As a supporter of free market principles, I'm having to face the reality of our automated future

originally posted by: olaru12
The military industrial complex will always need warm bodies to dance in the ritual of blood and death.

We're just getting started, believe me!

Goddam, Olaru. You are jaaaaded.

That was, like, the single most depressing post I've read in a long time.

The real question is, what should my kids do? The arts? Are robots going to ruin that as well? Too late?

a reply to: stormcell

Really, it's not there to be seen. Honest. What's happening is that the term "AI" is being redefined to include very basic functions. I mean, organising college timetables is not a difficult piece of programming by any stretch of the imagination.

Rather like 'hoverboard' (i.e., a segway without the steering column) or 'hologram' (film of a person, projected onto a solid medium of some kind) the term "artificial intelligence" been debased by golly-gee PR types.

In the sense of AI actually existing as anything approaching the intelligence and/or functionality of a human brain, or even one of the lower primates, Hell even a clownfish, the technology just isn't there.

originally posted by: stormcell
In our small high street, we have around 45 coffee shops and 20 hairdressers, not including nail bars, clothing shops, bars and restaurants.

Exactly. ai, robots; might make drinks , they will eventually make food more consistent than sous chefs can oversee, etc..but the human element will never ever be allowed to leave until society is ok with it. the same society that is made up of the individuals that hold these jobs. everything will be ok

a reply to: ixc77

How many restaurants and hairdressers do we need total ya think?

How does the labor market not devalue itself in a free market system when there is an abundance of supply which is kind of what we are already and have already been dealing with for over a decade?

We can't just pretend everything will be fine and dandy when we are already feeling the effects.

a reply to: audubon

thank you for pointing this out. My personal pet peeve is referring to remote control quadcopters as 'drones'. A drone qualifies itself as some sort of self driven autonomous being, which is only recently being proven on a limited basis for Amazon deliveries. Artificial intelligence is certainly the future. We're not nearly there yet and it most likely wont resemble popular media depictions of it

originally posted by: Abysha

originally posted by: olaru12
The military industrial complex will always need warm bodies to dance in the ritual of blood and death.

We're just getting started, believe me!

Goddam, Olaru. You are jaaaaded.

That was, like, the single most depressing post I've read in a long time.

Perhaps, but old enough to see the patterns and enough experience in the military to know the drill.

Embrace the Suck....

I agree with the premise of the OP. The future of robotics and automated everything may potentially reduce the job force required to a level where a socialized "base income" becomes inevitable. Not my preference, but reality is reality. The one thing that drives social factors more than politics or religion is technology.

If you have enough people out of work with no hope to get a job, you end up with either adjusting the system to accommodate this or you get massive war. People fight when they cant eat.

We arent anywhere near this yet, but there will come a time. I hope we can find a good compromise position that preserves some manner of free enterprise when the time arrives.

Dogmatism will not stop the march of technological progress and its ramifications.

I say this as a generally center-libertarian who can see the writing on the wall. The good news is that with a base income at that point, time will be freed up to create new ideas and businesses. So its not all doom porn. One thing is for sure though - the robotics revolution will be entirely transformative to society whether or not one wants it to be.

originally posted by: ixc77
a reply to: audubon

thank you for pointing this out. My personal pet peeve is referring to remote control quadcopters as 'drones'. A drone qualifies itself as some sort of self driven autonomous being, which is only recently being proven on a limited basis for Amazon deliveries. Artificial intelligence is certainly the future. We're not nearly there yet and it most likely wont resemble popular media depictions of it

Maybe the name drone is foreshadowing future events?

Could they be easily programmed to run a script based on identifying human characteristics for search and rescue operations??

a reply to: toysforadults

You just pointed out an abundant supply of multiple services. There will continue to be as many as have sustainable business. And when/if those service jobs diminish, for any reason, they will find new services to provide. I mentioned in a previous post there will be bumps, but I truly believe people will adapt, without government intervention.

a reply to: toysforadults

search and rescue or kill and destroy equally viable. both are eventually going to happen once it becomes reliable enough to depend on. deep machine learning for big data analysis and autonomous driving are really driving that particular technology

a reply to: ixc77

deep learning and autonomous driving are pretty close to AI.. I mean it doesn't have sentience but it can adapt.

I would say adaptability is inching closer to full autonomy.

a reply to: ixc77

Replacing soldiers and firemen and police is waaay down the future, and at this point is irrelevant. I'm saying that society will naturally adjust, keeping in mind the fact that humans love humans and want each other to do well. i don't see that changing anytime soon regardless of the progression of technology.

a reply to: ixc77

Is society naturally adjusting right now?

Let's not speak about the future because the future is now.

I will never forget my family vacation in 1977. We went to Florida and made a stop at Disney World. The 'cool' ride at that time was Space Mountain. back then we also had long lines, but while in line we walked through several exhibits talking about the future and the benefits of future productivity / technology increases. One of the benefits they listed was that higher productivity would allow all of us to work fractions of the 40 hour work week and yet live a much grander leisure filled life. Unfortunately it has not worked out that way. Instead of benefits being spread through the population, it has been given to the few at the top in unfair proportions. We need to start giving workers more of the value of their work.

a reply to: sligtlyskeptical

Precisely.

I work long hard hours and produce more for less pay.

Benefits have been taking hits as well used to have full coverage everything, not anymore.

There is also less jobs as the machines become more advanced they produce more.

a reply to: toysforadults

Are we literally losing massive amounts of jobs unproportionate to any sort of rate of adjustment period for individuals to adjust? The jobs in question are low skill, low pay employment. Adoption is relatively fast among big business, slower in local business. Putting aside the media circus of people and discourse that's driven by the ratings that are driven by people, I would say that yes, things are adjusting naturally. And will continue to. One can tell the weather by looking outside, certainly doesn't mean anything, so no, the future is not now or we wouldn't have people and computers predicting it.

a reply to: ixc77

Foxxconn

Are you suggesting that every job is low skill low wage?

Most of the factories around here pay between 15-23 an hour those aren't really low wage jobs and many of them require skill.

CNC, printing and many other jobs are not low skill, just because a machine can do the job doesn't mean that when a human does it it requires no skill.

originally posted by: toysforadults
a reply to: ixc77

Foxxconn

Are you suggesting that every job is low skill low wage?

Most of the factories around here pay between 15-23 an hour those aren't really low wage jobs and many of them require skill.

CNC, printing and many other jobs are not low skill, just because a machine can do the job doesn't mean that when a human does it it requires no skill.

No, I wasn't implying that, that's silly. To follow that question, are you implying that all jobs are being replaced by machine automation? Or that the factories around you are being automated to replace those market negotiated jobs? CNC and printing have always been done by machines, supervised by job holding humans. The link you posted is in reference to Chinese based jobs. They are certainly not making the wages you refer to. And China is probably, and most likely moving forward on automation. But that is not something one can judge or act on effectively without living within that country. Thats up to that country's people to decide and act on. And, if the market doesn't correlate to the needs of the people in a timely basis, the people will find a way to correct it. Are you so misanthropic to believe people can't take of themselves?

User Generated Content = other peoples' original content = ATS's idea stream