Hacker News with Generative AI: Social Change

A 1930s movement wanted to merge the US, Canada and Greenland (theconversation.com)
A movement that wanted to merge North America into one nation and extend its borders as far as the Panama Canal might sound incredibly familiar. But this group, called the “technocracy movement”, was a group of 1930s nonconformists with big ideas about how to rearrange US society. They proposed a vision that would get rid of waste and make North America highly productive by using technology and science.

History, North America, Political Movements, Social Change

20 points by valeg 10 days ago | 6 comments

We Should Own the Economy (elysian.press)
We need to change who owns capital.

Economics, Capitalism, Social Change

27 points by tndl 13 days ago | 48 comments

The political philosophy motivating Musk (archive.org)
I have always been a huge science fiction fan, and I find these days that it’s helping me in my work life. Great science fiction often deals with geopolitical issues, broad social pendulum shifts, and large-scale systems failure (think Dune, or Isaac Asimov’s The Foundation trilogy, which I inhaled when I was about 12 and re-read for fun every decade or so). All these are in play today, particularly in the US, where politics is totally in flux.

Politics, Philosophy, Science Fiction, Social Change

14 points by doener 19 days ago | 16 comments

Extreme poverty in India has dropped to negligible levels (economist.com)
Thirty years ago Siddharth Dube, a writer, visited a small village in northern India near the site of a historic peasants’ revolt. He found plenty that remained enraging: mud huts, primitive ploughs, “barefoot old men” and “bone-thin children”. One older villager, Ram Dass, recalled the bitter deprivation of his younger years, when he would work long days on someone else’s land for the meagre reward of 1.5kg of grain.

Poverty, India, Economics, Social Change

233 points by suraci 23 days ago | 233 comments

Idées-Forces (newleftreview.org)
How important is the role of ideas in the political upheavals that have marked great historical changes? Are they mere mental epiphenomena of much profounder material and social processes, or do they possess a decisive autonomous power as forces of political mobilization?

Politics, History, Ideas, Social Change

16 points by hackandthink 24 days ago | 2 comments

A humble attempt to save Europe (ycombinator.com)
A friend and I have been working on an idea to create a little bit of European dynamism—because to be honest Europe is cooked and I feel like I have to try do something

Europe, Social Change, Innovation

19 points by solettyy 32 days ago | 18 comments

The End of Children: Birth rates are crashing around the world (newyorker.com)
Societies do collapse, sometimes suddenly. Nevertheless, prophets of doom might keep in mind that their darkest predictions have been, on the whole, a little premature.

Demographics, Population Trends, Social Change

9 points by haltingproblem 32 days ago | 2 comments

'Everybody is looking at their phones,' says man freed after 30 years in prison (news.sky.com)
A man who has been released from prison after 30 years for a crime he says he never committed has been readjusting to life - and getting used to just how connected people are now.

Social Commentary, Technology, Crime, Prison, Social Change

188 points by austinallegro 38 days ago | 171 comments

Population Decline Will Transform Our Social World (jacobin.com)
Population growth has been slowing and even reversing in many countries, a trend with far-reaching social implications that looks certain to continue.

Demographics, Social Change, Economics

8 points by PaulHoule 44 days ago | 0 comments

A dose of MDMA transformed a white supremacist (bbc.com)
Brendan was once a leader in the US white nationalist movement. But when he took the drug MDMA in a scientific study, it would radically change his extremist beliefs – to the surprise of everyone involved. Rachel Nuwer investigates what happened.

Drugs, Psychology, Extremism, Social Change

44 points by fzliu 68 days ago | 13 comments

Men have grown twice as much as women over past century, study shows (theguardian.com)
Amid the profound changes humanity has witnessed, one might be forgiven for failing to notice a rise in sexy and formidable men: those tall, broad-shouldered types that are strangers to self-doubt.

Human Biology, Gender Differences, Demographics, Social Change

13 points by pseudolus 71 days ago | 0 comments

Billionaire-Proofing the Internet; Picks and Shovels Chapter One (Part 5) (pluralistic.net)
Billionaire-proofing the internet: Scolding people for choosing popular services is no way to build a popular movement.

Internet, Technology, Social Change, Movement

5 points by pabs3 74 days ago | 0 comments

Is Societal Collapse Inevitable? (theguardian.com)
For someone who has examined 361 studies and 73 books on societal collapses, Danilo Brozović’s conclusion on what must happen to avoid today’s world imploding is both disarmingly simple and a daunting challenge: “We need dramatic social and technological changes.”

Societal Collapse, Social Change, Technology, Sustainability

16 points by marban 94 days ago | 3 comments

Is Societal Collapse Inevitable? (theguardian.com)
For someone who has examined 361 studies and 73 books on societal collapses, Danilo Brozović’s conclusion on what must happen to avoid today’s world imploding is both disarmingly simple and a daunting challenge: “We need dramatic social and technological changes.”

Societal Collapse, Future, Social Change, Technology

14 points by pseudolus 95 days ago | 6 comments

Underrated Ways to Change the World (experimental-history.com)
A lot of people would like to make the world better, but they don’t know how. This is a great tragedy.

Social Change, Personal Development, Impact

35 points by usrme 134 days ago | 15 comments

The 1600s were a watershed for swear words (2022) (historytoday.com)
Swear words are a constant, but their ability to cause offence is in flux. In the 1600s, today's obscenities were mundane.

Language, History, Linguistics, Culture, Social Change

119 points by pepys 157 days ago | 145 comments

Post-postal: What did we lose when we stopped writing letters? (resobscura.substack.com)
Lately I’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about the world that my two daughters — both under the age of three— will inhabit when they’re adults.

Social Change, Communication, Technology, Culture

68 points by benbreen 161 days ago | 73 comments

Remote Work Was to Reshape the Political and Social Landscape. What Happened? (joanwestenberg.com)
The remote work experiment proved we don’t need to be in an office to succeed—so why are we still being dragged back to our desks?

Remote Work, Workplace Culture, Social Change, Politics

6 points by cratermoon 185 days ago | 0 comments

Deep Adaptation opens up necessary conversation about breakdown of civilisation (2020) (opendemocracy.net)

Climate Change, Civilization, Sustainability, Social Change

5 points by Bluestein 226 days ago | 0 comments

Generation Z Is Revolutionizing Sex (thewalrus.ca)

Generation Z, Sex, Social Change, Demographics

14 points by laurex 233 days ago | 10 comments

What adults lost when kids stopped playing in the street (theatlantic.com)

Childhood, Urban Planning, Social Change

95 points by jseliger 247 days ago | 107 comments

UBI and the Anti-Work Vibe Shift (greshm.org)