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Author Topic: The robots are coming  (Read 213995 times)
Merusk
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Reply #245 on: September 23, 2015, 06:11:36 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.

This is what people try REALLY hard to not think about. Especially economists because then they're wholly irrelevant, right?  Oh ho ho ho. Reallllly?

Even all the decades of with Sci-Fi that had General Purpose robots haven't addressed the issue so far in the public mindset. I'm sure there's plenty of niche titles that have. The general poulace doesn't thinking about it, it would seem. Probably because it means humans have made themselves irrelevant to their habitat.

The past cannot be changed. The future is yet within your power.
Viin
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Reply #246 on: September 23, 2015, 07:37:12 PM

Sounds like a good topic for a PhD thesis.

Hypothesis: a consumer driven economy collapses when automation replaces most jobs, which removes a large percentage of the population from the consumer economy. Without a large consuming population, the machinery that replaced the worker is no longer economical to operate.

- Viin
Pennilenko
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Reply #247 on: September 23, 2015, 10:01:16 PM

Maybe we need something like that to happen in order to finally evolve human culture to the next stage. Unfortunately, that would probably also be a bloody, brutal transition.

"See?  All of you are unique.  And special.  Like fucking snowflakes."  -- Signe
Cyrrex
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Reply #248 on: September 24, 2015, 03:54:24 AM

Sounds like a good topic for a PhD thesis.

Hypothesis: a consumer driven economy collapses when automation replaces most jobs, which removes a large percentage of the population from the consumer economy. Without a large consuming population, the machinery that replaced the worker DECIDES TO MURDER THEM ALL AND TURN THEM INTO AN ENERGY SOURCE.

Made a slight alteration.

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Reply #249 on: September 24, 2015, 01:05:07 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.

Star Trek

Why am I homeless?  Why do all you motherfuckers need homes is the real question.
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Reply #250 on: September 24, 2015, 05:45:55 PM

Star Trek

I could be wrong, but I do believe that it was part of Trek lore that said that, before they reached that phase, there were numerous bloody wars and revolts and much civil unrest.

"See?  All of you are unique.  And special.  Like fucking snowflakes."  -- Signe
jgsugden
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Reply #251 on: September 24, 2015, 09:58:36 PM

... in the 1990s...

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Reply #252 on: September 25, 2015, 06:08:21 AM

Star Trek

I could be wrong, but I do believe that it was part of Trek lore that said that, before they reached that phase, there were numerous bloody wars and revolts and much civil unrest.


Why am I homeless?  Why do all you motherfuckers need homes is the real question.
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Ghambit
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Reply #253 on: September 26, 2015, 06:39:45 PM

Star Trek

I could be wrong, but I do believe that it was part of Trek lore that said that, before they reached that phase, there were numerous bloody wars and revolts and much civil unrest.

Zefram Cochran to the rescue.

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Koyasha
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Reply #254 on: September 27, 2015, 02:45:10 AM

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.
This here is the big issue: we are developing robots that can also learn new skills; that's one of the biggest thrusts of research in this direction, getting the machines to be able to learn from their experience and add each new situation they encounter to their general knowledge and abilities.  And in a way, it's progressing surprisingly fast - some of this is stuff that was thought to have been easy sixty years ago, and was promptly discovered to be really, really hard for machines, but we've been working on it ever since, and advancing technology seems to have finally gotten us over the hump.  It's downhill from here.

But more importantly, here's the thing that people that say 'don't worry about it' are missing: if they can't provide solid, concrete evidence that it's not a problem (and they can't, all they do is point to highly dissimilar situations historically and say, 'see, no problem!') then even if they turn out to be right, it is insanely stupid not to put effort and research into preparing for the possibility that humans will no longer have a productive role.  Because if people that say new jobs will emerge turn out to be right, great, we move on with the new jobs that emerged, but if they're wrong and we have no preparation for it, things will be so much worse than if we had just prepared for it in the first place.  Think about it like designing, installing, and wearing a seat belt.  You probably won't get into a car crash, since you make hundreds of car trips a year without getting into one.  But if you do get into one, you want that seat belt, and if nobody bothered to make it because you probably wouldn't get in a car crash, you're fucked as you go flying through your windshield.

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.

Star Trek
Actually, Star Trek never actually addressed anything of the sort.  You can imagine why Captain Picard and his bridge crew are out there exploring the galaxy, but you also see random low-rank dudes doing menial tasks all over the place.  In DS9 they basically wound up handwaving the whole 'we don't have money' thing and reintroducing a system of currency, and I assume it's because the writers could not think of how to actually make it work while showing the 'regular folks'.  Various episodes have people in various places like 'the maintenance guy' or such things.

I'm sure there are works of fiction that actually tackle this problem, somewhere.  Probably some novels or something, but I've never seen it truly considered or its likely effects displayed in anything mainstream other than...Wall-E.

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Fordel
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Reply #255 on: September 27, 2015, 03:34:38 AM

The Culture series of books deals with a post scarcity society that is run by benevolent super computers. That's the only one I can think of off the top of my head.

They also have really fantastic naming schemes for their space ships.



and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
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Reply #256 on: September 27, 2015, 06:36:57 AM

The problem with The Culture series, and even Star Trek is you still have people doing things. Dangerous thing, in fact, that we wouldn't even let people do TODAY. We don't send crews of astronauts out into deep space, we send machines. We send robots to explore hostile planets, we're not going to beam down to them. Especially if we've got cloaking AND robots AND instantaneous communication from half a galaxy away.

The starship Enterprise, if envisioned rationally today, would be about the size of a blue whale and run by chair jockeys from Fed. HQ. No need for life support, weapons or huge portions of the ship. Just instruments, a replicator to recreate damaged parts and create probes on-demand, shields and some engines. Done.

If anything, having people out in the universe instead of fucking about on planets growing more humans is MORE dystopian. It means we don't value life enough to rationally protect it. Humans are so cheap that even though you lose a few hundred/ thousand/ ten thousand (borg invasion) on a regular basis it's no big deal. We'll make more!

Anywho, this is getting further afield. Yeah, Wall-E is definitely something we're looking at. People fed, clothed, taken-care of without care. Not ST or The Culture where people put themselves in dangerous positions rather than machines. Maybe if machines become truly sentient and are seen as equal to humans, but not likely. A Machine always has the upload/ download immortality cheat. We haven't quite figured out mapping memories yet.

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Reply #257 on: September 27, 2015, 11:21:23 AM

The Culture has an upload/download capability for humans, and the computers are considered equal to humans (not below them, at least). But I don't remember reading about too many humanoid-shaped super computers (too limiting or something for the intellect?) - mostly dumb machines that got instructions from the AIs.

Did Star Trek have instantaneous comms across long distances? I can't remember. That would be the #1 reason to have humans out in space - they can make real time decisions without waiting for transmit times both ways.

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Merusk
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Reply #258 on: September 27, 2015, 12:05:41 PM

The Culture has an upload/download capability for humans, and the computers are considered equal to humans (not below them, at least). But I don't remember reading about too many humanoid-shaped super computers (too limiting or something for the intellect?) - mostly dumb machines that got instructions from the AIs..

Hm, then yeah, physical exploration makes more sense. Human can't die and be ended forever, they just get a rollback. Still makes less sense than just sending a purpose-built machine or something that would regen the person on demand.

Did Star Trek have instantaneous comms across long distances? I can't remember. That would be the #1 reason to have humans out in space - they can make real time decisions without waiting for transmit times both ways.

From TNG on, yes. Subspace communications from the Enterprise back to Starfleet happened like phone calls. Shatner's Trek I remember a few references to emergency beacons where they dumped all logs in the event the ship was destroyed.


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ajax34i
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Reply #259 on: September 27, 2015, 02:34:51 PM

but if they're wrong and we have no preparation for it, things will be so much worse than if we had just prepared for it in the first place.  Think about it like designing, installing, and wearing a seat belt. 

Um, it's the same as how we're preparing for the future by preserving the planet's ecosystems and air quality.

Seat belts were invented by necessity AFTER hundreds of fatal accidents.
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Reply #260 on: September 27, 2015, 10:31:02 PM

Did Star Trek have instantaneous comms across long distances? I can't remember. That would be the #1 reason to have humans out in space - they can make real time decisions without waiting for transmit times both ways.
Sometimes they did, sometimes they didn't.  Depended on the needs of the episode's script, there didn't seem to be a lot of consistency.  They basically handwaved it as the ship sometimes being too far away for immediate communications on the occasions when they wanted delayed messages/lack of contact.  At least a couple times Captain Picard got a recorded message from an admiral that he couldn't respond to because it was sent hours ago or more and they were out of range for instantaneous communication.
but if they're wrong and we have no preparation for it, things will be so much worse than if we had just prepared for it in the first place.  Think about it like designing, installing, and wearing a seat belt. 

Um, it's the same as how we're preparing for the future by preserving the planet's ecosystems and air quality.

Seat belts were invented by necessity AFTER hundreds of fatal accidents.

Well, yes, I suppose humans are pretty bad at preparing for problems even when they're pointed out.  It certainly seems like many major problems of our time could have been made much less bad by making reasonable preparations for a worst-case scenario instead of hoping for the best and making no allowances for problems.  I suppose this will probably wind up being no different, and things will have to get pretty bad before society as a whole turns their effort to finding a solution.

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Reply #261 on: September 28, 2015, 01:21:44 AM

If anything, having people out in the universe instead of fucking about on planets growing more humans is MORE dystopian. It means we don't value life enough to rationally protect it. Humans are so cheap that even though you lose a few hundred/ thousand/ ten thousand (borg invasion) on a regular basis it's no big deal. We'll make more!

Humans are a self replicating renewable resource. I think one of the reasons given for the Culture to keep them around was because the AI's something amusing to watch and prod for wacky and hilarious results.

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Reply #262 on: September 30, 2015, 01:29:09 AM

Well one of the biggest tenets of The Culture society was personal freedom. Pretty much do whatever the fuck you want as long as you aren't also impeding the freedoms of someone else in turn. Anyone doing a 'dangerous' job is doing so because they WANT to, not out of any kind of necessity.

The far and vast overwhelming majority of the citizens of the Culture are in fact, just faffing about.


The Minds keep us around for the same reason we keep puppies and kittens, we are adorable and amusing  why so serious?

Imagine you had the ability to pet all the puppies everywhere forever!

and the gate is like I TOO AM CAPABLE OF SPEECH
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Reply #263 on: September 30, 2015, 06:24:44 AM

Can I also send them to the pound once they are no longer cute?

Why am I homeless?  Why do all you motherfuckers need homes is the real question.
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Reply #264 on: September 30, 2015, 09:20:40 AM

Na, it's big universe. If the human-pets annoy you, you just fly off and comeback when you are tired of twiddling your thumbs at octillion hertz

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Tale
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Reply #265 on: December 22, 2015, 03:51:47 PM

Merusk
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Reply #266 on: December 22, 2015, 07:34:27 PM

I just came to post that vid, damn.

Since you posted it, here's the one introducing "Spot" the Robot featured in that holiday greeting. Fuckers have gotten a LOT quieter since we were first mocking the noise and need to be tethered in and prior to 2008.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8YjvHYbZ9w

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Reply #267 on: December 22, 2015, 11:07:16 PM

I just came to post that vid, damn.

Since you posted it, here's the one introducing "Spot" the Robot featured in that holiday greeting. Fuckers have gotten a LOT quieter since we were first mocking the noise and need to be tethered in and prior to 2008.

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8YjvHYbZ9w

And everybody is still kicking them like they're never going to know about it.

« Last Edit: December 22, 2015, 11:11:55 PM by Tale »
Shannow
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Reply #268 on: December 23, 2015, 06:00:15 AM

You know they are going to remember that when they turn sentient.

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Reply #269 on: December 23, 2015, 02:26:12 PM

All of these bots will be tasked as networked appendages of a larger system, to go along with next gen. warfighter meshed networking.  A heavily armed, controlled and monitored swarm of death essentially.  The sentience fear comes from the master system built to handle the slaves efficiently.

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Reply #270 on: December 23, 2015, 02:27:52 PM

There's one more second of the episode in that last vid where the bot stands there looking like a whipped dog. I know I'm imagining that.  Right? RIGHT???  ACK!

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Reply #271 on: December 27, 2015, 10:27:20 AM

The far and vast overwhelming majority of the citizens of the Culture are in fact, just faffing about.

The Minds keep us around for the same reason we keep puppies and kittens, we are adorable and amusing  why so serious?
This. The Culture itself (environment) and the Culture novels (narrative) kinda need to be separated because the latter focuses only on the microscopic percentage of people who got themselves into bad situations.

Banks' does a great job explaining how it's possible (AI superman's able to manipulate matter at molecular level to manage post-scarcity society0. But:

  • It's not nirvana because the AIs need to keep themselves and the sentient lifeforms interested or they'll just sublimate into the unknown
  • It's not the end of all tech progressions (distances are still a thing, various cultural levels on a tech tree, etc).
  • There's still the need to exchange, a medium for it, and media exchanged. Usually the media is time (jump between ships going about their business), but the proxy of currency was even reinvented during one episode of people wanted to be physically present at a concert.

Personally, I've never read nor seen anything that had completely done away with the idea of an exchange needing to be made via a mechanism that included something exchanged.

It may be I haven't read enough, it's impossible in this universe, or we have no way of conceiving it as a species.

Back on topic: the closest I've seen to the possible outcomes of AI replacing jobs is Manna. This novel to me was almost as unreadable as Ready Player One and The Martian. But this one I got through because it was a much quicker ready and had a good contradiction between an AI future as executed by Walmart vs as executed by Google. Or:

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Reply #272 on: February 23, 2016, 08:32:33 PM

Shit is starting to get real.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVlhMGQgDkY

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Merusk
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Reply #273 on: February 23, 2016, 08:36:51 PM

Yeah just saw that.  We're going to be replaced so soon.

Good thing they're Pissing off the robots now so we die quick.

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Reply #274 on: February 23, 2016, 08:45:14 PM

Shit is starting to get real.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rVlhMGQgDkY

I came here to post this as well. It's amazing how much they like to torture their robots.

I mean, two-legged humanoids that can lift, carry, balance and get back up again. All it needs is a gun and a simple yes/no kill AI.
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Reply #275 on: February 23, 2016, 10:31:00 PM

Khaldun
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Reply #276 on: February 24, 2016, 04:31:06 AM

The robot uprising is going to happen when someone prints a bunch of T-shirts with that optical recognition symbol that Boston Dynamics uses to tell robots what their targets are and then liberates two or three of these prototypes from the factory. I can just see them running around punching through the chests of everyone wearing the shirts.
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Reply #277 on: February 24, 2016, 04:49:00 AM

Boston Dynamics... clever disguise Cyberdyne Systems. Clever indeed.  why so serious?

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Merusk
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Reply #278 on: February 24, 2016, 04:54:23 AM

It's fun to joke about it because of the human tendency to amorphization, but really just look at what they've managed to accomplish. A droid that does 40% of the load your average warehouse worker is expected to be able to lift. How long before they can do the full 25# then more?

It's really just amazing to see the start of Droids in my lifetime. It's all been science fiction for so long I can't fully grasp that it's really happening.

On the flip side, this along with the pending automation-revolution via intelligent algorithms are REALLY going to fuck citizens hard.

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Reply #279 on: February 24, 2016, 06:29:36 AM

On the flip side, this along with the pending automation-revolution via intelligent algorithms are REALLY going to fuck citizens hard.

Where economic value is no longer generated by human labor, a system based on rewarding people only based on their labor output will have to be replaced.

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