Hacker News Reader

Comment by bjt2n3904 | Hacker News Reader

> There would be still be very rich and poor people, but we could eliminate fear, suffering, and existential panic for a substantial part of the population. #6m28s

I actually laughed when I heard them say this, given their videos on things like the Fermi Paradox.

View on HN

Can you break that down a little more? I'm having trouble connecting those two statements.

Many of their earlier videos (before they started to do "What If" videos a la XKCD) focused on the confusing, absurd, and seemingly meaningless existence of humanity -- so much so, that they made a video on "Optimistic Nihilism".

They're quite reserved in the statements that they make, as well. They won't say life is meaningless, only that we haven't found something we truly agree upon as meaningful, and given that the universe is headed towards big crunch / heat death, what does it all matter?

Given those two points, I found it amusing that they'd go so far to say that simply giving someone $1000 a month COULD resolve misery, suffering, and existential angst. It seems to fly in the face of their ethos.

I think "existential panic" in this case maybe isn't referring to existentialism, but... existence? Like if you aren't going to have food tomorrow, and there's no solid prospect of figuring out how to get food the next day, that's a panic fueled by the desire to continue to exist. It's kind of an imprecise term in this case, but that's what I took it to mean.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com