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What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

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Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#501

Post by morgante »

pygy_ wrote: post #107
AmirS2 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> fulltime labor for everyone is simply not going to happen. We just don't need it. and from the article > there’s not enough work to go around I disagree. There's not enough paid employment to go around, but there is an enormous amount of work that needs to be done! Our entire society needs to be weaned off its carbon dependence if we want humans to survive the next century. This will involve at the very least the w…

The constant supply solar of energy (and finite supply of mineral energy sources) also means that we won't be able to grow the economy indefinitely and need to find a way to transition to a system that thrives at equilibrium.

Right now we're using a very small percentage of the total supply of solar energy to Earth. [0]

We could grow our economy by literally 1000x and still not have any worry of running out of energy coming from the sun.

Your comment sounds like someone who says we shouldn't bother doing anything due to the inevitable heat death of the universe.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kardashev_scale#Current_status...

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#502

Post by reflexive »

morgante wrote: post #499
reflexive wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if you could work on startup ideas and software projects simply because you were passionate about solving a problem or creating something, and not because of the money. I've been in this position, and I've concluded: if you really have no financial constraints, you'd be daft to spend your time working on a startup, or solving the dull, pedestrian problems that are of such utilitarian concern to society. If yo…

I get far more enjoyment out of working to fix actual problems for actual people than working on vaguely creative disputes. Making a robust automated toll booth sounds a lot more appealing to me than making yet another programming language.

I get far more enjoyment out of working to fix actual problems for actual people

I'm with you - the catch is, how do you know what are the actual important problems, except by how people allocate money?

We could each list a thousand problems that ought to be solved, but we can only work on one thing at a time. Thus we use a scarce resource (money) to communicate our actual priorities.

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#503

Post by pascalxus »

meekins wrote: post #378
cesarbs wrote: post #240

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the bit that hits close to home to me: > they must demonstrate commitment above and beyond their contracted work hours, and express constant satisfaction and happiness about their work My wife and I are both software engineers and that is a nearly constant source of stress for us. In our experience, people in our field frown upon people who treat software engineering as just their job. Two things I recall fro…

What bothers me the most about this is that passion and wish to work 9-5 are considered mutually exclusive. This feels like passion for software engineering just means passion for cranking out code for the company 24/7. Of course this is just a personal anecdote but during heavier work weeks I have very little energy or interest in any spare time hacking. In contrast on normal 9-5 weeks I tend to do a lot more of rea…

For most job descriptions, Passion doesn't mean literally 'passion'. Passion is just a euphemism for "Wage slave willing to work 80+ hours per week"

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#504

Post by mooreds »

morgante wrote: post #499
reflexive wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if you could work on startup ideas and software projects simply because you were passionate about solving a problem or creating something, and not because of the money. I've been in this position, and I've concluded: if you really have no financial constraints, you'd be daft to spend your time working on a startup, or solving the dull, pedestrian problems that are of such utilitarian concern to society. If yo…

I get far more enjoyment out of working to fix actual problems for actual people than working on vaguely creative disputes. Making a robust automated toll booth sounds a lot more appealing to me than making yet another programming language.

Can't reply to reflexive, but they say:

> ... the catch is, how do you know what are the actual important problems, except by how people allocate money?

Attention is another scarce good that has value. Many open source projects have value because they are solving a problem many people have. The original authors knew they were on to someone because people laid attention to the solution.

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#505

Post by greedo »

hkmurakami wrote: post #53
a3n wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The big question is will the majority be able to maintain enough power to obtain income for those who aren't working, or will we see some kind of serious class warfare/starving populations? In the United States it will be the class warfare/starving thing. You don't deserve anything here unless you pay for it. Many people believe that taking unemployment compensation is shameful. I think a lot of us will be fed in p…

>You don't deserve anything here unless you pay for it. So true. Even things like safety, cleanliness, education quality, etc. are things we must pay for here, in stark contrast to other countries in the world.

Someone is paying for it...

TANSTAAFL

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#506

Post by majewsky »

reflexive wrote: post #492
majewsky wrote: post #485

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a false dichotomy. Even with, say, UBI, you can still pay people to work on important problems.

I'm not arguing against Universal Basic Income - provided that, in practice, the proportion of people who elect to work for money remains relatively high. I am arguing against the idea that we don't need money to create incentives.

I didn't see anyone arguing that money is not needed for incentive purposes.

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#507

Post by Animats »

edblarney wrote: post #272
sqldba wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole "computers can do anything" theme in the original post and the comments is borderline retarded and describing a mythical state always one or two decades in the future. Teaching a computer to do anything is fucking HARD. And most of the time the problems are just unsolvable. Sure you see cool demos like one that can cook for you. That shit is awesome. So uhhh... where are they? They're demos and proofs of co…

Ya. Whenever anyone talks about 'the singularity' (i.e. computer consciousness) I usually respond with "get your bot to make me a goddam ham sandwich and clean my toilet!" - then we can talk! But let's avoid calling people 'retarded', eh :)

Ham sandwich.

That would be Item #130001 from Integrated Food Services.[1] "Today IFS and their affiliates own and operate a state-of-the-art facility which includes two USDA processing plants, a wholesale bakery and a dry warehouse which total over 100,000 square feet on five acres. We are located in the greater Los Angeles area, almost equidistant from downtown, LAX and the Port of Los Angeles." Most of the prepackaged sandwiches in Southern California come from those plants. Here's an automated sandwich assembly line.[2]

[1] http://integratedfoodservice.com [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8D9YE26QEs

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#508

Post by Natsu »

collyw wrote: post #481
Natsu wrote: post #375

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno. I've done straight-up factory work, i.e. manual labor as well as IT. Maybe I just have a good company, but I'd much rather do this than ever go back to factory work, even if the pay were better in the factory job.

Try doing Salesforce integrations. Unstimulating, boring factory line work IT.

When I compare that to the infamous 20 hour shift of unstimulating, boring factory line factory work, it still comes out ahead :)

At least I can try to automate IT work more easily.

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#509

Post by hkmurakami »

heisenbit wrote: post #466
hkmurakami wrote: post #389

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well when I interviewed in Japan for a traditional bigco, they asked me whether I was committed to working there for the next 40+ years of my life. So there's that, in other parts of the world.

Did you ask them whether they are committed to stick around the next 40 years? Could they please demonstrate this?

They were upper mid level managers and C level folks. Current tenure for them was 20-30 years, so yeah they had demonstrated this.

Re: What if jobs are not the solution but the problem?

#510

Post by freehunter »

edblarney wrote: post #318
freehunter wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course a robot could do those things. Those are very easy things to do. The problem is, you wouldn't want to pay thousands of dollars for a robot to make you a sandwich or clean your toilet because those are things you can easily do yourself for free. And there's no economy of scale to offset the cost, because it's just doing it for only you . How about "get your bot to build my microprocessors" or "get your bot t…

"Of course a robot could do those things. Those are very easy things to do. " Sorry, but no. Very, very hard. + Find my fridge + Open it + Find the meat + Find the bread + Open the mayo + Get a knife + Spread it etc. etc. etc. Even if you do it 'the machines way' it's extremely difficult. No way. Not for quite a while. Much harder than 'driving a car'. Without proving it directly - let me do it indirectly: Factories…

Are you saying that everything in the food industry is done by humans? Watch an episode of Unwrapped on Food Network and you'll see that everything you've just said is false. Robots make a lot more of your food than you might think.

Again, they just don't do it in a "human" way. They do it like robots do it. Driving a car is infinitely harder because you have to do it the human way.

Again, you're thinking of making an android: something that resembles a human and has fingers and hands and would spread butter with a knife. That's a far cry from "a robot that makes a sandwich". Those have existed for longer than the Internet has.

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