Always worth linking to Marshall Brain's "Manna" with a title like that;
AI will create 'useless class' of humans
11–20 of 85 posts
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#12[deleted]
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#13Comparative advantage isn't abolished just because the advantage is large.
Economic participation by a class of entities who have a lower capacity for production than every other class of entities is still useful to all involved.
A great many of the world's prejudices, fears, and passionate causes are driven by ignorance of basic economic principles, and this is another example.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#14Every time a new tech emerges someone will always say, that the new tech will take away human jobs. The new tech will take away human jobs. But the humans will just go do other newly created jobs.
There is no law of economics that says the value of labor has to be above survival, let alone minimum wage. When cars replaced horses, most horses didn't get new jobs. They literally became worth less than the cost of feeding them, and were slaughtered.
Near future AI will make the majority of humans basically worthless. There isn't much left that people can do, and computers can't. Sure maybe high intelligence jobs like engineers and programmers are safe (for now...), but most people can't become programmers or engineers.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#15Every time a new tech emerges someone will always say, that the new tech will take away human jobs. The new tech will take away human jobs. But the humans will just go do other newly created jobs.
That has been the general trend over time, but AI breaks this trend. The basic problem is there is minimum wage below which humans can't survive. No such lower limit exists with AI. At some point every job can be performed for less by an AI.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#16Every time a new tech emerges someone will always say, that the new tech will take away human jobs. The new tech will take away human jobs. But the humans will just go do other newly created jobs.
So far we've automated physical tasks. It was possible to go into intellectual jobs as an alternative avenue, since automating that wasn't possible. However now we're automating mental work. Humans can currently go into jobs requiring higher education or creativity but 1) this won't work for everybody and 2) this is not a new avenue outside of the reach of automatization. The machines have a good chance of catching, especially since a lot of those humans moving into more specialized jobs will be tasked with making better machines, which in turn endangers more jobs.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#17Every time a new tech emerges someone will always say, that the new tech will take away human jobs. The new tech will take away human jobs. But the humans will just go do other newly created jobs.
Which takes time and pain, and brings Revolution and WAR.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#18Seems to me that a large section of the population is already at this point without AI. The other weakness of this argument is that in order to perform many of the human jobs, the AI will need a robotic body. Human labor will easily win on cost for many of those jobs.
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#19[deleted]
Re: AI will create 'useless class' of humans
#20Comparative advantage isn't abolished just because the advantage is large. Economic participation by a class of entities who have a lower capacity for production than every other class of entities is still useful to all involved. A great many of the world's prejudices, fears, and passionate causes are driven by ignorance of basic economic principles, and this is another example.
Comparative advantage only works if you have something of value to trade. If AIs automates away your job, then you no longer have anything of value to trade with.