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Author Topic: The robots are coming  (Read 213994 times)
Signe
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Reply #210 on: September 15, 2015, 08:49:04 AM

I'm sure there are tons of people who think rebooting the world will bring them salvation.  Entire countries, even.  We need thought monitoring with some sort of early warning mechanism post stat!   ACK!

My Sig Image: hath rid itself of this mortal coil.
shiznitz
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Reply #211 on: September 15, 2015, 11:24:31 AM

Rebooting the world will mean a world rebooted in someone's version of good. That version is unlikely to be your version or my version. It is likely to magnify many current disparities.

I have never played WoW.
pxib
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Reply #212 on: September 15, 2015, 02:42:50 PM

Additionally the reboot process itself is almost guaranteed to be unpleasant and may last several generations.

I still say there's a cost singularity in front of the technological one.

Most of the solutions people are innovating today are facing problems created by last generation's solutions. That has been the historical norm, regardless of the famous exceptions, and there's no reason it won't remain so. Technology also consistently requires more and rarer material, at progressively higher energy costs, both in aggregate and per capita. That we keep up with those costs is, I yield, to be lauded. There's a point at which that is guaranteed to eat its own tail.

Returns diminish... and, in every gamble, risk always goes infinite before reward.

if at last you do succeed, never try again
shiznitz
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Reply #213 on: September 16, 2015, 01:34:06 PM

Let's be clear, though. Robots will not lead to massive unemployment. It will change employment. In 1900, the highest employing job was house servant. Prior to that it was farming. The economy managed to shift away from those large sources of wages quite elegantly. Robots will certainly replace some jobs but having robots in the first place will create new jobs.


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Merusk
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Reply #214 on: September 16, 2015, 01:43:15 PM

That has not been the case to date, so no reason to see it as the case in the future.

Sure, fleets of automated cars need mechanics, but existing mechanics will transition. Programmers? Not full time. Longshoremen at warehouses? Again, not full time and you've got those already.

No, the problem is automation isn't like the transition of the 19th century. It's not creating new jobs or industries like horsewhip guys who moved on to make steering wheel covers or what have you.

Consider Bank Tellers. They're by and large gone. You might have one or two at a location now, but even then banks like Capital One and 5/3 are moving to full ATM locations instead of branches. Those tellers didn't all get jobs as ATM assembly workers or programming ATMs or Repairing/ Restocking them or even running the Customer Service line for the banks. Their jobs just disappeared and were replaced by nothing.

One programmer replaces hundreds to potentially thousands of workers, not just three or four. That trend is going to continue in all industries. Robots and automation aren't doing the same old dance, this is a new one we're only seeing the first steps of.

The good news for us is enough people are technophobic about the BIG changes that can happen that they won't happen for another 40 or 50 years.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
HaemishM
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Reply #215 on: September 16, 2015, 02:01:07 PM

Automated self-serve point of sale machines haven't yet replaced all the grocery store checkout clerks, but frankly, they are probably on the way out too. They are about 5-10 years from being the guy who used to fill up your tank at the gas station.

Viin
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Reply #216 on: September 16, 2015, 02:09:59 PM

Consider Bank Tellers. They're by and large gone. You might have one or two at a location now, but even then banks like Capital One and 5/3 are moving to full ATM locations instead of branches. Those tellers didn't all get jobs as ATM assembly workers or programming ATMs or Repairing/ Restocking them or even running the Customer Service line for the banks. Their jobs just disappeared and were replaced by nothing.

Using the example in shiznitz's post, house servants did not get jobs as Merry Maids either. There was not a "new technology" equivalent that they moved on to.

The beauty of a consumer economy is that as things become optimized (ie: automation) they often become cheaper which means the consumers have more money to spend on other things. Like boats. Or children.

Who knows, day care worker may be the #1 job in 30 years.

- Viin
jgsugden
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Reply #217 on: September 16, 2015, 02:26:50 PM

Technology allows more work to be done with less effort.  Eventually, when fully automated, it allows for work to be done with no human effort.

In the future, when we rely upon drones, self driving cars and AI that is far better than what we see today, we WILL get to a point where MOST of the jobs performed today are either irrelevant or can be performed better by technology without human involvement.  If a computer can process the transactions and manage inventories while drones/self driving trucks can move around merchandise, why can't Amazon eliminate 95%+ of their staff?  Why can't fast food places automate preparation and delivery?  And if the machines can maintain and service themselves better than people....

Humans are amazing biological machines.  However, we're not the most efficient design possible for all tasks (any tasks?), and we will be replaced by more efficient technology in time.

2020 will be the year I gave up all hope.
Merusk
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Reply #218 on: September 16, 2015, 02:39:04 PM

Automated self-serve point of sale machines haven't yet replaced all the grocery store checkout clerks, but frankly, they are probably on the way out too. They are about 5-10 years from being the guy who used to fill up your tank at the gas station.

My local Kroger opens one checkout lane during the day, pushing up to three at peak hours of 4-8 PM. The rest of the traffic is handled by 10-item-or-less checkout lanes. They would absolutely love to keep it at one or two during peak hours but don't have the space and would also have a revolt from the Cashier/ Bagger union.

I know this for fact because there is another Kroger along a busy road only 3 miles from here. They have the 10-item lanes along with the belt-run lanes for 'full carts' like the local Meijer store has. They both only open 2 registers at peak hours and close them after 8pm. The Kroger was built in the last 7 years and only has 9 cashier lanes in total.

I have yet to see all of them open, even on the full-tilt holiday weekends like Thanksgiving. I think if the union were out of the picture entirely you'd see the demise of the profession a lot sooner than 5-10 years.

If a computer can process the transactions and manage inventories while drones/self driving trucks can move around merchandise, why can't Amazon eliminate 95%+ of their staff?  Why can't fast food places automate preparation and delivery?  And if the machines can maintain and service themselves better than people....

Humans are amazing biological machines.  However, we're not the most efficient design possible for all tasks (any tasks?), and we will be replaced by more efficient technology in time.

Amazon's working hard on that. Look up the vids about their fully-automated warehouses (I think we've talked about that in this thread before.) The biggest problem outside of "Human stocked something in the wrong bin" is small items that require fine motor skills right now, but big stuff? Yeah, robots all the way.

Food prep will be one of the last ones to be truly automated - unless it's very specifically processed and engineered food. Foodstuffs have enough variables right now that there's still 'art' to preparing fresh ingredients. You can automate the hell out of processed foods, though, as the American Snack Food industry has illustrated countless times on "How It's Made."

Hell, I have more faith in Architects and Artists being replaced by smart algorithms designed for certain aesthetics than I do chefs being replaced by robots any time soon.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
jgsugden
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Reply #219 on: September 16, 2015, 03:49:42 PM

...
Food prep will be one of the last ones to be truly automated - unless it's very specifically processed and engineered food. Foodstuffs have enough variables right now that there's still 'art' to preparing fresh ingredients. You can automate the hell out of processed foods, though, as the American Snack Food industry has illustrated countless times on "How It's Made."

Hell, I have more faith in Architects and Artists being replaced by smart algorithms designed for certain aesthetics than I do chefs being replaced by robots any time soon.
I smell Food Network's next reality show: Robo Chef.  Remote control / AI control food prep.

2020 will be the year I gave up all hope.
Samwise
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Reply #220 on: September 16, 2015, 05:21:48 PM

Hell, I have more faith in Architects and Artists being replaced by smart algorithms designed for certain aesthetics than I do chefs being replaced by robots any time soon.

I preordered The Grid so I'll let you know how that robot artist thing works out.   Oh ho ho ho. Reallllly?

As far as chefs I'm still waiting for Momentum Machines to open their flagship restaurant in SF like they say they're planning to do.  If I can get a well-made burger for cheaper than an In-N-Out, I for one welcome our robot overlords kitchen slaves.

"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
Cyrrex
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Reply #221 on: September 16, 2015, 10:40:08 PM

You say that now, but just wait until they start serving manburgers.  Gotta do something with all that unused labor force.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Samwise
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Reply #222 on: September 17, 2015, 08:23:04 AM


"I have not actually recommended many games, and I'll go on the record here saying my track record is probably best in the industry." - schild
Merusk
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Reply #223 on: September 17, 2015, 01:56:42 PM

Hell, I have more faith in Architects and Artists being replaced by smart algorithms designed for certain aesthetics than I do chefs being replaced by robots any time soon.

I preordered The Grid so I'll let you know how that robot artist thing works out.   Oh ho ho ho. Reallllly?

Looks cool. The first step to a larger replacement.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
shiznitz
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Reply #224 on: September 18, 2015, 11:08:01 AM

Here is a theoretical question that PhD economists are currently struggling with.

Median wages have been stagnant for almost 20 years. Yet no one can argue that there are many improvements in our lives that have added significant value but cost zero at the margin. Most of us here are old enough to remember life in the 1980s. How much of your current income would you give up to avoid losing all the technological innovations since 1985? 20%? 30%?

Or I can ask this question in another way. If tomorrow, an alien race came down to Earth and retconned all technological innovations since 1985 and then asked you how much you would pay per month to get it back, what would your number be? How much is GPS worth to you if you had to pay for it? Texting? Email? It isn't hard to get to $500 a month in value for these conveniences. That $500 a month is after tax, so $750 a month pre-tax. That is $9,000 a year pre-tax. If we take that $9,000 a year and spread it evenly across the last 20 years of wage stagnation, wages don't look so stagnant any more.

The bottom line is that GDP, wage data, et al. are doing a very poor job of assigning value to all of the things we currently take for granted that make our lives so much more efficient.

I have never played WoW.
Merusk
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Reply #225 on: September 18, 2015, 11:34:54 AM

Bollocks.

Also I can do without just about everything you mentioned. I did until 2013 when the job forced me to get a phone. I'll take the $750 a month instead, myself.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
Pennilenko
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Reply #226 on: September 18, 2015, 11:57:55 AM

Here is a theoretical question that PhD economists are currently struggling with.

Median wages have been stagnant for almost 20 years. Yet no one can argue that there are many improvements in our lives that have added significant value but cost zero at the margin. Most of us here are old enough to remember life in the 1980s. How much of your current income would you give up to avoid losing all the technological innovations since 1985? 20%? 30%?

Or I can ask this question in another way. If tomorrow, an alien race came down to Earth and retconned all technological innovations since 1985 and then asked you how much you would pay per month to get it back, what would your number be? How much is GPS worth to you if you had to pay for it? Texting? Email? It isn't hard to get to $500 a month in value for these conveniences. That $500 a month is after tax, so $750 a month pre-tax. That is $9,000 a year pre-tax. If we take that $9,000 a year and spread it evenly across the last 20 years of wage stagnation, wages don't look so stagnant any more.

The bottom line is that GDP, wage data, et al. are doing a very poor job of assigning value to all of the things we currently take for granted that make our lives so much more efficient.
Wait a second, I am confused. Are those economists making the assumption that all of those technological innovations are somehow free now? Like we don't pay through the nose already for that technology with our currently stagnant wages? I need somebody to explain to me what this margin is and how somebody can say that current technology/conveniences cost zero at it.

"See?  All of you are unique.  And special.  Like fucking snowflakes."  -- Signe
jgsugden
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Reply #227 on: September 18, 2015, 12:40:34 PM

The question seems to me to be one of benefit relative to cost.  So, if we pay an average of $500 a month for cell phones, tablets, cable, robot aids, and the servicing of those devices to make/keep them functioning, but we would be willing to pay $1500 a month, then has our income relative to the point prior to us having these devices increased by $1000? 

If that is what is meant, it is a messy line of thinking.  You're inserting too many abstracts. 

The better question to me is: Line up everyone in the relevant population segments and rate their health, happiness, and future security.  Go back to 1985 and rank everyone from that segment on the same scales.  Compare the charts using percentage of the population.  Adjust appropriately for changes in the size of the segments of population (if you're assessing lower middle class people, you potentially need to account for a higher percentage of the population being in that class now than before).  On average, are we healthier, happier and more confident that our future is secure?  I am betting happier is actually more of a wash, healthier probably has taken a dip (more treatments, worse living conditions when you factor in health of food choices), and security in the future is way down. 

But our robot overlords will make us happy, healthy and give us long lives.  Drop me in the Matrix already.

2020 will be the year I gave up all hope.
Merusk
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Reply #228 on: September 18, 2015, 01:09:42 PM

It's the same bullshit thinking that lets people make stupid statements like, "America has no poor. Compare the US poor to the poor of Asia and they're fucking kings."

Woo! No need to have 8 kids and see how many reach adulthood, you're doing awesome. No lost mules or horses to a big freeze, you've got a car! Yeah, consider how much you'd lose in feed and land costs vs. fuel and you're at a net gain! How much is all that free time worth to you vs. having to work 12 hours in the field?

 Ohhhhh, I see.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
shiznitz
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Reply #229 on: September 18, 2015, 01:29:03 PM

Here is a theoretical question that PhD economists are currently struggling with.

Median wages have been stagnant for almost 20 years. Yet no one can argue that there are many improvements in our lives that have added significant value but cost zero at the margin. Most of us here are old enough to remember life in the 1980s. How much of your current income would you give up to avoid losing all the technological innovations since 1985? 20%? 30%?

Or I can ask this question in another way. If tomorrow, an alien race came down to Earth and retconned all technological innovations since 1985 and then asked you how much you would pay per month to get it back, what would your number be? How much is GPS worth to you if you had to pay for it? Texting? Email? It isn't hard to get to $500 a month in value for these conveniences. That $500 a month is after tax, so $750 a month pre-tax. That is $9,000 a year pre-tax. If we take that $9,000 a year and spread it evenly across the last 20 years of wage stagnation, wages don't look so stagnant any more.

The bottom line is that GDP, wage data, et al. are doing a very poor job of assigning value to all of the things we currently take for granted that make our lives so much more efficient.
Wait a second, I am confused. Are those economists making the assumption that all of those technological innovations are somehow free now? Like we don't pay through the nose already for that technology with our currently stagnant wages? I need somebody to explain to me what this margin is and how somebody can say that current technology/conveniences cost zero at it.


You get right to the point.  The cost is not zero, but the cost is also not being reflected in the economic statistics either. Someone making $40,000 a year today has many conveniences that someone making $40,000 15 years ago does not. The economic theory of utility would argue that the modern person has much higher utility for the same income. That utility has some economic value that differs from person to person, but there is an average.

I don't have an answer, but this issue is relevant to the main topic of this thread because robots will inevitably add more utility than they cost to buy.   

I have never played WoW.
shiznitz
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Reply #230 on: September 18, 2015, 01:30:33 PM

It's the same bullshit thinking that lets people make stupid statements like, "America has no poor. Compare the US poor to the poor of Asia and they're fucking kings."

Woo! No need to have 8 kids and see how many reach adulthood, you're doing awesome. No lost mules or horses to a big freeze, you've got a car! Yeah, consider how much you'd lose in feed and land costs vs. fuel and you're at a net gain! How much is all that free time worth to you vs. having to work 12 hours in the field?

 Ohhhhh, I see.

There will always be a bottom 10% in any population, but there is an objective difference between "starving poor" and "welfare poor".

I have never played WoW.
MahrinSkel
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When she crossed over, she was just a ship. But when she came back... she was bullshit!


Reply #231 on: September 18, 2015, 02:10:50 PM

What is the net present value of the eradication of smallpox? Questions like that are interesting to economists, and absolutely useless, even to them. Taking such questions seriously leads to seriously believing things like how drinkable water is far undervalued and it should all be privatized, so that it's full value can be extracted.

Without 'public goods', life is impossible. I don't mean 'uncomfortable', I mean literally impossible (don't believe me? Then start breathing only metered, private-sector, oxygen). The fact that modern life is filled with technologies that make various aspects of our lives better (or at least less boring) than the historical mean has no bearing on the question of how to address future technology's impact on our economic system.

Our lives were *supposed* to be better than our grandparents, it's what they wanted, what they worked for, what they believed in. Will our grandchildren's lives be better than ours?

--Dave

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Lantyssa
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Reply #232 on: September 19, 2015, 08:26:48 AM

We only consider it 'better' because we have trouble imagining living without those things.  Better would be things like living healthier and longer lives.  Having more leisure time.  Having the money to do things with that free time.

Changes in technology are just different, not better.

Hahahaha!  I'm really good at this!
MahrinSkel
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Reply #233 on: September 19, 2015, 04:21:53 PM

I don't have trouble imagining living without such things, I watched them on their way in. Didn't own a cell phone until I was in my late twenties, first got on the Internet when we still capitalized it, I remember the World Wide Web before there were *any* search engines. I remember TV with 5 channels.  Hell, I remember a world before stored video in any consumer-usable form, when what was on that 5 channels of TV at that particular moment was the entire menu of options. I remember having literally nothing to read, because I had read every single damned book in the local library. Now, I have the distilled essence of the sum of human knowledge at my fingertips where-ever I go, I can learn more about any given arbitrary topic in 5 minutes than I could have in five hours in an old-style library.

Living healthier? I remember air in Denver and LA that would literally burn your throat and make your eyes water, the entire sky was *orange*. Leaded gasoline that probably poisoned an entire generation, stunted their minds. Rain falling from the sky that was dissolving stone statues, killing entire watersheds. Hell yes, life is better, and it's not like I am that freaking old. It amazes me how bad people are at remembering their own selves, their own state of mind, even just a few years before, I remember nearly every part of my teens and twenties with a clarity most people don't have for last week, not just what happened but how I felt *while* it was happening.

You want more leisure time? *Take* it. How much of your time is spent working, paying for shit you don't need, that you don't have time to enjoy, or simply have to maintain the public presentation that is 'required' to go with the work you're doing that is eating your life one day at a time? Is there a room in your dwelling you haven't entered in a week? A month? Then why do you need it? Why are you paying for it?

Want to live longer? Then cut the shit that you're stressing about out of your life, that will do more to improve your life expectancy than having an on-call personal doctor.

The good old days mostly sucked. Why everybody forgets that, puts this rose-colored filter of perfect harmony over their late childhood, I don't know.

--Dave

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Shannow
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Reply #234 on: September 20, 2015, 04:19:22 AM

You're going off narrative Mahrin. Shit is ALWAYS getting worse don't you know? Get back into line.

Someone liked something? Who the fuzzy fuck was this heretic? You don't come to this website and enjoy something. Fuck that. ~ The Walrus
Fordel
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Reply #235 on: September 21, 2015, 06:01:31 PM

This is the best video I've seen about the whole automation vs. Jobs thing. :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
Johny Cee
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Reply #236 on: September 21, 2015, 06:46:13 PM

This is the best video I've seen about the whole automation vs. Jobs thing. :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

The automation thing pretty regularly gets torn down on reddit/badeconomics, but the best is probably here: 

https://np.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/35m6i5/low_hanging_fruit_rfuturology_discusses/cr6utdu


If you want to read other (snarkier but also informative) threads search for "humans are horses" or "automation".
Count Nerfedalot
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Reply #237 on: September 21, 2015, 06:59:35 PM

Mahrin is right about standards of living though. We are FAR better off now than 100 years ago, much less 1000 and that is almost entirely due to improvements in productivity due to automation. Whether our quality of life is better or worse, now that is a much more debatable question.

Just 50 years ago people still died of tuberculosis (or leprosy, or an infected cut, or ulcers, or illnesses caused by smoke from cooking and lighting, or ...) often after a decade or two of misery wasting away from a stupid bacteria that could be cured with antibiotics that cost a dollar or two to manufacture. And it's pretty much true no matter where you are on the wealth scale. I think (hope?) even the poorest homeless person in America has access to food and shelter if they are willing to accept the conditions under which it's offered, such as not bringing your booze or drugs in the shelter with you, listening to some preacher rant about hell, taking a shower, maybe doing some manual labor, or maybe in the worst case moving to a different city that isn't run by selfish assholes who will take fire hoses to homeless but wont lift a finger to find them a place to sleep. They may not have options they like but they DO have access to more goods (without stealing them) than someone in an equivalent position 100 or 1000 years ago.  But they also are missing some options now that they used to have, like living off the land. Which was absolute backbreaking hell and usually a short and miserable life for all but a very very few lucky ones in ideal circumstances of climate, natural resources and total lack of population pressure and external enemies.

Slightly more germane to the original topic of the thread, I'm starting to suspect that the biggest risk to humanity, or at least our current "civilization" such as it is, that our automation and industry and economy and the entire trajectory of our society is making more and more likely is not AI or robots or the wealth gap or water or food or energy or other limited resources or pollution or grey goo or global warming or nuclear war, but the loss of purpose and the dignity of self-reliance for ever larger numbers of people.  Because without purpose and dignity, there is no hope, and without hope there is nothing left to lose. And that is when the pitchforks and torches come out.

Yes, I know I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
Fordel
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Reply #238 on: September 21, 2015, 07:11:18 PM

This is the best video I've seen about the whole automation vs. Jobs thing. :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

The automation thing pretty regularly gets torn down on reddit/badeconomics, but the best is probably here: 

https://np.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/35m6i5/low_hanging_fruit_rfuturology_discusses/cr6utdu


If you want to read other (snarkier but also informative) threads search for "humans are horses" or "automation".

Which part tears it down? Explain it to me like I am a three year old.

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
Johny Cee
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Reply #239 on: September 22, 2015, 05:52:07 PM

The major points:

1. Humans aren't horses.  General intelligence means humans can be retrained/learn new skills.  Doesn't mean disruption won't impact workers/wages short-term.
 
2. Lump of labor fallacy.  Basically, that there are only a certain amount of jobs in an economy.  Snarkily put: "we can only mine so many jobs from the job mine, so each immigrant or robot that takes a job replaces a good American/German/etc.!!!"  Same fallacy as "dey took ar jerbs" for immigrants.  (The much quoted study that 47% of jobs could be automated in X amount of time specifically says it treats labor as a fixed pool so doesn't account for replacement effects, then later studies linked look at that).

3. Comparative advantage.  Same basic principles as when used in trade discussion, good summary here: https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/3hl6ws/ask_badeconomics_midweek_discussion_thread_19/cu8oezr


The link to the HE3 post basically summarizes most of these arguments while linking to the actual studies behind them.  The big take away, and the major blow to "automate all the jobs" is that there isn't any empirical evidence of increasing technologic job displacement, and no increasing structural unemployment.

That's not to say that automation won't cause some issues.  Increasing inequality, for instance, in declining worker share of production is possible (ie, capital taking a larger share of earnings over labor).  Disruptions/shocks causing uncertainity in low skill workers and mid-term depressing of worker wages.  Also, most people in these rebuttals say "if we have General AI and robots can easily gather all the resources necessary to create more robots that can do anything a human can do" (ie, singularlity) than yah, all bets are off.


The basic problem is that futurists say "this time is different!" but have no empirical evidence it is.  What should really key you in to thinking that maaaaayyyybbbeee they don't know what they are talking about since it is usually followed by a "and that is why we need UBI/bitcoin".


Both reddit/badeconomics (snarky debunking of the rest of the site's bad economics) and reddit/goodeconomics (links to what people think are good explanations of economics) deal with automation related stuff alot, as other subreddits are hotbeds of ridiculous navel gazing.  If you want more detail, browse down either of those.
jgsugden
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Reply #240 on: September 23, 2015, 03:18:37 PM

Reddit and forums: Athena's New Home.

Make is Simple. 

When you want to hire someone, will you hire the cheaper, more efficient and more reliable option or the more expensive, less efficient and less reliable option?

Now, if technology continues to evolve through meaningful changes essentially every few years and evolution makes meaningful changes in humanity essentially every few hundred years (being generous here), why wouldn't we assume that technology will becomes cheaper, more efficient and more reliable than humans at pretty much everything?

2020 will be the year I gave up all hope.
Merusk
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Reply #241 on: September 23, 2015, 03:21:28 PM

The basic problem is that futurists say "this time is different!" but have no empirical evidence it is.  What should really key you in to thinking that maaaaayyyybbbeee they don't know what they are talking about since it is usually followed by a "and that is why we need UBI/bitcoin".

Fuck bitcoin. I usually see, "And that's why we need minimum assured income."

Anyway, we already gave you two jobs as examples as to why it's different. Here they are again with a few more.
* Paralegals and Lexis/ Nexus - Happened already.
* Cashier/ Checkout - Quickly being replaced.
* Bank Tellers - What're those? Been inside a bank often in the last 10 years, have you?
* Financial/ Sports reporters - This is automated stats tracking. Machines do it better into a standardized format. But hey, who reads ESPN and shit.
* Stock Traders - What's a trading floor?

Another is phone operator, but that doesn't count because it was "so long ago" right?

Future jobs in danger:
* Any sort of automated car and 90% of driving-based jobs.
* Warehouse workers/ stockers
* General Practitioners - Watson is being developed explicitly for this purpose. It's already giving better diagnoses
* Pharmacists - Hey, Watson again. He can look-up drug interactions and problem combinations with better accuracy and speed for less money.
* Surgeons - What? Yeah, 'net surgery is becoming an automated thing. Fewer surgeons working harder all around the world remotely. Routine things like closure & suture, given to others than the surgeon are starting to be done by robotic staplers.
* Pilots - FedEx is looking at drone fleets vs. Pilot fleets.
* More lawyer stuff - Quantitative legal prediction: Lawyers get paid a lot to predict if a lawsuit has merit, right? There's a program MSU & Texas state developed that does this with 71% accuracy.
* Architects - Google is working on this with a spinoff project. A LARGE portion of actual practice is knowing, researching and understanding code. This can be done in a similar way to Lexis/ Nexus and eliminate 50% of our expertise. Then we become funny artists and nobody wants to pay for those.
* Accountants - You and Paelos will argue this until your face turns blue but so much of this can be automated. All it takes is a government willing to let it happen, which will come as Boomers die and the more tech savvy gens move-in.  X and Mils  hate fucking paperwork.

So what are those "not horses" being retrained to do? Programming? To program the stuff that already replaced them? Tech support? Already in place, right? I mean there was a company that replaced you, I assume they had support already. They certainly don't need everyone out of a job to do it.

Large groups of experts with nobody to sell services to become labor for.. who? Doing what?

That's why they say it's different. There's no answer right now. Economists assume that one will come about.
Technologists say; Shit no. Not fast enough, not big enough and not complicated enough to not also be automated.

THAT is why it's different. You can't shove all the unemployed into the very few jobs that can't be replaced by a program or a machine. You certainly can't do it fast enough. This isn't the 40-year march from 1890 to 1930 to replace horses. This is a decade, maybe 20 years.

I guess we can all be hippies and artists. Oh wait, they can automate that too, it turns out.

Shit.


The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
MahrinSkel
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Reply #242 on: September 23, 2015, 03:44:55 PM

It's worse than just the time compression, because there's a scope issue, it isn't one narrow range of jobs in a complex labor chain being replaced, but entire chains being either automated or just plain rendered irrelevant. Right now Amazon is replacing armies of minimum wage humans crawling around shelves full of pallets, with robots that take the pallets to a much smaller number of humans (still minimum wage), and even that is just a stopgap until robots that can pick things out of the bins are cheaper than humans.

Add in trucks that drive themselves from regional hubs to drone delivery centers, drones and planes that fly themselves at each end.... You aren't going to be replacing those people with other people, or hiring those people in other sectors. You're talking about a massive structural surplus of labor, steadily marching up the "value chain". A massive hole in the economy right where the middle class used to be, all jobs falling into categories of either "not worth automating" and "not automatable *yet*".

And at some point, the general purpose robot that can replace all "warm body" human workers knocks the bottom out completely.

--Dave

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Yegolev
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Reply #243 on: September 23, 2015, 05:33:37 PM

The easy solution is to give the robots some money so they can keep the economy going.

Why am I homeless?  Why do all you motherfuckers need homes is the real question.
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Pennilenko
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Reply #244 on: September 23, 2015, 05:38:49 PM

What happens when the vast majority of people cannot afford to continue buying shit? You know, that whole process of consumerism that drives our culture and economy.

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