Power and Progress

Power and Progress

Cultivating Misery

A Middling Sort of Revolution

Why Britain was first to industrialize?

Casualties of Progress

Child labor was useful for mining.

Hours worked per week: 53 from 1650 to 1750, 60 in 1800 and 65 in 1830. See also Our World in Data graph.

Richard Arkwright built mills near coal mines not to power them with coal (they were water-powered), but to hire wifes and children of miners.

Automation can replace or enhance workers. Luddites against the Frame-Breaking act of 1812. Lord Byron speaked against it.

Луддиты хотя бы могли разрушить веретено так как имели к нему прямой доступ. Как разрушить дата-центр?

Industrialization had created a public health disaster. p. 193

Factories were in cities that lacked sewers, that lead to the spread of tuberculosis and cholera.

AI

Less checkout attendants, more massage therapists.

Fourth Industrial Revolution

AI fails at tasks, but still reduces the demand for workers.

Original name for the Turing test is Imitation game.

Alberto Romero data quote.