Major Firm Announces It’s Replacing Its Employees with A.I.

a reply to: JoshuaCox

Only one thing I have ever heard of would work and that is universal salaries... every American gets 3grand a month and then any work you can find is extra...

That is an interesting concept, there would still be poor, middle class and rich, because some of those people couldn't manage their money, other entrepreneurs might be able to open a business, that service the local economy. And the rich would basically be entertainers and sports people, and those with old money.
Actually I would love it, I could work part time and still have the same lifestyle I have today.
There is a show on TV showing earth in the future that has colonized our solar system that basically has this type system. Those that want to work for more money leave the planet to make it.

Personally, I plan to take full advantage of automation and AI. Everything from food to cleaning up around the house will be done for me, freeing up my time and energy for other pursuits.

My time and energy may be at a bit more of a premium than most, but I assume pretty much anyone can put such tactics to use in the same way that is lamented when used by these companies.

In the end, there is no stopping it and the only reason it would be detrimental is if we aren't able to evolve socially and culturally (which is a very real concern). Our tools are outpacing our collective maturity, so to speak, but we aren't helpless in that. Regardless of how it turns out, it will be interesting, that's for sure.

EMPs aren't too big of a concern, as there are methods to protect critical applications along with more clever solutions, but hacking most certainly needs to be examined. Years ago, some saw the dangers of extensive connectivity of everything from cars to microwaves, but only recently has the vulnerability entered into the general conversation. At that time, it was flat out disparaged..

There are ways around that too, but there is a price to pay for a completely connected world using our current mindset and blueprint.

Except it's not AI. Massive computing power? Sure. AI? No.

originally posted by: MyHappyDogShiner
a reply to: Bone75

Just think?, if all or most of the work was done by mindless droning machines, how difficult it would be to regard anyone's jealously criticizing those who supposedly don't work hard enough for what they have.

Well my plan is to find as many people as I can who are willing to shovel sh!t to make my dream of a US with no money or trade a reality.

If we could round up a few million folks ready and willing to take the crappy jobs in return for free everything, then the rest of the snobs in this country who are worried about being forced to work a crappy job won't have anything to gripe about.

A.I. could be the key to the evolution of the human race to a more just world and freer societies.

A.I. (self aware AI) is the most retarded and irresponsible thing we could possibly do as a species, but I'm afraid its too late to stop that train. I don't see a Terminator scenario in our future but I can almost promise you a bonafide artificial intelligence will wreak havoc on this Earth.

If we wanted a war we could just send robots to a hardened enclosure to nuke the piss outta each other...

Yeah let's not mmmk? lol

...What reason would there be for even that type of war, if everything was done for us?...

Well I imagine the rest of the world is gonna be pissed when we crash the very system we've imposed on them for the last century. We're gonna have to watch our backs until they see that what we become is working.

You’ll have a dole, just as in Ancient Rome. You’ll have social services. You won’t starve or be homeless or lack access to things like medical care.

You won’t have any rights any more, of course. But then, you’ve proved you can’t be trusted with any.

Roll on the Millennium! I can’t wait.

originally posted by: marg6043
Well when people can not longer make money to buy into what companies wants them to buy and invest in, then they can have their robots boycott them for fair pay and Robots can start buying gadgets so companies can make money, hell robots can pay taxes too.

Who needs pesky, dirty, environmental hazards humans, we will become the bugs that needs to be fumigated to death

Boycott the darn companies.

Yeah and smash those weaving looms while we're at it!

a reply to: soficrow

There is no way AI can replace people at this stage

No way

originally posted by: fleabit
Except it's not AI. Massive computing power? Sure. AI? No.

Exactly

originally posted by: greydaze
I know man,it's sad but true..I used to work as web press assistant,My job was to stack the bundles using switches,turn dials,strap machine,and vacuum lift to put them on a pallet etc.That was 11 yrs ago,from I heard My prev job has gone A.I

It happened in the 1800's as well - punch card looms replaced artisans who sat four to a loom.

Again in the 1960's when telephone exchanges became automated. Protest groups did form in order to object to digit dialling, but the operator women found new jobs.

In the 1980's there was the Wapping Street dispute where the print union workers who had objected to modernization suddenly found themselves unemployable overnight. Their manual labour jobs that involved adding and removing metal lettering onto giant copper print drums suddenly disappeared due to WYSIWYG systems. Journalists simply typed their shorthand notes into the document system and everything was laser printed. Thousands lost their jobs overnight.

originally posted by: Plotus
Not to mention HACKING...... We could be brought to our knees in a moment.

I think you hit on something with this comment that is hard for most people to grasp as they try to divine the future: who the heck knows what kinds of yet-to-be imagined opportunities will be created with each new wave of technology? I mean right there you mention something that probably a lot of people will start doing if they find it to their advantage (hacking the robots). Then on top of that will spawn entire industries based on safeguarding against those hackers. The arms race that will ensue will keep people on both sides of that equation "employed" far, far into the future.

oh yeah and OWN THE ROBOT!!!

originally posted by: LesterJust
a reply to: soficrow

There is no way AI can replace people at this stage

No way

Huh?

It's already happening. And the pace is accelerating. True, it's not "real" AI - but things are moving right along. Here's a quick taste but there's much, much more.

It May Surprise You Which Countries Are Replacing Workers With Robots the Fastest

...Of the more than 229,000 industrial robots sold in 2014 (the most recent statistics available), more than 57,000 were sold to Chinese manufacturers, 29,300 to Japanese companies, 26,200 to companies in the U.S., 24,700 to South Koreans and more than 20,000 to German companies. By comparison, robot sales in India totaled just 2,100, IFR reported.

None of this should surprise us. Automation makes little or no economic sense in countries where there is comparatively little manufacturing or where abundant cheap labor is readily available. The basic economic trade-off between the cost of labor and the cost of automation is the primary consideration. Labor laws, cultural considerations, the availability of capital and the age and skill levels of local workers also are important factors.

Robots are now really stealing jobs as Japanese firm replaces staff with AI

...Previous reports have already forecast the impending AI-powered automation cycle, with experts speculating human workforce will lose roughly seven million jobs to robots in the next five years.

Robots, automation simplify building sites in Japan

Japan is running out of people to take care of the elderly, so it's making robots instead

...as countries witness a climbing number of seniors, the amount of caregivers remains stagnant.

This is particularly a problem in Japan, as a nearly 300-page Merrill Lynch report projects a shortage of 1 million caregivers by 2025 for the country.

To address the issue, Japanese companies are leading in the development of Carebots.

Carebots are robots specifically designed to assist elderly people, and it's an industry that's growing in a big way. One-third of the Japanese government's budget is allocated to developing carebots.

2016. Japanese firm to open world’s first robot-run farm

originally posted by: MOMof3
a reply to: marg6043

The only progress left is up. To the stars and only the rich can do that. That is whom the corp and investors will make money from, like incest, and death. Hey its a new world welcome all the kiddies to it.

I welcome our future robotic system overlords with open arms

a reply to: JoshuaCox

Ain't going to happen unless we find a inexhaustible green energy like in Star Trek Movies. Free money comes with free energy and population control because sex will be happening more and more if you don't work. Bet on it!

More like starvation with total war first however!

a reply to: CharlesT
what are you talking about, that is exactly what it could mean. The fund managers are being replaced, the people who make the decisions on which companies they trade in the index and how often they move are what control the price and yield of the fund. Going AI means faster action and calculation which could easily mean better and faster pay out.
a reply to: Bone75
Yea my bad, sometimes that happens.
a reply to: Blondy

sex will be happening more and more if you don't work. Bet on it!

originally posted by: Bone75

originally posted by: MyHappyDogShiner
a reply to: Bone75

I would love to be able to LOL right along with you, but it really isn't very funny at all.

The thing is, I think that deep down we all do agree... at least on what kind of world we want to live in and what we want for all of humanity... and we'll get there I promise.

But in the meantime, laugh while you still can because things are going to get alot worse before they get better.

Ain't that the truth!

Transitions suck.

Man this is so concerning to me.

I'm ex IT, I divorced it a few years ago after realizing I needed to be more creative. But the trend with every tech company I worked for was "How can we automate your job, please help us replace you with a robot" and it's been a steady forward march since. MS, AT&T, Google, they are all about letting automation make them $$

The quality and feature of tech are getting more and more sad as a result, it's not improving anything except profits

I'm one of those people that know Skynet is a reference to a Arnold movie, but still talk about it like it's real

originally posted by: dfnj2015
Since they've already outsourced all the labor to foreign workers on H1-B visas, what difference does it make if foreigners working here lose their jobs?

Lol. First, there are only 85,000 H1-B visas issued per year. This article from Kellogg will help you to understand. Second, in February of this year, there were 145,798,000 jobs in the US and those are only what they know of.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out the basic math on this one.

originally posted by: fleabit
Except it's not AI. Massive computing power? Sure. AI? No.

True. It's not real AI. But massive computing power is all it takes to put billions of humans out of work.

The rest comes later.

a reply to: soficrow
I still say AI does not have to tell you it feels sad or laugh at a joke to be true AI. I think there should be a distinction for the kind of programming that could legitimately pull that off.

AI refers to the concept of thoughts, adaptation, learning. Many people say it is not AI though until it is personified with emotions or its ability to explain its decisions. I would say that could be called synthetic life maybe??

Today's AI fits the definition of AI to me. It can learn and adapt. THAT is intelligence. To be able to feel though, that is a different leap altogether I believe. Maybe there is not a proper term for it yet, or one better than synthetic life.

But IMO, these things are legit AI.

originally posted by: worldstarcountry
a reply to: soficrow
I still say AI does not have to tell you it feels sad or laugh at a joke to be true AI. I think there should be a distinction for the kind of programming that could legitimately pull that off.

AI refers to the concept of thoughts, adaptation, learning. Many people say it is not AI though until it is personified with emotions or its ability to explain its decisions. I would say that could be called synthetic life maybe??

Today's AI fits the definition of AI to me. It can learn and adapt. THAT is intelligence. To be able to feel though, that is a different leap altogether I believe. Maybe there is not a proper term for it yet, or one better than synthetic life.

But IMO, these things are legit AI.

I see your point but don't agree. I think there's a ways to go even without the 'human' stuff. There are significant limitations to current 'deep learning' algorithms.

Understanding the limits of deep learning

...deep learning is simply more powerful pattern recognition than previous statistical and machine learning methods. “The most important problem for AI today is abstraction and reasoning,” explains Chollet, an AI researcher at Google and famed inventor of widely used deep learning library Keras. “Current supervised perception and reinforcement learning algorithms require lots of data, are terrible at planning, and are only doing straightforward pattern recognition.”

By contrast, humans “learn from very few examples, can do very long-term planning, and are capable of forming abstract models of a situation and [manipulating] these models to achieve extreme generalization.”

Even simple human behaviors are laborious to teach to a deep learning algorithm. ...

...How can we overcome the limitations of deep learning and proceed toward general artificial intelligence? Chollet’s initial plan of attack involves using “super-human pattern recognition, like deep learning, to augment explicit search and formal systems,” starting with the field of mathematical proofs. Automated Theorem Provers (ATPs) typically use brute force search and quickly hit combinatorial explosions in practical use. In the DeepMath project, Chollet and his colleagues used deep learning to assist the proof search process, simulating a mathematician’s intuitions about what lemmas (a subsidiary or intermediate theorem in an argument or proof) might be relevant.

...Geoffrey Hinton, widely called the “father of deep learning” wants to replace neurons in neural networks with “capsules” that he believes more accurately reflect the cortical structure in the human mind. “Evolution must have found an efficient way to adapt features that are early in a sensory pathway so that they are more helpful to features that are several stages later in the pathway,” Hinton explains. He hopes that capsule-based neural network architectures will be more resistant to the adversarial attacks that Goodfellow illuminated above.

Perhaps all of these approaches to overcoming the limits of deep learning have truth value. Perhaps none of them do. Only time and continued investment in AI research will tell.