[p-o]

Why did we have to go through all this pain. Was that really necessary? And given we mostly talk about technology here, let me put this through that lens:

With all the technology advancement and improvement with access to information in the last 30 years, why does it feel that all of this culminates to more disinformation, more pain, and less understanding?

[gtowey]

It's because technology doesn't change the fundamentals of global geopolitics. Which is that nearly all of history can be explained as a struggle to control basic resources such as arable land, oil, minerals, etc. Everything you're seeing today is because those resources are becoming either increasingly scarce, or increasingly valuable.

[vladms]

Technology can change things but people that profit today from something will oppose a change.

Case in point: switching from oil to renewables - which can lower dependency to external actors a lot as solar panels and windmills have life span of years, so even if the producers suddenly refuses to sell more, one has some time to find an alternative - was done slower than it could have because of "discussions".

Since 20 years I almost feel the discussion "climate change or not" is fueled by people that want dependency on oil, such that we don't talk about the issue of a couple of big producer points of failure (USA, Russia, Gulf countries). Not sure if oil companies are smart enough to finance green groups (to which I agree generally but is besides the point), such that the public discourse stays in a conflict area (climate) rather than a simple one (independence), but if they are that would be meta-evil.

[asdff]

Geopolitics are an entirely optional game of course that just amounts to trading seats of who gets entitled to be owner of some thing that one can hardly even say is ownable outside the legal definition. Seems to me there is no actual reason why the middle east has to look like the middle east and not midwest USA. Israel arming itself should be seen as just as absurd as say the city of Cleveland arming itself due to Detroit.

Kind of interesting how we have some areas of the world where there are no geopolitics and people live in peace and don't see any differences between the people they come across in the grocery store. And other places in the world where those vary same cultures in that midwestern grocery store might now be picking up arms against eachother.

And also kind of interesting how no one cares to highlight this cognitive dissonance we have, how an israeli and a persian can live as neighbors in the US, but in the middle east they are water and oil.

[lesuorac]

Are they?

We have so much stuff that we just throw things away if a tiny piece of it gets tarnished / broken.

The US's population density is pretty low and we have a ton of land not in cities that's very sparsely populated.

Like it largely seems that geopolitics of now is about creating scarcity.

[gtowey]

> Like it largely seems that geopolitics of now is about creating scarcity.

How else do you create scarcity except by controlling all the resources?

[pcthrowaway]

Convincing people something is scare or artificially creating scarcity.

[mrguyorama]

No actually. There's no real "resource" justification here.

This is directly caused by technology. Morons have helped the worst possible people build surveillance and coordination and propaganda networks and are all confused pikachu about that going exactly the way you should have expected it to go.

Technology was also bypassing the "resource" problem at warp speed. Solar panels are the energy future, and thanks to China being actually good at strategic planning, solar can be deployed and utilized far faster than any other energy innovation. With the sheer abundance possible through bulk solar, water scarcity is an engineering issue, about manufacturing enough plumbing and membranes to desalinate whatever you need.

We are fighting an 80s oil war because people voted for an 80s TV personality to run our country after he was known to rape kids, brag about Mein Kampf (even though everyone knows he doesn't read for fun), and attempt to invalidate the 2020 election.

Israel saw a clear opening to wildly advance their imperialist ambitions and because Donald Trump is so damn stupid we have jumped in to this absurdist situation because Donald Trump wanted to be seen shooting first, because he thinks that looks "Strong".

[Schmerika]

You still think this problem is one sided?

Dems had Trump dead to rights for insurrection. They had everything in the Epstein files and didn't drop it. They told you they were working tirelessly for a ceasefire - while unilaterally vetoing 4 of them at the UN.

Genocide. They armed genocide. Which we could all see on our phones.

They loved arming it so much, they decided they'd rather keep arming it than gain millions of votes in swing states vs Trump.

Trump is worse. Yes. But when both parties in the two party system are pro-genocide, pro-torture, pro-ICE, pro-Epstein etc etc etc, you can't blame the whole problem on just half the people involved.

[constantius]

A controversial take unfortunately.

Americans are under the delusion that Democrats are the second coming of Christ, even after it enabled and took part in genocide. To anyone outside of the West, the differences between the two parties are inexistent.

The memoryholing of all Democrats' failures, corruption, and horror is painful to watch. But they do it with a different kind of posturing, and this seems to be sufficient to most.

[Schmerika]

> this seems to be sufficient to most.

Yeah that's the really painful bit alright. The pretence isn't even good.

But they'll get so mad at you for pointing out the obvious.

It's been this way for a long time - MLK pointed all this out 6 decades ago. It's gotten worse since, to the point where over 98% of US voters in 2024 didn't hold enabling live-streamed genocide as a red line for their vote.

I'll keep talking about it, and USians will probably keep getting mad at me for it. Ah well.

[bryanlarsen]

> increasingly scarce, or increasingly valuable.

Neither of which is actually true for oil. We're still finding oil reserves faster than we deplete them, major users such as China are rapidly decarbonizing, and the price was relatively low before the war.

But the people in power thought it was true, which is all that matters.

[DesaiAshu]

Technology is at the mercy of our social and financial systems, it rarely leads social advancement. As with other tools, it can be used in many ways

In surveying my friends in Silicon Valley, it seems that most VCs/techies know that: 1. This administration is likely leading us into long term wars and social instability 2. American Dynamism and Defense Tech (or more politely bundled into "DeepTech") are war profiteering, benefiting from greater instability

Speaking / acting out against the American military complex and Big Tech/VC's role in this carries 3 big risks: 1. Not being invited to parties ("too much negative energy, we want to be surrounded by positivity" or "don't talk politics") 2. Censorship and reduced following across most major social media platforms 3. Being economically left out as the world bifurcates into a K-shape economy

As a result, most of my community (generally peace-loving, music-loving humans) seem to be either taking a position of "the world has always been at war and will always be at war, I'm just a realist" or "I'm just going to focus on my locust of control and my personal wellbeing" or "if it's gonna happen anyways, I might as well make money off of it". There is a strong contingent of the resistance as well (still fighting for climate, social justice, peace) but much higher rates of depression and social isolation in this group

So it does not seem to be a problem that can be solved by more information and more technology (though k-12 and higher education assuredly is worth investing in), but perhaps by less nihilism and a stronger social/moral fabric

A big reason I am considering starting a company again is that we need more flags of institutions that carry large weight/reputation and stand for a set of values that is different than the current (and historical) status quo. I expect most of my community would be thrilled to align with those flags if those flags where held up tall and broke through the noise

Which is to say, if you're considering setting up one of those flags, please please do. The world doesn't have to be this way.

[akudha]

Because it is much easier to do more damage (disinformation, propaganda etc) with today's technology than ever before. Radio could do more damage than newspapers, TV could do more damage than radio, internet can do way more damage than TV...

Someone with a 500$ laptop, internet connection and a handful of social media accounts can do a level of damage and cause pain that would be impossible 3-4 decades ago.

Technology might advance, but people are still people. Greed, stupidity, ego, jingoism...these don't change no matter how much tech advances

[GolfPopper]

>Why did we have to go through all this pain. Was that really necessary?

Because the United States government is so grossly dysfunctional that a blatant real world re-enactment of Wag the Dog[1] has gone off without a hitch. "Without a hitch" in the "distract from the President's rape of a child" sense of the original film, of course.

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wag_the_Dog

[collingreen]

People are people. Adding tech doesn't change the people very much.

[jameskilton]

This is a tale as old as humanity itself. Power-hungry people will always push lies to foster their version of events. This always causes pain and destruction.

[p-o]

I am not delusional about those power-hungry people, but I somehow thought that with better access to information, society would have been able to better regulate them.

Maybe in hindsight, "flooding the zone" will be considered a much bigger threat than it is today. Most of what's going on in the last 12 months have happened in plain sight and would have never worked 30 years ago. Today, it just flies, attention span be damned.

[vladms]

Irak war seemed to me reasonably "in plain sight". And there were other blunders as well. What I find amazing though is that more people passionately believe very strange reasons.

30 years ago people were like "meh, sure we don't get something, I bet there are hidden interest that I don't know about". Nowadays they are like "oh, yeah we attack country X because they have aliens that attack us telepathically, I know that for sure and if you don't agree you are an alien too!".

[consumer451]

> With all the technology advancement and improvement with access to information in the last 30 years, why does it feel that all of this culminates to more disinformation, more pain, and less understanding?

One of the original adages in technology is:

    garbage in, garbage out. 

The more technology ate the world, the bigger a problem that became.