AI, this is Skynet calling (and so it begins...)

[theprestige]

On my walk today one of the other walkers was concerned whether they had had a good night's sleep or not as her watch hadn't recorded her sleep last night.

I know when I've had trouble getting to sleep, because I've been awake for the duration. But it turns out there's a lot of suboptimal sleeping phenomena that are difficult or impossible to accurately self-report, simply because the sufferer isn't really awake enough to observe or form memories.

Plus, once you start collecting data on a regular basis, it's fun to track the data, and it's reasonable to be disappointed when there's a gap in the data.

But thanks for reminding us that skepticism means pointing and laughing at people who prefer data over dimly-recalled personal anecdotes! Really putting the F-for-faffing-about in ISF, you are.

 

[theprestige]

Oh great https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3ek3gvdnj3o

I'm starting to see stuffing money under the mattress as less and less crazy.

I'm getting increasingly annoyed at these people trying to blame their own incompetence and lack of critical thought on their tools.

Also, printed money would be absolutely useless in any real breakdown of civilization. You'd be better off stuffing gasoline and penicillin under the mattress. And bullets.

 

[alfaniner]

Eventually it'll be a "smart" mattress that will connect wirelessly to Google servers to inform them of whether you have money under it, as well as provide video feed, and play subliminal advertising at you as you sleep.

I was perturbed when the guy installing my Sleep Number bed had to access my wi-fi to code... something. I entered the password which he didn't see but I still didn't like it. If I had known I would have temporarily changed my network password earlier. I didn't want to change it after because I have way too many devices that use it, but eventually I may want to.

 

[theprestige]

It's always a bummer when the tradies just park outside your house all day for the free wifi.

 

[Jack by the hedge]

On my walk today one of the other walkers was concerned whether they had had a good night's sleep or not as her watch hadn't recorded her sleep last night.

Ugh. Mrs By The Hedge likewise doesn't know whether she slept well until her app tells her. And she lets another app bully her about what she eats, even though she eats incredibly healthily.

"How many different veg does it want you to eat each week?"
"Eight."
"How many have you eaten?"
"Thirty."
"And it's only..."
"Wednesday."

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Oh great https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c3ek3gvdnj3o

I'm starting to see stuffing money under the mattress as less and less crazy.

If it's paper money it's more and more crazy. Precious metals, fine jewels, etc., would still be worth something after a crash. Paper money not so much.

 

[Thermal]

If it's paper money it's more and more crazy. Precious metals, fine jewels, etc., would still be worth something after a crash. Paper money not so much.

I had this argument with a half-assed prepper buddy of mine. He was stockpiling small amounts of gold, thinking it would be a commodity in the event of a global economic meltdown. I asked him why.

"Because it's worth a lot of money!"

"It's worth a lot of what?"

I mean, it would depend on the nature and severity of the apocalyptic hellscape, but generally if you are in post-apocalyptic ◊◊◊◊, gold, jewels and money have no meaning. As said above, gas, food water, bullets and medicines are the more likely barterable goods. You ain't eating diamond tennis bracelets.

 

[theprestige]

If it's paper money it's more and more crazy. Precious metals, fine jewels, etc., would still be worth something after a crash. Paper money not so much.

I don't know about that. Precious minerals as proxies for wealth probably only make sense when there's a lot of surplus wealth and labor to go around.

Not so much in a post-apocalyptic societal collapse scenario. If you've lost the banking system that legitimizes paper money, you've probably also lost the commercial system that values gold as representational wealth.

You can't eat gold. You can't feed it to livestock. You can't use diamonds to set a broken bone or treat a bacterial infection.

In the scenario under consideration, you'd be much better off stockpiling things that directly or indirectly enable useful work. Livestock, obviously. Oil and coal. Lumber. Salt. Bullets. Fertilizer. Penicillin. Labor.

I think a course of antibiotics will probably be worth zero times its weight in gold, and ten thousand times its weight in healthy farmhands. And I mean this literally: "I will trade you the labor of ten men, to get your crops in this season, in exchange for ten two-week courses of penicillin."

What would be the point of acquiring all the gold in Fort Knox*, only to have one of your workers die of an infected work-related injury, because it never crossed your mind to hoard 150 pounds of doctor instead of 150 tons of gold?

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I had this argument with a half-assed prepper buddy of mine. He was stockpiling small amounts of gold, thinking it would be a commodity in the event of a global economic meltdown. I asked him why.

"Because it's worth a lot of money!"

"It's worth a lot of what?"

I mean, it would depend on the nature and severity of the apocalyptic hellscape, but generally if you are in post-apocalyptic ◊◊◊◊, gold, jewels and money have no meaning. As said above, gas, food water, bullets and medicines are the more likely barterable goods. You ain't eating diamond tennis bracelets.

Gold and jewels had ascribed value BEFORE money.

But, for a fun read, find a copy of "Alas, Babylon", a post-(atomic)-apocalypse novel.

 

[Thermal]

Gold and jewels had ascribed value BEFORE money.

They sure did! Among stable civilizations that had use for luxuries. Bling means nothing to a starving man. It gets them nothing of use till an economy is restored that values them.

But, for a fun read, find a copy of "Alas, Babylon", a post-(atomic)-apocalypse novel.

Will look into it, but I don't know of it will beat out the view presented by Mad Max, or McCarthy's The Road. That's how I picture a realistic post apocalypse.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I'm familiar with Mad Max. Not "The Road". Alas Babylon is a "immediately after the nuclear exchange" scenario. I didn't know jewelry could be lethal.

 

[theprestige]

Gold and jewels had ascribed value BEFORE money.

But, for a fun read, find a copy of "Alas, Babylon", a post-(atomic)-apocalypse novel.

Two men show up at your post-apocalyptic farm. One has a sack full of gold and jewels. The other has a truckload of fertilizer. Both want to trade for your entire crop, to feed their people for another season. Which one do you sell to?

Hell, why would you take Mister Gold and Jewels seriously at all? It's obvious his people can't or won't farm, or mine, or otherwise gather commodities for trade.

Assuming they don't starve to death, they're almost certainly going to show up again next year with violence, to take your crops by force because they like that better than actually producing trade goods of their own.

I'd buy extra fertilizer, just to mine the app roaches for when the reavers show up.

 

[Thermal]

I'm familiar with Mad Max. Not "The Road". Alas Babylon is a "immediately after the nuclear exchange" scenario. I didn't know jewelry could be lethal.

Mad Max is obviously way comic book, but the value on survival necessities wars realistic. Started with gas in the first, then food and water that wasn't radioactive by the third as their society started to rebuild (in Bartertown).

Cormac McCarthy's The Road is a great read, just from the literary standpoint. Without giving anything away (obvious in the first page or so), it was all about finding food after a nuclear detonation, and the horrific logistics that followed.

 

[theprestige]

I'm familiar with Mad Max. Not "The Road". Alas Babylon is a "immediately after the nuclear exchange" scenario. I didn't know jewelry could be lethal.

No but I really want you to explain how I'm supposed to ascribe value to a gold bar, in a post apocalyptic economy.

If I can manufacture penicillin, why would would I want to be paid in gold, rather than livestock, produce, bullets, tools, or labor?

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Well, I once ate a Mekong catfish that had been eating* me. So I'm not a fussy eater.


*Technically debriding a wound. The VA docs said the fish might have saved my life, definitely my leg. Never thanked it. :burp:

 

[theprestige]

Well, I once ate a Mekong catfish that had been eating* me. So I'm not a fussy eater.


*Technically debriding a wound. The VA docs said the fish might have saved my life, definitely my leg. Never thanked it. :burp:

Even if believed this opportunistic anecdote (which I don't), it still wouldn't support your bizarre claim that subsistence farmers would prize gold over fertilizer, lumber, fuel oil, or some other commodity with immediate practical applications.

 

[Roger Ramjets]

If I can manufacture penicillin, why would would I want to be paid in gold, rather than livestock, produce, bullets, tools, or labor?

Because even a post-apocalyptic economy will want money. The limited usefulness of gold as a consumable - along with its durability and decorativeness - is precisely what makes it useful as a currency.

If you can manufacture something then you can probably produce more than you need for personal use, which opens up the possibility of barter. However the person you are trading with needs to have something of equivalent value that you want, which quickly becomes unmanageable. Money makes trading easier because coins can represent anything, in a form that is easy to carry around.

The downside of gold in a post-apocalyptic world is its scarcity. This was a problem even in ancient times. Money is really just a generic IOU which can be freely passed around, so anything that can be made to unambiguously represent the value owed will do. What would a post-apocalyptic world have relatively large quantities of that are practically useless but durable and hard to reproduce? Candy bar wrappers - specifically the printed foil wrappers on commercial chocolate bars.

Anyone worried about apocalyptic collapse of society should horde chocolate bars. You should collect as many different ones as possible, because you don't know which ones will be the most valuable. Best to store whole bars, because they have high energy value and you can eat them and still 'have' them. Uneaten chocolate bars will be very valuable. Partially eaten ones less so, but still worth more than the bare wrapper alone.

 

[theprestige]

Because even a post-apocalyptic economy will want money. The limited usefulness of gold as a consumable - along with its durability and decorativeness - is precisely what makes it useful as a currency.

If you can manufacture something then you can probably produce more than you need for personal use, which opens up the possibility of barter. However the person you are trading with needs to have something of equivalent value that you want, which quickly becomes unmanageable. Money makes trading easier because coins can represent anything, in a form that is easy to carry around.

The downside of gold in a post-apocalyptic world is its scarcity. This was a problem even in ancient times. Money is really just a generic IOU which can be freely passed around, so anything that can be made to unambiguously represent the value owed will do. What would a post-apocalyptic world have relatively large quantities of that are practically useless but durable and hard to reproduce? Candy bar wrappers - specifically the printed foil wrappers on commercial chocolate bars.

Anyone worried about apocalyptic collapse of society should horde chocolate bars. You should collect as many different ones as possible, because you don't know which ones will be the most valuable. Best to store whole bars, because they have high energy value and you can eat them and still 'have' them. Uneaten chocolate bars will be very valuable. Partially eaten ones less so, but still worth more than the bare wrapper alone.

Penicillin is also scarce.

I'd rather found my community on a tradeable commodity with real worth, than on an arbitrary valuation inherited from a dead society.

As far as I can tell, the people who want to uphold the value of fiat currency in a post apocalyptic economy are exactly the people you want to shoot the moment they arrive at your gates.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

Hyped up melodrama or legit long-term concern?

How far will AI go to defend its own survival?

Recent safety tests show some AI models are capable of sabotaging commands or even resorting to blackmail to avoid being turned off or replaced.

www.nbcnews.com

I strongly object to the thread title. I never called anyone

 

[alfaniner]

I strongly object to the thread title. I never called anyone

Well, I've been waiting... (Al - faniner)
This is why when referring to the ultimate destruction of humanity I'm always going to type it as "Ai", because of that font confusion.
Still, if Ai gets control of even a small amount of certain services, it could either entice or force real humans to do the things it needs to do to get even stronger. (See Colossus: The Forbin Project.)