History already ran this experiment… the machine smashers lost

16 Aug 2026 · 1 min

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In this brief monologue, Dan Novaes recounts the story of the Luddites during the Industrial Revolution, describing how the introduction of mechanized production dramatically increased productivity, prompting workers to fear job loss and respond by destroying machines. He explains that despite a five‑year period of machine sabotage, the new technology could not be halted; instead, it spurred the creation of entirely new occupations related to manufacturing, distribution, and support. Novaes uses this historical episode as an analogy for contemporary automation and AI, arguing that when a technology yields massive productivity gains, societal resistance cannot stop its advance, and economies will inevitably adapt by generating new roles.

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Almost to the T, 210 years ago, there was a group called the Luddites, and this happened during the Industrial Revolution. The Industrial Revolution was one of the last major times that we had this like complete change in how people were living. And then now they were super productive because this machinery could essentially replicate what people were doing by hand, and you could output thousands of widgets instead of one widget in a small period of time. People were freaking out like, you're taking my job, whatever. So there was this movement and it was called the Luddites, and they'd go and just destroy machines. And that's what they did, right? Lasted for about 5 years and they would just try and destroy these machines. But it just— you can't destroy every machine. And then eventually people realized, oh, you know what, actually these machines are creating a whole new set of jobs, right? So like when you're making 1,000 widgets, how do you now deliver widgets to people? They used to not have to go and think about that. And so new jobs were created. And so essentially that movement faded away. But the point is that the moment that something happens that creates immense productivity in society, it's going to continue happening. No one is going to stop it.