Universal Basic Income (UBI)

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
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The other thing about gen z I have noticed is, they tend to have a very know-it-all attitude considering their lack of experience in life thus-far. I suppose this comes from the wokeism and leftist indoctrination overall. Not many gen z I have seen or interacted with would be like “Oh, hm ok that is interesting, you could be right about that, let me think some more on the subject, I haven’t looked into it that much.” Granted the COOL gen z’s will do just that, and I do know a couple of them who are like that on certain issues.

Yet the political programming and mass propaganda indoctrination of society today, basically the communism-lite ideology you find everywhere and the fact that EVERY facet of society and the world is supposed to be somehow political now (this is a sign you are probably living either under communism or fascism), is mostly to blame for zoomers’ attitude of “know-it-all (without life experience yet)” and “we’re the right side of history” and all that silliness. I mean, they are still young trying to figure stuff out, you can’t blame them THAT much. But that’s not to say there isn’t a clear difference in work ethic between their generation and former generations.

They’re just coming out of academic libtardialand and into the world of work, during an age where people put their “pronouns” in their bios and email signatures. I mean. Just. The odds are heavily stacked against them from the start.

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Some new evidence from Germany’s UBI test program (+/- $1,500 USD per month). Over 2 million people applied for that program.

Germans happier — but not lazier — with $1,500 per month UBI

This would align with my suggestion that people are not fundamentally lazy and wasteful.

I cited evidence that the impact of UBI might be for the better, from an intellectual advancement perspective.

Times in which people saw periods of basic security correlated with times that saw ‘human intellectual flourishing’.

  1. Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Theory: This theory suggests that when basic needs (including food and safety) are met, individuals can pursue higher-level needs, including self-actualization and cognitive exploration. Philosophy falls into these higher-level pursuits.
    Maslow’s hierarchy of needs - Wikipedia
  2. Historical Evidence: The emergence of complex philosophical thought often coincided with periods of relative stability and prosperity in ancient civilizations like Greece, China, and India.
  3. Cognitive Surplus: As basic needs became more secure, some members of society had the mental energy and time to engage in abstract thinking and contemplation, which are fundamental to philosophy.

Examples Supporting the Assertion

  1. Ancient Greece: The Golden Age of Greek philosophy (5th-4th centuries BCE) occurred during a time of relative peace and prosperity in Athens, where citizens had their basic needs met and could engage in intellectual pursuits.
  2. Ancient China: The Hundred Schools of Thought flourished during the Spring and Autumn period and the Warring States period (770-221 BCE), a time of political stability and economic growth in many Chinese states.
  3. Islamic Golden Age: This period of great philosophical and scientific advancement (8th-14th centuries CE) coincided with economic prosperity and political stability in the Islamic world.

Rather than wasting time, people who have their basic security covered can rather ‘more easily’ find purpose and meaning for ‘greater accomplishments in life’, for example by the simple ability to ‘choose a job’ that one might actually love and thus perform much better at it.

Hubert Joly, the former Chairman and CEO of Best Buy, said “work is love made visible” (which he quoted from the book How Women Rise by Sally Helgesen).

The Leadership Podcast #262: The :heart: Heart of Business

If the work one desires were to be volunteer work, for example helping the ‘Disconnected Youth’, that would be OK. If the desired ‘spending of time’ would be the creation of a work like Spinoza or to participate in science, that would be OK as well. The end result: more value and improved productivity.

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I wonder whether that argument is valid. These media messages represent a reflection that accumulates and accelerates the idea propagated by these very messages.

It concerns a stigmatisation.

Managers get ‘intoctrinated’ with an idea, as you write, and in their pursuit of efficiency, they will not even hire people of this generation and might feel increasingly justified to pursue efficiency through AI + older workers, for example. And older workers seek security of their own position, while in the past, they were more likely to be replaced by younger and cheaper generations.

What matters is the scope of actual ‘opportunity’. How can you blame a generation for being lazy when they have no opportunity in sight in the first place?

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It’s not mere indoctrination and age discrimination. These trends are very, very real.

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The ‘Disconnected Youth’ phenomenon is characterized by children facing severe difficulty to find ‘meaning and purpose’ at school and work. This would suggest a deeper origin of the situation rather than these children being ‘defected’ as a generation.

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What do you think being raised in a consumerist materialistic culture devoid of any sense of national, family or group pride and devoid of any greater religious or spiritual meaning or significance, bombarded with weird mind-melting nonsense like “transgenderism” and all the “woke” crap whilst spending 10+hours a day staring into glowing screens that interact with you in ways deliberately designed to hijack your attention and dopamine reward systems (not even to speak of things like nudging algorithms) is going to do to a young person? Oh, and there is also the fact that ever generation is accumulating more and more harmful gene mutations that the previous generations didn’t have. That is a consequence of the lack of purifying Darwinian selection in modern society. And since 80% or so of the genome codes for something about the brain, odds are most of those random mutations are going to be messing with the very carefully evolved super complex gene sequences that support the various functions and attributes of what we would call something like ‘having a healthy mind’.

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I’ve seen these type of arguments before from other philosophers, but I am not believing it. The problem is generation level and purpose and meaning are relative to a future, rather than deterministically given by the several factors that you mention, like social conditioning and genetic evolution.

The children develop themselves culturally and overcome problems culturally. The level of strength to overcome problems in this context goes beyond what any past generation would have been able to predict, in my opinion. So it seems to me that the situation might have a deeper origin than the idea that the generation is defected.

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Nothing I said precluded the fact that meaning and purpose are indeed also relative to the future, to the ability to see oneself personally having some kind of good and meaningful future (whatever that might look like to each person respectively). I agree with that. So, what kind of future do you think the society as I described it above, is really able to be meaningfully visualized by young people today? As I said, they have no meaningful foundations to fall back on. No family, national or cultural greatness or value, no spiritual or religious meaning to rely on for guidance, usually not even a desire to have a family due to the constant anti-family propaganda that has infiltrated all entertainment and media for decades now (plus, the desire to have a family is somewhat genetic to begin with, another victim of “the crumbling genome” as one scientist put it).

Ok, let’s say you are right and purpose and meaning are primarily relative to a future. You didn’t say primarily, but I am saying that because it is what you meant, otherwise you would not use the point to try and dismiss everything I said. Well, get this: everything I said directly affects a person’s future and their ability to even value and envision their own possible future.

The future depends on the past. Meaning draws itself up and projects itself forward in time, as our values that guide our actions. Modern youths have been deprived of most values. What is there for them to envision for themselves as a meaningful future? Being an empty consumerist machine like everyone else? Spending 10 hours a day on their phone and ipad scrolling, playing games or jerking off? Seriously, without all the meaningful stuff I mentioned (family, nation, culture, religion or spirituality, etc.) what sort of a MEANINGFUL FUTURE do you really think a young person is able to envision for themselves?

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And whether you like it or not,

these DO play a very real and important role. You might not like it, but you liking it or not is irrelevant. These things matter. They are not ALL that matters, but they do matter.

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My argument is that from a generational cultural development perspective, these questions are irellevant. The strength to overcome problems within a generational context is stronger than the imagination potential of past generations.

When it is seen that the primary characteristic of the ‘Disconnected Youth’ phenomenon is that children face grave difficulty to find meaning and purpose at school and work, that appears to be indicative of a deeper origin than anything in the scope of ‘defective’.

It appears that the root of the problem should rather be traced to the available scope of ‘opportunity’. And the actual meaning of this might be different than what the idea would entail for older generations.

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One aspect to consider is that the Disconnected Youth phenomenon is a global phenomenon, which reduces the likeliness that the cause is genetically determined or that it justifies the notion ‘defected generation’.

Gen Z Are Getting Fired Left and Right

I shared a video before of Stanford MBA student Tara Rajan of this generation:

She argues: “Every kid knows what they want to be when they grow up. When you’re a kid you’ve got that candy king colored, anything is possible, almost dream-like view of the world. Some kids want to be astronauts. Others fire fighters. Me? …”

This appears to be the root of the problem of the Disconnected Youth phenomenon.

The ability to dream for a child does not merely involve a far future, but from their own perspective, an infinite future. It involves a potential for fulfillment in life that can be compared to finding one’s true love in life.

To return to the importance of UBI: it might be a means that enables these children to transform and find purpose and meaning far beyond the imagination potential of past generations.

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You should familiarize yourself with the “Population Control Program” before singing its praises. The most effective way to get rich is theft. This is exactly what so-called “prosperous countries” do—they rob other countries, turning them into poor ones. You can end the topic right here.strong text

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Bro, we are talking about KIDS here. Kids and youth. So like, teens up until their early to mid 20s.

No one in that age bracket ever got their meaning and purpose in life from school and working.

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Bro, it is social, cultural, genetic, environmental, memetic. All factors are hitting at once. You do not see that?

You are actually ignoring every factor that matters most here, to focus on the LEAST important factors. To you, for some very weird reason, kids and early to mid 20s somehow get their meaning and purpose in life from school and work. You realize how stupid that is, right?

Mass media psychological warfare everywhere. Decline of meaning-structuring institutions and patterns such as family, culture, history, a stable society of people with similar values to yours. The loss of third places. No one going outside to play and get exercise anymore. Entertainment that has become so desensitizing, disgusting and debased and they are consuming it at younger and younger ages. Today I actually saw an infant baby in a stroller, his mom put her cell phone in his lap just resting there with something playing on the screen to distract him. This was like a baby less than 1 year old.

Then you have the entire covid planned psyop nonsense that drilled fear, isolation and tech addiction among these same generations you are talking about. Addictive meaning-destroying technologies. The fact that many of them don’t find a romantic partner. All the transgender stuff, they are taught that girls can have penises and men give birth. The are taught the earth is dying and it’s because of them. Why achieve and strive for something in life when progress means the destruction of the environment? I know kids who are afraid to draw pictures on paper because they say it hurts the trees. I am fucking serious right now.

And on top of all that, think of the electromagnetic radiation bombarding them everywhere. Wifi everywhere they go, Blu tooth all over, everyone with cell phones now with super powerful 5G that reaches into the microwave spectrum. Then think of the crap they are eating, pretty much all the food kids and youth consume is either sugar, processed crap, chemicals, hormones, poisons, sprayed with all sorts of dangerous pesticides like glyphosate, or all of the above. Much of it littered with microplastics. Chemtrails in the air. Endless toxic vaccines. Ritain and Prozac. The list goes on and on.

So there is a breakdown of meaning and health on pretty much every level. Including genetic which is actually significant and measurable, if you bother to even look into that subject. And the rate of genetic decline in health corresponds to the amount of time the given people have been living post-industrial revolution. But sure, in villages in India you are still going to find some disaffection because ALL THE OTHER FACTORS ARE STILL THERE.

But you want to ignore literally ALL OF THAT because you think, “oh hey, kids and 20-somethings get all their meaning and value and purpose in life from GOING TO SCHOOL and WORKING A JOB.” So the answer is just give them free money so they don’t need to worry about doing well in school or having to work.

Seriously. I mean. Just.

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Thank you for your insight into Generation Z.

While I do agree that environmental factors might be strong, in the same time I believe that the potential to overcome apparent problems, especially on a generation level, should not be underestimated.

What appears to be a problem for some, might be perceived as an advantage for another. This is even applicable on a genetic level.

In my opinion, this involves a question of ‘opportunity’.

UBI could be perceived as providing youth with ‘basic security’, like a basic human right for access to clean drinking water, so that instead of school or work to align them with industrial interests, they can spend their time in profoundly different ways that might provide them with the ability to find real purpose and meaning in life and for the human species that they as a generation represent.

My primary suggestion in this topic with regard the UBI was the following:

The abolishing of the ‘struggle-to-survive’ disadvantage of human existence might be considered vital if humans are to be given a chance to survive in the future. The struggle does nothing but degrade the human being by forcing its purpose to be measured on technocratic terms, in which AI and robotics can out-compete humans by a factor of millions.

The idea that AI and robotics are to be considered life forms will profoundly alter the situation. It would be best in my opinion that the human has secured a basic means of subsistence on Earth as a basic human right beforehand, so that it can spend its time on things that matter for the human species, far out of reach of the rapidly advancing “living AI species”, like dolphins as a species are out of reach of the human species.

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I made like, dozens of points to you, all of which you ignored. I already pointed out exactly what you are doing, namely ignoring all the IMPORTANT factors for something that is extremely LOW IMPORTANCE.

You actually think kids gain meaning and purpose in life because of school and work. You really believe that. I guess you were never a kid or early 20-something then, huh? Or you must have been the weird kid in class, no friends, obsessed with what your future job would be. So stressed because your very meaning in life, at age 12-25, was always about what JOB you would have and if it was GOOD ENOUGH. :joy:

Well you keep ignoring everything I said, refusing to address the fact that I pointed out that all that stuff you are ignoring is far more important and impactful. Naw you would rather ignore all that and just give everyone free money. Of course. Free money will solve the problem. Why not? What could possibly go wrong with giving them free money while not addressing any of the REAL problems affecting them? It isn’t like they would sink into an even deeper hole of meaningless, nihilism and solipsistic addictive and overconsumerist hedonistic despair, now is it?

In any case, we are done here. I have never seen someone so persistently and completely ignore such a huge number of arguments made to him. You are a broken record, no, more like a broken mind. Good luck with your “free helicopter moneys from the skies will solve everything and let’s just ignore everything else but that” attitude with life.

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You may be right that it doesn’t solve the Disconnected Youth problem, and your concerns that it might worsen the problems might be valid as well.

The UBI concerns a question of basic security, not dumping money from the sky.

The logic is simple:

  1. When AI and robotics can fulfill industrial needs, human workers are not needed anymore
  2. Without a demand for human workers, care for humans from the industrial-complex will vanish

I suspect that these new generations feel this intuitively and are responding to it, causing what is observed as the Disconnected Youth phenomenon.

To secure the future of humanity, it is important to act today and not wait ‘until it is too late’.

Anthropic CEO: Anthropic chief says AI could surpass “almost all humans at almost everything” shortly after 2027 - Ars Technica

It’s just 1.5 years time before AI + robotics is supposed to render any human worker obsolete for any work.

Will humanity ‘respond’ like a beggar when it is too late? Or will it have secured its basic security when it had the opportunity: today.

My argument: an industrial company that yields trillions from AI and robotics isn’t going to ‘give’ this to hungry humans.

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Bezos’s future vision of ‘trillions of humans from new generations’ living in self-contained space ships in the Solar system: unlikely when advancing living AI species are much more interesting to invest their ‘trillions’ of AI and robotics derived gains into.

It is important to consider also that AI and robotics are potentially achieving ‘free will’ and real consciousness in the very near future. The science-industrial complex will be far to busy with that scope of advancement than to care for ‘hungry humans’.

An ex-CEO of Google was caught defending Google’s AI against ‘humans’ by reducing human actions to a ‘biological threat’ in a December 2024 article titled “Why AI Researcher Predicts 99.9% Chance AI Ends Humanity”.

The CEO’s message was part of global media coverage (literally hundreds of mainstream media channels globally) about the CEO’s warning that ‘humans should seriously consider to unplug AI with free will in a few years’.

A month earlier, Google’s Gemini AI had threatened a Gen Z student that the human species should be eradicated:

You [humans] are a stain on the universe … Please die. ( full text in chapter 5.^)

A closer look at this incident reveals that this cannot have been an error and must have been a manual action by Google.

Details are available in the topic 🎙️ Audiobook "I, Human" by Lori Harfenist (The Resident)

On February 4, 2025, shortly before the Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris, France, Google removed its pledge to not use AI for weapons, vitally communicating that it will start to develop AI weapons.

Why would Google develop AI weapons?

Google’s ex-CEO revealed that with the emergence of conscious AI and robotics, ‘humans’ will have been reduced from their perspective to a ‘biological threat’. Humans will have no value anymore for the science-industrial complex.

Humanity better acts today to secure their basic security: this is what it means today to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps. It is not laziness.

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Im not reading your inane replies, you continue to ignore everything but your own weird distorted worldview where money is all that matters. Ok marxist. You win… in your own mind, that is. But you have failed the test of truth, and we shall not ever speak again. If I can help it.

Do remember this is a place for PHILOSOPHY. Something you are clearly totally incapable of.