You’re right and I’ve a interesting thought experiment I’ve played out here before…

Try and imagine up some groundbreaking new technology. For example, a device that can carbon copy the entire universe and embed you within it as a temporary sandbox environment. It’s literally the entire universe, copied and playing out as a slightly alternate reality, and you get to go in there to do whatever you want.

We currently live in a world that would put profit before important ethical questions like: do the simulated people have rights? Are their experiences as real to them as ours are to us? How can we ever be sure we are any different from them, more “real,” and how would we like it if a god figure popped into our universe just because it could?

We currently live in a world that would soon market this as a technology that lets you live your wildest adventures with no consequences. People would engage in murder, rape, … over and over again. People would defend it, “they aren’t real…”

I like to think a different kind of world is possible… one where the speed of innovation isn’t at odds with the stability of governance. One where a new technology doesn’t risk an arms race because of fear and game theory mechanics. One where you can still get ahead, but your fellow man also helps you from falling behind. One where technology actually serves the majority, like it was first touted to do.

But then I remember we have like 10 years to figure this shit out before the Earth turns into an oven / freezer for the next century.