Check out this article for a good summary of all of the pressures on employment coming from technology and automation. I particularly appreciated Jon Evans' efforts here to connect the dots between the loss of employment with the first wave of efforts to deal with the problem: Basic Income or Negative Income Tax. Some writers have taken a dystopian view of this trend, others a utopian, but Evans suggests that the future has already happened. Only instead of happening in America and other developed countries, he suggests post-work societies exist in Brazil, Russia, and India. Also great is the list of links which is a veritable who's who on this topic. Enjoy!
Having recently finished the last book in Liu Cixin's instant classic "The Remembrance of Earth's Past" series, Death's End, I can only report a feeling of total amazement and awe. There is so much about this novel that blew my mind, that offered different and better ways of viewing the universe. This novel did what I wish more novels would, serve up a new universe entire, evoking beauty and horror, nobility and disgust, in a timeless monument to unfettered speculation. Obviously, in discussing the events of the last of a trilogy books, spoilers are to be expected. I am, however, going to try to avoid discussing much beyond the first 100 pages of the third novel. I read the translation of this novel, as ushered into being by the amazing talent of Ken Liu. Ken has written of a certain prickliness when it comes to translating work. He makes an effort not to anglicize the source material, not smudging away the occasional difficulties in bringing Cixin...

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