> Why do Apple, Google and major IT companies seem so much interested by our health suddenly ?
I have come to the conclusion that some of the tech visionaries recently are actually motivated, on the bottom-most level, by doing Good - in the old-fashioned moral sense.
As far as I can tell, Elon Musk is firmly in this category. Recently I've started to believe that Larry Page and Sergey Brin also belong here. Sure, they have companies and profits and board meetings to worry about, and of course they don't mind having their egos pampered a bit, but their prime motivator appears to be improving the future of humanity on a large scale.
Not everyone is like that, however. In fact, the list is very, very short. I'm only willing to put these three names on it, so far. Most of the others are energized by more mundane reasons, and of course there's also a minority of plain old villains out there.
You've named three unbelievably wealthy people who you believe are motivated to Do Good. Which is Iron Man? Which is Batman? And more terrifyingly, which is Ozymandius?
I think we're clear (or at least the press is) on who is Iron Man in this bunch.
Batman is still pretty cool, in my book. I've been around the block, and I've learned that to ask 100% kink-free moral perfection from human beings is a fool's errand. Stomp a few people's faces for the eventual greater good is fine, if you don't do it too much. Not sure if I could find an equivalent in real life, though. Maybe Bill Gates? No, he's more like the ruthless merchant turned philantropist.
Ozymandias is some famous media moguls, along with a bunch of finance tycoons for good measure. It's a far more popular archetype.
I'm sorry, I used to be a die-hard Linux desperado way back in the day, I must have some sort of mental block against Bill Gates.
Yes, I feel inclined more and more to add him, too, to the list. I hated his business tactics in the past, but his persona after retirement is nothing short of awesome.
Yes, it's not very nice to collude. On the other hand, were programmers get very good salaries. To some, maybe even Sergey, it might not seem like an urjent and critical moral issue,in the way that saving lives is.
If it's not an urgent and critical issue, then he would have just let it be, and would have let the free market for wages sort itself out. Instead, he actively sought to impair the ability of his own employees, the people he can most directly impact in life, to earn a living that was consistent with the intellectual capital they had spent years gaining, and all for the sake of his own personal gain. You guys can put as much lipstick on this pig as you want to, but what he did was truly shitty and not the action of a good person. Maybe he's changed, but I haven't heard an apology or anything (not that I'd expect to given the legal liability that would expose him to).
No doubt they have their skeletons in a closet, somewhere. The biggest paragon of morality is bound to have hurt someone, at some point. The obverse is certainly true of the greatest villains, too.
After a while, you learn to let go of details, step back, and consider the big picture. How will this person go down in history? That's what really matters. So far I'm getting very good vibes from these guys, overall.
Just to get this straight, you are under the impression that actually doing documented and premeditated bad deeds is irrelevant, but 'vibes' are important to developing an opinion on someone's character?
The thing about visionary technologists and supervillains is that it's pretty hard to tell the difference before the maniacal laughter starts. Still, I fucking love supervillains, so it's all good to me.
I have come to the conclusion that some of the tech visionaries recently are actually motivated, on the bottom-most level, by doing Good - in the old-fashioned moral sense.
As far as I can tell, Elon Musk is firmly in this category. Recently I've started to believe that Larry Page and Sergey Brin also belong here. Sure, they have companies and profits and board meetings to worry about, and of course they don't mind having their egos pampered a bit, but their prime motivator appears to be improving the future of humanity on a large scale.
Not everyone is like that, however. In fact, the list is very, very short. I'm only willing to put these three names on it, so far. Most of the others are energized by more mundane reasons, and of course there's also a minority of plain old villains out there.