[andy_adams]

You must roll with some motivated crowds if everyone has long-term goals.

> 60% of the folks I meet would be pretty content watching TV all day, every day. When you talk to them, they just talk about the shows they watched.

[wool_gather]

I'm just as cynical and misanthropic as the next HN poster, but I do wonder about this.

My hunch is that many people would indeed find something other than mindless TV if they weren't having their intellectual/emotional energy used up on a daily basis by a job. Not all people, maybe not even most, but many.

What they got up to instead is a whole nother question, but I do really think that the typical human would find something active to do, given no forced use of their time.

[TeMPOraL]

I strongly second this. Most people tend to be pretty used up after a day at work, and after commute, errands and household chores, TV is pretty much all they have energy for.

Personally, I hang out with regular "normies" as much, if not more, as with technical people, and all the boring TV-watching "normies" I know do have dreams and hobbies, but it takes getting to know them better to discover that. And those dreams and hobbies are generally blocked by dayjobs and errands.

[Verdex]

Most people just want to waste time watching TV would be the good outcome. I'm more concerned that it turns out that once money is no longer a concern that a large portion of people would spend their time trying to figure out how to cause problems for others.

How many people would ignore education, socialization, and general societal cohesiveness if they knew that they would never have to worry about getting along with anyone else in order to survive.

[ilovetux]

I don't agree with this. People will still have to get along in order to survive. Two things:

First, crimes usually come with financial consequences I doubt that this would change even with UBI.

Secondly, its just as likely that the opposite becomes true and people learn to appreciate a sense of community much more deeply due to the lessening of competition. For instance intramural sports teams might become even more popular than they are now which could increase the general sense of camaraderie.

edit: grammar

[fulltrottle]

Why wouldn't crimes go down with UBI? people commit crimes out of desperation. The crime rate is substantially lower in socialized europe

[ilovetux]

That is what I am trying to say when I responded to OP, perhaps I phrased it poorly.

I think that without constant competition it is equally possible that people would have higher regard for community than less. There are many things to consider here, but I am generally not concerned about people becoming more problematic or dangerous as a result of UBI.

[SolaceQuantum]

I believe of the people who discuss shows they watched, this is actualy used as a way to bond with their peers, whom they are stuck with 8 hours a day.

[robohoe]

Or all the video games they played in their copious amounts of spare time.