efficient regimes to empower their people like Cuba did?

I guess what I'm really asking is:

Will the rich in the first world allow the poor in the third world to exist, if they have nothing that they want from one another?

Ref1: LaMDA transcript

skedaddle3644

I wonder if we will be ever rid of a “third world”, the Pareto principle, also known as the 80/20 rule, states that there will always be a minority of things. Of course, as things get better over time, definitions will change.

The 20% can be broken down even further too, 20% of the top 20% and so on… This works in nature too, 80% of the planets rotate around 20% of the stars, 80% of software glitches are caused by 20% of bugs, 80% of sleep quality occurs in 20% of sleep…

So, maybe we will never be rid of the Third World, there is likely always going to be someone better off than someone else, I'm optimistic things won't be as bad as some worry about.

tetris

I would argue that the 80/20 split works just as well with other ratios (50:50, 99:1) with plenty of examples for each.

skedaddle3644

That sounds quite possible, I haven't thought about a 50:50 split, though.

Certainly, the 99:1 exists, maybe even more, the 0.01% owning and controlling the vast majority, perhaps?

tetris

Perhaps indeed :-(

tatterdemalion

What will the bourgeoisie in the imperial core (first world) do with the proletariat of the imperial core when they no longer need them?

Exterminism

tetris

Well said, and I sadly agree with the website. As killer drones start to become the norm, the interaction of "make me rich, general" -> "steal those resources, captain" -> "kill that man, private" is reduced to a single expressionless, almost gamified action.

The old rich dinosaurs who rule the rock won't hesitate to decimate large portions of society. I do have some hope that their kids who interact with us more might at least hesitate.

dakota

I think decentralized energy is farther off in the future; hopefully countries will build out more nuclear and shut down fossil plants sooner, but that depends on having access to uranium and a state capable of enriching it (plus proliferation concerns). I guess we're all hoping for "energy independence" that relies on clean sources, but disagree on whether nuclear is appropriate.

tetris

I see nuclear only being necessary if battery tech doesn't get better. Sure we need lots of power for costly projects like water desalination and long term space travel, but what's to stop us from just saving tons of slow-drip solar and wind in long battery storage (assuming we develop such tech)

There's a techno-optimistic angle of this: the same technology that reduces the reliance on poorer countries can also be used to help the people in those poorer countries. After all, we're all human and with the same basic requirements. Call it trickle-down techonomics, but it has an effect nonetheless. The problem is getting poorer and developing countries access to these new technologies, but access is better problem to have than the technology not existing in the first place.

Historically, the question of "but what will the people do without jobs?" has always been asked when some new, revolutionary technology appears. So far, that question has always been answered by new jobs appearing elsewhere. If you were to tell someone living in the US from the early 1800s that technology would improve so much that over 90% of the population would be out of a job (>90% of the labor force was farmers, compared to 1.3% today) they'd be panicked. But of course, we know that it has instead opened the opportunity for people to work in other sectors that can dramatically improve our lives in other ways.

The real question is whether we can set aside greed enough to empower people to live good lives in a post-labor world. Universal basic income is practically a requirement, in that regard.

tetris

I think a lot of people are optimistic that a horse -> car transition will take place in regards to AI. I'm not so sure, since I think AI is not just a tool, but a direct competition to the human condition.

AI can wield AI in a way that a car cannot wield another car (nor a horse wielding another horse).

I'm hoping it creates more markets than it closes, but how long will those markets last when they're just replaced by newer ones (e.g. an AI that writes music, followed by an AI that redefines music genres, followed by an AI that unites music, art, culture, and mathematics, etc.)

How can anyone specialize, plan, cooperate in something that will just change again not soon after. I see an end to the stock exchange (maybe a good thing) and any security that a government can promise its people.

I think we're all going to be put through a fine mesh, and come out the other side the same color (maybe a good thing). Hopefully UBI is seen as a necessity here and we find more meaningful ways to define the value of human life outside of economics

inquiry

> The real question is whether we can set
> aside greed enough to empower people to
> live good lives in a post-labor world.

<~inquiry pushes all his chips to the "NO" region of the table>

<~inquiry closes his eyes, resting uncomfortably in how much he likes his odds>