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The colossal problem with universal basic income
Here's why universal basic income will hurt the 99%, and make the 1% even richer.
22 March, 2019
Videos
- Universal basic income is a band-aid solution that will not solve wealth inequality, says Rushkoff.
- Funneling money to the 99% perpetuates their roles as consumers, pumping money straight back up to the 1% at the top of the pyramid.
- Rushkoff suggests universal basic assets instead, so that the people at the bottom of the pyramid can own some means of production and participate in the profits of mega-rich companies.
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The internet is emotionally abusing us. And we can't quit it.
Algorithms and propagandists exploit the human instinct to connect to play us.
29 January, 2019
Videos
- We invest trillions in companies that develop algorithms designed to play us for the sake of profits.
- Facebook algorithms, for instance, show us content that will provoke emotional responses.
- The algorithms look for "exploits" in humans, find how we establish rapport with others, and leverage it for marketing.
Videos
- Facebook and Google began as companies with supposedly noble purposes.
- Creating a more connected world and indexing the world's information: what could be better than that?
- But pressure to return value to shareholders came at the expense of their own users.
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Why 'upgrading' humanity is a transhumanist myth
Upload your mind? Here's a reality check on the Singularity.
18 January, 2019
Videos
- Though computer engineers claim to know what human consciousness is, many neuroscientists say that we're nowhere close to understanding what it is, or its source.
- Scientists are currently trying to upload human minds to silicon chips, or re-create consciousness with algorithms, but this may be hubristic because we still know so little about what it means to be human.
- Is transhumanism a journey forward or an escape from reality?
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Douglas Rushkoff
Douglas Rushkoff is the host of the Team Human podcast and a professor of digital economics at CUNY/Queens. He is also the author of a dozen bestselling books on media, technology, and culture, including, Present Shock, Program or Be Programmed, Media Virus, and Team Human, the last of which is his latest work.
