Originally posted by bradybaker
It's clear that people (in general) desire the rich, powerful, intelligent and talented. So would it not follow that music, art, ecomomics, and technology are just the result of things we do to get in each other's pants?
Historically? When these things first emerged from hominid behavior? Probably.
But today, now that each of these things have taken on their own evolutionary characteristics? No, they've become significantly more independent and are definitely not \"just\" the result of the desire to reproduce.
Ultimately they're related to reproduction on a high level of abstraction. These things all have to do with creativity, and procreation is one of the most ancient creative acts we have. But we no longer think of it as creative, assuming we ever did. Creation means a whole lot more to us, doesn't it?
Ask any artist if they do what they do because they want to have sex. They'll probably admit, \"it'd be really nice,\" but not claim that it is the primary goal of their work.
Why don't I ask you... Do you write scripts so that you can sexually reproduce?
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Oh yeah, here's a link to a paper by Kurzweil that is his essential thesis, the \"law of accelerating returns.\"
http://www.kurzweilai.net/articles/art0134...tml?printable=1
It's a bit long, but you can scroll down to the parts where he talks about evolution without missing much.
And just to add, as a nascent economist, it's this part towards the end that mostly concerns me:
Originally posted by Kurzweil
I am not saying that technology will evolve to human levels and beyond simply because it is our destiny and because of the satisfaction of a spiritual quest. Rather my projections result from a methodology based on the dynamics underlying the (double) exponential growth of technological processes. The primary force driving technology is economic imperative. We are moving toward machines with human level intelligence (and beyond) as the result of millions of small advances, each with their own particular economic justification.
Let me tell you, not only does no one talk about that in business school, but the fundamental precepts of economics that are taught in econ courses outright contradict Kurzweil's claims. In particular, I'm referring to diminishing marginal returns (which is of course the opposite of accelerating returns) and the quantity theory of money, which states that price deflation is detrimental to economic growth, a la the Great Depression (which would preclude economic growth from Kurzweil's accelerating price-performance on abstract technological services, such as computation cycles). Both of these concepts are at the core of Microeconomics and Macroeconomics respectively. And they're basically a bunch of shit, according to Kurzweil.
And I'm inclined to agree.
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