What he did not envision is that electronic books are music are often freely available either by or inspite of the publishers wishes.
This is not a bad thing though, music created by those who want to create great music has always sounded better than commercially focused efforts. And the same goes for books. And we should consider that such replication already occurs, except commercial interests have got in the way. Plants and animals are precisely such self creating pattern machines which theoretically produce such abundance. Farming has always produced relative abundance, and in a way this was the first labour saving activity, not that there is no effort, but clearly effort is reduced over hunting and scavenging. I guess we have been on this path for a long time. All these promises of the future seem to also have existed when land was freely available and people owned their own little farm. If only they also had a washing machine, dishwasher, car, internet/phone/TV... John On Sat, Dec 13, 2014 at 10:03 AM, Jed Rothwell <jedrothw...@gmail.com> wrote: > > John Berry <berry.joh...@gmail.com> wrote: > > I just had another idea. >> >> Self sufficiency. >> >> The idea is that with sufficient advances in 3D printers and robots. >> And growing your own food in a personal multi level garden... >> > > Let me again point out that Arthur Clarke described this and all of the > other ideas in this discussion in "Profiles of the Future" in 1963. He > described a "replicator" which is the ultimate form of 3D printer: > > "The advent of the replicator would mean the end of all factories, and > perhaps all transportation of raw materials and all farming. The entire > structure of industry and commerce, as it is now organized, would cease to > exist. Every family would produce all that it needed on the spot—as, > indeed, it has had to do throughout most of human history. The present > machine era of mass production would then be seen as a brief interregnum > between two far longer periods of self-sufficiency, and the only valuable > items of exchange would be the matrices, or recordings, which had to be > inserted in the replicator to control its creations." > > > . . . A society based on the replicator would be so completely different > from ours that the present debate between capitalism and communism would > become quite meaningless. All material possessions would be literally as > cheap as dirt. Soiled handkerchiefs, diamond tiaras, Mona Lisas totally > indistinguishable from the original, once-worn mink stoles, half-consumed > bottles of the most superb champagnes—all would go back into the hopper > when they were no longer required. Even the furniture in the house of the > future might cease to exist when it was not actually in use. > > > At first sight, it might seem that nothing could be of any real value in > this utopia of infinite riches—this world beyond the wildest dreams of > Aladdin. This is a superficial reaction, such as might be expected from a > tenth century monk if you told him that one day every man could possess all > the books he could possibly read. The invention of the printing press has > not made books less valuable, or less appreciated, because they are now > among the commonest instead of the rarest of objects. Nor has music lost > its charms, now that any amount can be obtained at the turn of a switch. . > . ." > > > - Jed > >
