Tyler Cowen, by his own report, in a recent podcast on AI and the workplace:

This may sound counterintuitive, but under a lot of scenarios, the more unhappy people are, the better we’re doing, because that means a lot of change.

I repeat:

the more unhappy people are, the better we’re doing, because that means a lot of change.

There may be no more succinct statement of this view of the world, one that brings together a certain approach to capitalism, labor, technology, and “progress.”

This is what R. S. Thomas and Wendell Berry mean by “the machine” or “industrial humanity.” And they were right to hold it in contempt.