Humans Need Not Aply

[WH40krules]

So, I just recently watched this video:

. It's about how there will be a change from people doing jobs, to machines doing those jobs. When this eventually happens, what do you guys think will happen?

[Aningaaq]

So, I just recently watched this video:

. It's about how there will be a change from people doing jobs, to machines doing those jobs. When this eventually happens, what do you guys think will happen?

Well, for one it would open up jobs for people designing and maintaining those machines. Humans would not directly be doing the work but a sector would be created for mechanical engineers and the like. Unfortunatly, not everyone has or wants the aptitude for such a job. Simply, some people are better at hard labor and some may even find solace in such work.

The downside, as I see it, is the lack of objects created by the hands of a human. Quality or Quantity? That is the question but the answer is quantity considering the increase of population. A silver lining is that a demand for human crafts will increase as they become more rare. Just spitballing here.

[Nuke]

simply, we become a race of bureaucrats. there is no real work to do, so we invent ways to keep us busy. we have already started doing this. every time a politician claims to have "created jobs" what they really have done is create a new agency to overly complicate a simple problem, so that it absorbs a good chunk of the work force.

[rtxoff]

Human need not aply? I am not scared of this. It's very simple: No Jobs -> no money -> no consumation -> no economy -> not working, won't happen

Too many robot's will only work against that ones that put them in there. Too much greed is not good, the big companies will find that out sooner or later.

[StrandedonEarth]

I work at a tire retreading plant. I can only see technology replacing 2-3 jobs there, at least not without massive increases in tech and a massive price tag. I do know that tech has eliminated one post compared to older plants.

[EndOfTheEarth]

There will still be jobs, but the nature of the jobs will change. We may not use typewriters any more, but keyboard and word processor companies still have plenty of positions.

Same with robots. The robot performs the task, but who repairs the robots--and before you answer "other robots", think for a moment of how specialized the initial robots must be to replace humans, and how complicated a repair-bot you would have to build to repair 1000+ designs of worker-bots.

[WH40krules]

Yeah, I was thinking the main jobs would be robot oversight, robot repair, and maybe robot construction/coding.

[Seret]

It's already happened. The trend has been ongoing ever since the industrial revolution. Humans just move into more specialised roles, or the service industry.

[vger]

Yeah, I was thinking the main jobs would be robot oversight, robot repair, and maybe robot construction/coding.

Since the main point of automation is to reduce the number of humans needed, this will NEVER provide enough jobs for the population. Not by a long shot. And that's assuming every human is even capable of the kind of technical knowhow to maintain and service machines. They're NOT.

Jobs themselves will become a rare commodity. The number of workers required to complete a task decreases by the day, yet the number of people who need jobs increases by the day.

Something in the capitalist system will have to give here. Either money itself becomes obsolete, or public companies need to be done away with.

Shareholders will always force a business to keep the line on the graph moving upward, and that means layoffs, replacing workers with robots wherever possible. Slave labor won't even be practical, because "mindless physical work" is the stuff that is easiest to replace with robots. There's a machine that exists now that can run an entire fast food kitchen on its own. It flips the burgers, adds the condiments, and spits them out at the end of the line.

Where's that leave us? Nobody can afford the services that the 0.0001% of people who own the robot empires can offer. At that point we either become a utopia, or things start swinging back in the other direction.

[KerikBalm]

^ That....

For every 10,000 jobs replaced by robots, you might create 10 jobs for maintaining those robots.

The same trend is already affected industrialized countries with design& engineering vs production - except instead of robots, its cheap low skill labor in predominately asian countries.

Society would have to change to more of a socialist system, or we will find the masses are in need of "reduction" by the few humans controlling the machines.

Then it would be like the lords and ladies of old, with the peasants slaughtered and replaced by robots.

[Nibb31]

There will be no point in increasing productivity with robots if there is nobody around to buy the stuff that the robots produce.

If we get to a point where robots do all the work, we'll also have to find a way for people to have enough money to buy stuff without working. Or we can just do away with money altogether...

[magnemoe]

Since the main point of automation is to reduce the number of humans needed, this will NEVER provide enough jobs for the population. Not by a long shot. And that's assuming every human is even capable of the kind of technical knowhow to maintain and service machines. They're NOT.

Jobs themselves will become a rare commodity. The number of workers required to complete a task decreases by the day, yet the number of people who need jobs increases by the day.

Something in the capitalist system will have to give here. Either money itself becomes obsolete, or public companies need to be done away with.

Shareholders will always force a business to keep the line on the graph moving upward, and that means layoffs, replacing workers with robots wherever possible. Slave labor won't even be practical, because "mindless physical work" is the stuff that is easiest to replace with robots. There's a machine that exists now that can run an entire fast food kitchen on its own. It flips the burgers, adds the condiments, and spits them out at the end of the line.

Where's that leave us? Nobody can afford the services that the 0.0001% of people who own the robot empires can offer. At that point we either become a utopia, or things start swinging back in the other direction.

True, the point is to reduce the number of people needed, and no I do not see how this is different from that happened since the industrial revolution.

Unemployment depend on the state of the economy, not on automation.

We already see that sales and marketing employs more people than production, yes some of this can be automated and already has been for a long time, once secretaries was common.

Yes it will shift the type of labor needed, lots of the office work is likely to go the same way as assembly line work.

The main effect of automation is increased efficiency, this increase the GNP, no it don't address the wealth balance who is more of an political issue. Equality has not been the norm historical, rater the opposite.

And this technology will be for mass use, the 0.01% is a far to small group to defend the development cost, you can not buy an significant better cell phone for a million dollar, you can buy an better pc for a million as its an good marked for huge servers same as private jets are jets with expensive interior.

I also think he overestimates thing a bit, at least before 2050, robots are stupid, yes they become smarter as in they are able to avoid banging their head in the wall over an over.

[Red Iron Crown]

Jobs are not a finite resource. Eliminating them in one field through technology or other efficiency gains frees up that labor to work in other fields.

[Idobox]

Westerns economies that got rid of their industry already have issues with structural unemployment. Official statistics on unemployment are notoriously unreliable, since governments try to skew them all the time to give the impression their politics work better than they do, but it's easy to see Detroit hasn't become an attractive metropolis with all the factories closing, and Germany kicks Europe's ass because they slashed salaries in their already high performing industry while poverty is rampant in countries like UK, France or Italy, and even worse in Portugal, Spain and Greece, countries that saw industry dwindle to focus on construction and services.

Now imagine the chaos when waiters, barristas, cashiers, cleaners, construction workers, mechanics, and a significant part of the administration are replaced by machines.

Some of you claim that other jobs will be created, to maintain the machines, but also because the rising purchasing power will create new needs. It happened with the industry, but only because there is now massive redistribution of wealth through the welfare government and labor laws.

If you let companies what they wanted, they would bring back XIXth century type of exploitation (they do when they can, like on ships or by outsourcing), collapsing the purchasing power and their own long-term prospects.

[bsalis]

simply, we become a race of bureaucrats. there is no real work to do, so we invent ways to keep us busy.

Bingo! You win.

This whole automation of all labor has been in motion for some time. The video in the OP is just the next phase. You would think such a shift would be greeted with joy and relief. No longer would people need to work as many hours, and eventually we will not need to work at all. Free from having to sell our labor to be able to consume, we could pursue our own more satisfying and enlightened activities.

But no... the established cultural expectation is that one must submit to labor to contribute to the economy in order to extract from it (ie. consume). Otherwise to consume without contributing is seen as amoral. Full employment is still an economic goal. The fact that it is not needed any more is lost on people. It's simple inertia really.

One day this will all change. Until then, many of us will be busy pushing digital paper around, many thinking that what they do matters.

Edited September 16, 2014 by bsalis

[trekkie_]

The logistics of such a society are rather impossible.

But think about it, Imagine a world full of machines that do everything. Does everyone get a boat if they want? do they all have to settle for the same type or size? who decides what their home is like or how much land they get to live on and where. there's soo many things a person could want, there'd have to be limits because resources simply aren't unlimited and supply changes at a moments notice. I mean heck even star trek with their fancy replicators who could refuel years worth in a day, still rations them. Even though they have gotten rid of money, built robots, etc....they still do a lot of work.

so really the only way such a society could exist is in a world where everyone has a hive like purpose and rid of self comforts and personal wants.....which is really more horrifying than noble. such a society would be rather bland, even if they do have cool tech. the only freedom you'd truly have is to choose to be an outcast and do nothing with your life....and even that may not be allowable.

you could never have a society where machines do everything where people pursue their own personal interests. Imagine for a second electricity was completely free today....you might still use the same amount, but the guy down the street might start using 10 times that. Imagine the strain on the already existing system, even if it was free. Their burden to deliver and keep the power going would grow higher and higher.....and the same applies to a future where machines do everything. when you can just order something from a machine for free, everyone will have to be on board to not abuse it otherwise there simply won't be enough resources available in X span of time. Machines can only mine a finite amount of resources in a given amount of time.

it will be very hard to do away with money, because it's actually one of the few things that limits our resource usage. don't have the money, can't expend it. We'd all be using 100x or more resources if we could just tell a machine to make anything for us without cost. But at the same time, the limits themselves are a serious problem, because that means some serious concessions in lifestyle and freedoms. Sure you'll have the freedom to a roof over your head and more than enough food to sustain you.....but so did many slaves. We would be slaves to ideology.

But let's go back to the star trek comparison. You often see earth, people go out to eat at capt. cisko's dad's restaurant.......how are they paying if they abolished money? if they're not paying, then he's just running a restaurant to feed people for free, for the fun of it. And I mean these people have replicators in every home that can make anything they want, they don't even need to go out, and he doesn't even need to cook them food. who even decides he can even have his restaurant located where it is?

Now think of all those fancy city apartments on earth you see here and there in a few episodes.....who decides who lives in what apartment? who gets the high loft with the fancy view and who gets the first floor apartment if there is no money to decide who gets what based on what they've earned? what happens if two people want to live in the same place? do they live in the same place for the rest of their lives? are they assigned a place to live? do they switch places every now and then and decide 'hey get me a home ready, I'm moving here!'. Do the starfleet admirals live next door to some average joe? From what I've seen they're pretty high rollers.

here's another good example: holodecks. do they have enough for everyone in the general population? does everyone get their own if they want? do they have to share? and if so.....who decides how many to build for the general population to share?

Edited September 15, 2014 by trekkie_

[magnemoe]

The logistics of such a society are rather impossible.

But think about it, Imagine a world full of machines that do everything. Does everyone get a boat if they want? do they all have to settle for the same type or size? who decides what their home is like or how much land they get to live on and where. there's soo many things a person could want, there'd have to be limits because resources simply aren't unlimited and supply changes at a moments notice. I mean heck even star trek with their fancy replicators who could refuel years worth in a day, still rations them. Even though they have gotten rid of money, built robots, etc....they still do a lot of work.

so really the only way such a society could exist is in a world where everyone has a hive like purpose and rid of self comforts and personal wants.....which is really more horrifying than noble. such a society would be rather bland, even if they do have cool tech. the only freedom you'd truly have is to choose to be an outcast and do nothing with your life....and even that may not be allowable.

you could never have a society where machines do everything where people pursue their own personal interests. Imagine for a second electricity was completely free today....you might still use the same amount, but the guy down the street might start using 10 times that. Imagine the strain on the already existing system, even if it was free. Their burden to deliver and keep the power going would grow higher and higher.....and the same applies to a future where machines do everything. when you can just order something from a machine for free, everyone will have to be on board to not abuse it otherwise there simply won't be enough resources available in X span of time. Machines can only mine a finite amount of resources in a given amount of time.

it will be very hard to do away with money, because it's actually one of the few things that limits our resource usage. don't have the money, can't expend it. We'd all be using 100x or more resources if we could just tell a machine to make anything for us without cost. But at the same time, the limits themselves are a serious problem, because that means some serious concessions in lifestyle and freedoms. Sure you'll have the freedom to a roof over your head and more than enough food to sustain you.....but so did many slaves. We would be slaves to ideology.

But let's go back to the star trek comparison. You often see earth, people go out to eat at capt. cisko's dad's restaurant.......how are they paying if they abolished money? if they're not paying, then he's just running a restaurant to feed people for free, for the fun of it. And I mean these people have replicators in every home that can make anything they want, they don't even need to go out, and he doesn't even need to cook them food. who even decides he can even have his restaurant located where it is?

Now think of all those fancy city apartments on earth you see here and there in a few episodes.....who decides who lives in what apartment? who gets the high loft with the fancy view and who gets the first floor apartment if there is no money to decide who gets what based on what they've earned? what happens if two people want to live in the same place? do they live in the same place for the rest of their lives? are they assigned a place to live? do they switch places every now and then and decide 'hey get me a home ready, I'm moving here!'. Do the starfleet admirals live next door to some average joe? From what I've seen they're pretty high rollers.

here's another good example: holodecks. do they have enough for everyone in the general population? does everyone get their own if they want? do they have to share? and if so.....who decides how many to build for the general population to share?

Yes, you might get a boat, you still need a place to put it.

Simplest solution is simply to give everybody money and let them do that they want with them. If you earn lots of money you will pay more in tax than you get.

Having someone decide that you need is an very bad idea, first they might disagree with you about that is important, you don't want someone to have that sort of power. Very unlikely that they will not take the best stuff for themselves, decent chance they will limit production of status items so only they get it for themselves.

They are also likely to mess up as in cut production in something vital they don't see the use for, Soviet Union had lots of problems about this and problem increased over time as the compexity increased.

[WestAir]

"People will maintain the robots." - Unlikely, machines can probably detect, troubleshoot, and fix machines better than people can. Those jobs will give, too. That said, I hope this "Job collapse" happens sooner than later. Jobs and hard work get in the way of enjoyment and quality of life. The entire "how do we spread resources" debate can be argued as propaganda from the top 10%. We can provide food, water, and shelter for the Earths population - especially with machine precision handling difficult tasks like infrastructure repair, maintenance, and transportation of resources and goods.

I'm awake about 16 hours a day. I spend 11 of those hours either getting ready for, driving too, or at work. For the average 9-5 guy, that leaves 5 hours a day of "fun time" that I inevitably spend on chores and non-work related work. That isn't a very "high quality" of life. It's slave labor. I am a slave to the dollar bill.

Trust me when I say there is a reason the super rich don't have a 9 to 5. Quality of life is damaged by it, and machines will be the remedy to that whether you're on board or not.

[Idobox]

"People will maintain the robots." - Unlikely, machines can probably detect, troubleshoot, and fix machines better than people can. Those jobs will give, too. That said, I hope this "Job collapse" happens sooner than later. Jobs and hard work get in the way of enjoyment and quality of life. The entire "how do we spread resources" debate can be argued as propaganda from the top 10%. We can provide food, water, and shelter for the Earths population - especially with machine precision handling difficult tasks like infrastructure repair, maintenance, and transportation of resources and goods.

I'm awake about 16 hours a day. I spend 11 of those hours either getting ready for, driving too, or at work. For the average 9-5 guy, that leaves 5 hours a day of "fun time" that I inevitably spend on chores and non-work related work. That isn't a very "high quality" of life. It's slave labor. I am a slave to the dollar bill.

Trust me when I say there is a reason the super rich don't have a 9 to 5. Quality of life is damaged by it, and machines will be the remedy to that whether you're on board or not.

There will still be work to do, things like planning, designing new products (including robots), things robots can't do. So it won't be a society where nobody needs to work ever, but still a society where many people can't find work at all.

Discussing how we distribute work, income and capital is very important. It's pretty much 90% of all we've done in politics since the beginning of the modern age.

[Red Iron Crown]

I'm awake about 16 hours a day. I spend 11 of those hours either getting ready for, driving too, or at work. For the average 9-5 guy, that leaves 5 hours a day of "fun time" that I inevitably spend on chores and non-work related work. That isn't a very "high quality" of life. It's slave labor. I am a slave to the dollar bill.

I think you misunderstand what a slave is, your situation is not at all comparable.

For that matter, why not live more frugally and work less?

[Darnok]

I'm awake about 16 hours a day. I spend 11 of those hours either getting ready for, driving too, or at work. For the average 9-5 guy, that leaves 5 hours a day of "fun time" that I inevitably spend on chores and non-work related work. That isn't a very "high quality" of life. It's slave labor. I am a slave to the dollar bill.

Not a dollar bill Sir, but we all are slaves, because our paper money value is decreased by banks.

And it doesn't matter if you get loan or work less you are slave because you are part of slave society.

If people around you take loans value of your money is decreased that is main reason why we all are slaves and it is not going to change unless banking system is going back to gold deposits.

[Seret]

"People will maintain the robots." - Unlikely, machines can probably detect, troubleshoot, and fix machines better than people can.

That's certainly not the case currently. For a machine to outperform a human at a complex diagnostic task would essentially require a highly advanced problem-solving AI. Automated diagnostic machines for specific systems do exist, but they're not foolproof and are limited to the system they were designed to communicate with. They're also only able to detect a limited class of failures (generally electronic and comms problems). Asking a same machine to carry out the day to day jobs of a technician such as uploading new software to a motor controller, fault finding an electrical problem on a lighting circuit, replacing a faulty actuator, then testing the oil in a gearbox requires a board range of abilities well beyond anything robots will be capable any time soon.

[vger]

you could never have a society where machines do everything where people pursue their own personal interests. Imagine for a second electricity was completely free today....you might still use the same amount, but the guy down the street might start using 10 times that. Imagine the strain on the already existing system, even if it was free. Their burden to deliver and keep the power going would grow higher and higher.....and the same applies to a future where machines do everything. when you can just order something from a machine for free, everyone will have to be on board to not abuse it otherwise there simply won't be enough resources available in X span of time. Machines can only mine a finite amount of resources in a given amount of time

That's one of the reasons government exists. Obviously these kinds of things would be regulated just like they are today. Just because the guy next door makes a billion dollars a year, doesn't give him the right to build a giant tesla coil on his roof. Rationing will always make sense, especially in the long run if Earth resources start running out.

it will be very hard to do away with money, because it's actually one of the few things that limits our resource usage. don't have the money, can't expend it. We'd all be using 100x or more resources if we could just tell a machine to make anything for us without cost. But at the same time, the limits themselves are a serious problem, because that means some serious concessions in lifestyle and freedoms. Sure you'll have the freedom to a roof over your head and more than enough food to sustain you.....but so did many slaves. We would be slaves to ideology

That only makes sense to a point. Eventually 'want' just becomes ridiculous. "All you can eat" for example. Why would anyone buy a hundred tomatoes if 90% of them will rot before they get around to eating them? What would you do with ten cell phones?

And, ideology? I'd rather be a slave to that than be a slave to worrying about whether or not I'll still be good enough next month to be worthy of having a paycheck to buy food with.

Now think of all those fancy city apartments on earth you see here and there in a few episodes.....who decides who lives in what apartment? who gets the high loft with the fancy view and who gets the first floor apartment if there is no money to decide who gets what based on what they've earned? what happens if two people want to live in the same place? do they live in the same place for the rest of their lives? are they assigned a place to live? do they switch places every now and then and decide 'hey get me a home ready, I'm moving here!'. Do the starfleet admirals live next door to some average joe? From what I've seen they're pretty high rollers.

I don't know if that really matters. There are plenty of people who can afford to go to a restaurant, but still, only one of the groups is going to get that "spot by the window" that everybody likes.

[Red Iron Crown]

Not a dollar bill Sir, but we all are slaves, because our paper money value is decreased by banks.

And it doesn't matter if you get loan or work less you are slave because you are part of slave society.

If people around you take loans value of your money is decreased that is main reason why we all are slaves and it is not going to change unless banking system is going back to gold deposits.

You're confusing central banks, which regulate the money supply, and regular banks which provide safe storage and lending services (among other things).

The gold standard was awful, it tied the growth of the economy to the gold mining rate whether that was appropriate or not. Fiat currency lets a government choose between inflation and deflation.

Read on for comments on the slavery thing.

And while on that topic of "there's no comparison" ... I actually have to wonder what the inflated value of what slaves were typically given (housing, land to grow crops, animals to cook) would be compared to minimum wage today.

Comparing wage earners to slaves is borderline offensive. While it is true that wage earners have to work to earn a living, all the other bad things about slavery don't remotely apply. A wage earner cannot have his/her family broken up through sale of family members. A wage earner can choose to leave a job with which they're unhappy; a slave cannot. A wage earner has property rights for the things they own; a slave is property for which their owners have rights. A wage earner is free to travel or relocate at their whim; a slave can only travel or relocate at their owner's whim. A wage earner has a reasonable right to personal security; a slave can be confined, tortured, raped or killed without recourse or consequence.

Every time you think you're a slave for a wage, get down on your knees and thank $Deity that you'll never experience true slavery.

[WestAir]

I think you misunderstand what a slave is, your situation is not at all comparable.

For that matter, why not live more frugally and work less?

In my opinion, you missed the point of my comparison, and it's probably my fault you did. Compensation, right to refuse, and a lack of serfdom differentiate me from real life slaves, but at the end of the day I still sacrifice 70% of my time to someone else's labor for fear of consequence. At the end of the day, I'm not doing what I want with my life because I'll suffer if I don't work. I'm sure the English Dictionary has a word for this that isn't "slavery", but I don't know it.

EDIT: As a black man, I don't want to discredit my ancestors in America or brothers in Africa who are enduring real slavery that involves violence and servitude. Like you've said (multiple times), there is absolutely a difference here. Unfortunately I'm not intelligent enough to properly describe that difference with words.

Not a dollar bill Sir, but we all are slaves, because our paper money value is decreased by banks.

And it doesn't matter if you get loan or work less you are slave because you are part of slave society.

If people around you take loans value of your money is decreased that is main reason why we all are slaves and it is not going to change unless banking system is going back to gold deposits.

http://izquotes.com/quotes-pictures/quote-it-is-well-enough-that-people-of-the-nation-do-not-understand-our-banking-and-monetary-system-for-henry-ford-63849.jpg

I'm not sure I completely agree. I mean, even when mechanized workers saturate the workforce, all of the "money" has to go somewhere. No body is going to give healthcare or wages to an AI.

That's certainly not the case currently. For a machine to outperform a human at a complex diagnostic task would essentially require a highly advanced problem-solving AI. Automated diagnostic machines for specific systems do exist, but they're not foolproof and are limited to the system they were designed to communicate with. They're also only able to detect a limited class of failures (generally electronic and comms problems). Asking a same machine to carry out the day to day jobs of a technician such as uploading new software to a motor controller, fault finding an electrical problem on a lighting circuit, replacing a faulty actuator, then testing the oil in a gearbox requires a board range of abilities well beyond anything robots will be capable any time soon.

But eventually it will come. Nothing, absolutely nothing, will stop the next 50, 100, or 500 years from happening. To date humanity has had an economy based on services and trade with a huge distribution of wealth. In my opinion, we'll soon reach the point where that type of economic bubble will pop, because we'll be able to replace any and every human with a more efficient AI; Even in the tasks you've listed. I understand your point that it won't happen tomorrow. It probably won't happen by 2214, but it will happen - and that's part of the topic at hand. What do we do when computers can manage, design, and repair computers better than we can?

Edited September 15, 2014 by WestAir