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powerscunner t1_ivuxmxi wrote

Reply to comment by AssWreckage in Amazon introduces Sparrow—a state-of-the-art robot that handles millions of diverse products by maxtility

The 1930's were a naïve time, but it is hard to argue against the tight coupling of economics and energy. Does anything affect the economy like energy?

Plus, it's harder to hide energy use than to hide money use. And I feel like it's easier to distribute energy than money too. The technocrat's whole getting rid of a representative democracy is a bit much - but don't we all wish we could get rid of politicians ;)

Energy accounting (in the technocrat sense) is one of the few alternatives to money I've heard of. My other favorite being an beneficent, omnipotent superintelligence as the only entity with the PIN number to humanity's checking account. But that's still kind of a dictatorial setup, even if benevolent.

I like the idea of allocating energy. It feels fair and closer to true value than abstract moneys.

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SgtAstro t1_ivwf2vu wrote

If we followed this, solar panels would be much more expensive.

The energy to extract raw materials from the earth's crust does not factor in the scarcity of those elements. So as a corse example, a salt mine and an iron mine having the same value because the same energy is used to extract the mass.

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