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3.64 AVERAGE
3.64 AVERAGE
hopeful
informative
medium-paced
I really wanted to love this book. Possibly too much. Possibly, I pinned my hopes for a left wing coherent vision of the future and how we re-establish society to get there on this book, and that’s why it fell so short of my expectations.
The first 2/3 of the book detail historical developments in tech and predict future ones. I found this a little tedious, with references to the “state of nature” and “agricultural revolution” juxtaposed with descriptions of widely available gene editing and lab grown meat feeling too much like over-trodden ground.
I wasn’t sure whether the final third was intended as a manifesto for luxury communism, or a pragmatic guide as to how to get there, but I felt it fell short in both categories. Instead, it gave a lukewarm rehash of previous arguments, and some examples of how movements away from neoliberalism have been beneficial.
As I said I may have had too high expectations, and I did learn some things from this book- about Marxist theory and some ideas that rang true about the current state of the labour movement - but overall it was a bit meh for me.
The first 2/3 of the book detail historical developments in tech and predict future ones. I found this a little tedious, with references to the “state of nature” and “agricultural revolution” juxtaposed with descriptions of widely available gene editing and lab grown meat feeling too much like over-trodden ground.
I wasn’t sure whether the final third was intended as a manifesto for luxury communism, or a pragmatic guide as to how to get there, but I felt it fell short in both categories. Instead, it gave a lukewarm rehash of previous arguments, and some examples of how movements away from neoliberalism have been beneficial.
As I said I may have had too high expectations, and I did learn some things from this book- about Marxist theory and some ideas that rang true about the current state of the labour movement - but overall it was a bit meh for me.
informative
informative
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
hopeful
informative
medium-paced
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
medium-paced
informative
inspiring
slow-paced
Overall, Fully Automated Luxury Communism is a sufficient manifest arguing for a post-capitalist world necessary to accommodate a world that has surpassed scarcity in the many facets that we currently see it (labor, energy, and material). Bastani proposes that a coming “third disruption” to our world will bring about this post-scarcity and, thus, this post-capitalism that he reasons for here. This third disruption will bring about considerable change to our world that our current socioeconomic state may be incapable of adapting to, as the first two disruptions had done before it. The first two being the agricultural and industrial revolutions, respectively, which each completely changed the world, and the third being an upcoming artificial intelligence revolution.
Bastani does well at describing the reasons that this third disruption is coming and that our current system may be incapable of adapting to it, but, ultimately, his argument of how FALC will be necessary to overcome these challenges is certainly the weakest part of the manifest. His convincing argument for this third disruption and the need for a new or updated system is backed by sufficient examples and interesting evidence, particularly when he describes the ideas of how we will reach post-scarcity. However, by trying to tackle such a vast range of fields and areas to explore and explain the third disruption, it’s induced-post-scarcity, and his potential post-capitalist world, he opens himself and his argument up to minor inaccuracies, especially in fields which he is not an expert in. For example, he incorrectly uses the term “meteorites” to refer to “meteoroids”, which is a minor difference for someone who is not in the field of astronomy, but making these types of minor terminology issues hints of larger research-based issues hidden deep inside of his unnecessarily wordy text.
The writing for the book is my final point of contention. Bastani writes in his native British English style, which may be a turnoff for readers that are unfamiliar with its intricacies (e.g., it’s widespread neglect for Oxford commas). This is not a reason to deduct any points in my eyes, but Bastani writes both grammatically informally and overly wordy throughout, despite attempting to achieve a formal and academic tone. For example, he often begins a sentence with an explanatory statement that precedes what it aims to explain (such as “Thus, because Britain’s private rail providers, just like its outsourcing companies, are nothing more than machines designed to extract value for shareholders at the expense of workers and service users.” p.204).
Overall, despite the minor research inaccuracies, which are unexpected for a researcher of his caliber, and the grammatical upset, I believe that this manifest hosts an abundance of important ideas about our changing world that people should be interested in. As such, I hope to see more discussion about this coming third disruption and how we can adapt to it in the future.
Bastani does well at describing the reasons that this third disruption is coming and that our current system may be incapable of adapting to it, but, ultimately, his argument of how FALC will be necessary to overcome these challenges is certainly the weakest part of the manifest. His convincing argument for this third disruption and the need for a new or updated system is backed by sufficient examples and interesting evidence, particularly when he describes the ideas of how we will reach post-scarcity. However, by trying to tackle such a vast range of fields and areas to explore and explain the third disruption, it’s induced-post-scarcity, and his potential post-capitalist world, he opens himself and his argument up to minor inaccuracies, especially in fields which he is not an expert in. For example, he incorrectly uses the term “meteorites” to refer to “meteoroids”, which is a minor difference for someone who is not in the field of astronomy, but making these types of minor terminology issues hints of larger research-based issues hidden deep inside of his unnecessarily wordy text.
The writing for the book is my final point of contention. Bastani writes in his native British English style, which may be a turnoff for readers that are unfamiliar with its intricacies (e.g., it’s widespread neglect for Oxford commas). This is not a reason to deduct any points in my eyes, but Bastani writes both grammatically informally and overly wordy throughout, despite attempting to achieve a formal and academic tone. For example, he often begins a sentence with an explanatory statement that precedes what it aims to explain (such as “Thus, because Britain’s private rail providers, just like its outsourcing companies, are nothing more than machines designed to extract value for shareholders at the expense of workers and service users.” p.204).
Overall, despite the minor research inaccuracies, which are unexpected for a researcher of his caliber, and the grammatical upset, I believe that this manifest hosts an abundance of important ideas about our changing world that people should be interested in. As such, I hope to see more discussion about this coming third disruption and how we can adapt to it in the future.
An interesting book that talks about how we should move from capitalism to the newly coined term: Fully Automated Luxury Communism, where people are freed from work and enjoy a life of luxury under AI automation and an abundance of energy and resources.
Most of the book is about explaining how we will reach this stage. By overcoming issues in labor, energy, resources, health, and food. And how capitalism is causing a problem in all of these areas, e.g. climate issues or low wage exploitation. Overall, I enjoyed these chapters because most of what is explained here is fairly realistic and can be done in the next 100-200 years, but I've also come across this in many other books and I didn't find anything new here.
I'm disappointed that the book didn't answer some key questions I had. How will humans progress further if no one is doing the work? What incentive does a person have to create something new or start a new business? I believe the author could've spent more time explaining how the world would actually look once we reach the stage he described.
Most of the book is about explaining how we will reach this stage. By overcoming issues in labor, energy, resources, health, and food. And how capitalism is causing a problem in all of these areas, e.g. climate issues or low wage exploitation. Overall, I enjoyed these chapters because most of what is explained here is fairly realistic and can be done in the next 100-200 years, but I've also come across this in many other books and I didn't find anything new here.
I'm disappointed that the book didn't answer some key questions I had. How will humans progress further if no one is doing the work? What incentive does a person have to create something new or start a new business? I believe the author could've spent more time explaining how the world would actually look once we reach the stage he described.
The best thing about this book is that it avoids the usual inaccessibility of leftist theory. The books is a breeze to read. And for those not yet aware of cutting-edge economic developments like asteroid mining, the book will be a wealth of new info. But that info can be found in better form in various other books or any random speculative op-ed.
The worst thing about this book is the breezy one-sided arguments that avoid good-faith assessments or the strongest arguments on the other side. For someone like me that is best described as a radical centrist sympathetic to socialist and free market programs, it screams of shallow ideology and brazen bias. Bastani acts like any new kind of economic development (specifically social media and the information economy in this book) cannot possibly still be consistent with capitalism, but the very examples he gives (like Spotify) represent the flexibility and ingenuity of capitalism to retain the core features of free markets despite "creative destruction" (which, of course, is itself a core feature of capitalism a la Schumpeter). I'm not even sure Bastani represents leftists intellectual history or contemporary movements all that well: He claims communism has never been possible until now and then never really talks about socializing the means of production or addresses his praise for venture capitalists to cite two quick examples.
I'm still mad at my Kindle for not allowing me to export the copious notes and highlights I made in the Verso e-book format, so in lieu of manually typing all of that up for a book I'm not eager to spend more time on, I'm just going to redirect you to this extensive, leftist critique.
The worst thing about this book is the breezy one-sided arguments that avoid good-faith assessments or the strongest arguments on the other side. For someone like me that is best described as a radical centrist sympathetic to socialist and free market programs, it screams of shallow ideology and brazen bias. Bastani acts like any new kind of economic development (specifically social media and the information economy in this book) cannot possibly still be consistent with capitalism, but the very examples he gives (like Spotify) represent the flexibility and ingenuity of capitalism to retain the core features of free markets despite "creative destruction" (which, of course, is itself a core feature of capitalism a la Schumpeter). I'm not even sure Bastani represents leftists intellectual history or contemporary movements all that well: He claims communism has never been possible until now and then never really talks about socializing the means of production or addresses his praise for venture capitalists to cite two quick examples.
I'm still mad at my Kindle for not allowing me to export the copious notes and highlights I made in the Verso e-book format, so in lieu of manually typing all of that up for a book I'm not eager to spend more time on, I'm just going to redirect you to this extensive, leftist critique.
Really too pie-in-the-sky for my liking. This author correctly identifies that technology creates radical shifts in human culture and behavior but fails to criticaly engage with any of the forces acting against everyone's best interest, namely the incredible influences of the mega rich who really don't have any motivationto improvelife for the common man. He leaves some arguments on the table unexamined (for example, is it ethical to mine space resources?) and powers full steam ahead. He fails to criticize ways large companies like Amazon do their best to eliminate worker freedoms while surging ahead with automating in the search for profits, but does spend a few pages marveling over the idea of Amazon's "grab n go" stores concept... Also cannot stand a book that discusses climate change in a broad political context that fails to mention the repeated efforts to suppress climate change science since the 1950s.
Whenever Bastani does take a moment to mention how things actually work in the here and now, his best advice for how we'll convince those with power to do what is best is... lacking, to say the least. He'll broadly suggest we institute Universal Basic Services, that we switch to all renewable power, that we break from neoliberalism... And the entire time I'm steaming over the lack of actually actionable movements for the average person to make.
A lot assumed and a lot swept under the rug for the sake of a pretty thin argument. This book would have been better off as a "look at some of the cool stuff we might have in the future" spec tech book rather than a political treatise.
Whenever Bastani does take a moment to mention how things actually work in the here and now, his best advice for how we'll convince those with power to do what is best is... lacking, to say the least. He'll broadly suggest we institute Universal Basic Services, that we switch to all renewable power, that we break from neoliberalism... And the entire time I'm steaming over the lack of actually actionable movements for the average person to make.
A lot assumed and a lot swept under the rug for the sake of a pretty thin argument. This book would have been better off as a "look at some of the cool stuff we might have in the future" spec tech book rather than a political treatise.
hopeful
informative
inspiring
fast-paced
First time I've felt hope for the future in a long time.