Re:'Megascale' structures that humans could one day build
by forgingahead on Thursday January 14, 2021 @10:04PM
(#25786495)
Paul Krugman's prediction that the impact of the internet will be "no greater than that of the fax machine."[0]
This is not by the way a specific criticism of Krugman (though I do think too many people, including Krugman himself, wrongly think his Nobel Prize for trade theory gives him expertise in every other subject he pontificates about).
As usual, the non-doers (commenters or critics, places like the NYT) have little perspective on things that can change the world. It's up to us in tech to always have that bright-eyed optimism for what is possible, because we're the ones building it day-in-day-out. Observer critics don't really have a place in this, unless that criticism is coming directly from folks who are meant to be the initial customers/users of technology.
Re:'Megascale' structures that humans could one day build
by kodoque2 on Friday January 15, 2021 @03:22AM
(#25788323)
I've always felt the reverse, it's the doer that are in knee deep in the guts of various technological endeavor that display the most technological skepticism.
This is not by the way a specific criticism of Krugman (though I do think too many people, including Krugman himself, wrongly think his Nobel Prize for trade theory gives him expertise in every other subject he pontificates about).
As usual, the non-doers (commenters or critics, places like the NYT) have little perspective on things that can change the world. It's up to us in tech to always have that bright-eyed optimism for what is possible, because we're the ones building it day-in-day-out. Observer critics don't really have a place in this, unless that criticism is coming directly from folks who are meant to be the initial customers/users of technology.
[0]https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/revolutions/miscellany/paul...