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Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

economist.com

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Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#51

Post by wisty »

DannoHung wrote: post #16

I know that the suggestion that these are going to eliminate human positions is an unpopular sentiment here at HN because economics. However, are we really so sure that there will always be a human labor demand to effectively meet the human labor supply? What do we do when there is an excess of human labor? Everyone here is opposed to make work for good reason. But a suggestion that solves the moral issue of what to…

New industry will be service-orientated. Even if robot cooks can make a better pizza, people will tell themselves that human-made ones are more individual, and taste better.

As the price of human labor goes to zero, humans will be increasingly used as marketing props.

In a democracy or socialist state, handouts or negative taxation will redistribute wealth.

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#52

Post by joe_the_user »

wisty wrote: post #51
DannoHung wrote: post #16

I know that the suggestion that these are going to eliminate human positions is an unpopular sentiment here at HN because economics. However, are we really so sure that there will always be a human labor demand to effectively meet the human labor supply? What do we do when there is an excess of human labor? Everyone here is opposed to make work for good reason. But a suggestion that solves the moral issue of what to…

New industry will be service-orientated. Even if robot cooks can make a better pizza, people will tell themselves that human-made ones are more individual, and taste better. As the price of human labor goes to zero, humans will be increasingly used as marketing props. In a democracy or socialist state, handouts or negative taxation will redistribute wealth.

What evidence do we have that handout are increasing with the recent increase in automation? My sense is they're going in the opposite direction and have strong momentum.

And I will tell you that few people will chose human made pizzas just for the experience, especially if their wages are going to zero.

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#53

Post by [deleted] »

zizee wrote: post #46
forensic wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the classic view, but things have changed. Robots do not just make better workers, they are also better warriors. How many Chinese peasants does it take to kill a single UAV? How many protestors can modern riot police crowd control using sophisticated psychological warfare combined with advanced nonlethal weaponry? Once the violent, unskilled, uneducated, unmoneyed lawbreakers are rounded up by the riot polic…

I guess it could happen gradually (as these things usually do). But the original poster was talking about 50% of the population (500 million people in China alone). I have a hard time believing anyone could think that killing off half a billion people would be the way to go (rather than trying to work change into your social structure). It just sounds too James Bond villanesque. Also, if 50% of people are unemployed…

[deleted]

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#54

Post by jamieb »

zizee wrote: post #46
forensic wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the classic view, but things have changed. Robots do not just make better workers, they are also better warriors. How many Chinese peasants does it take to kill a single UAV? How many protestors can modern riot police crowd control using sophisticated psychological warfare combined with advanced nonlethal weaponry? Once the violent, unskilled, uneducated, unmoneyed lawbreakers are rounded up by the riot polic…

I guess it could happen gradually (as these things usually do). But the original poster was talking about 50% of the population (500 million people in China alone). I have a hard time believing anyone could think that killing off half a billion people would be the way to go (rather than trying to work change into your social structure). It just sounds too James Bond villanesque. Also, if 50% of people are unemployed…

I have a hard time believing anyone could think that killing off half a billion people would be the way to go ... It just sounds too James Bond villanesque.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Final_Solution

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khmer_Rouge#Number_of_deaths

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rwandan_genocide

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augusto_Pinochet

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombing_of_Dresden_in_World_War...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atomic_bombings_of_Hiroshima_an...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#55

Post by mahyarm »

zizee wrote: post #24
jacques_chester wrote: post #7

Automation is bad for the economy. Think of the tens of millions of phone operators put out of work by rotary pulse dialling exchanges. Where are they now? Those 100 or 200 million phones worldwide won't connect themselves!

This won't last forever though. Once true strong AI is created we will be able to automate everything. It might not happen for centuries but eventually we will be forced to rethink the way society functions. Perhaps people will pay a premium for a "human made" sticker on the side?

Saying true strong AI is like saying once teleportation is available, we can live anywhere in the world! Or that if we use nuclear fission for our power production, it will be too cheap to meter. Reality is a bit more sticky, and strong AI is a long ways away.

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#56

Post by adaml_623 »

wisty wrote: post #51
DannoHung wrote: post #16

I know that the suggestion that these are going to eliminate human positions is an unpopular sentiment here at HN because economics. However, are we really so sure that there will always be a human labor demand to effectively meet the human labor supply? What do we do when there is an excess of human labor? Everyone here is opposed to make work for good reason. But a suggestion that solves the moral issue of what to…

New industry will be service-orientated. Even if robot cooks can make a better pizza, people will tell themselves that human-made ones are more individual, and taste better. As the price of human labor goes to zero, humans will be increasingly used as marketing props. In a democracy or socialist state, handouts or negative taxation will redistribute wealth.

I hope you realise that if you look at the numbers it's unlikely that the people who are making the human-made pizzas will earn enough to pay for human-made pizza.

It's like there is a a pyramid of salaries and we just have to admit that we're trimming bits off the bottom of the pyramid. (IMHO)

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#57

Post by nknight »

zizee wrote: post #38
zizee wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you have brainwashed the tank crews (which admittedly does happen in the military).

In this situation a tank crew would be attacking their fellow country men, so one would hope hope they would be questioning their orders to fire on civilians. If they didn't question the orders you would have to question whether they were brainwashed into thinking the fellow country men were deserving of attack. A lot of militaries train their soldiers to not question the orders of their superiors. I believe the US m…

US law in this area is largely illusory. It makes reference to "lawful orders", but provides little guidance on what would constitute an "unlawful order". Getting it wrong means prison, and getting it right can still mean prison -- the last case I heard about, the military court basically said "the order is lawful unless you are told otherwise by a superior officer", making the entire question moot.

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#58

Post by free »

Groxx wrote: post #23
natfriedman wrote: post #18

At Foxconn in the last five years there have been 17 reported suicides out of ~1 million workers. The US rate in 2007 was, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, 11.5 suicides per 100,000 people, or ~35x higher than the Foxconn rate. Foxconners are not unusually predisposed to kill themselves. It's a jingoistic myth.

How many of those 11.5/100k have been done at work , though? The 17 and this quote seem to imply those are just the ones happening at the buildings themselves: > To pacify its increasingly restive workers, Foxconn has repeatedly bumped up their wages, improved facilities, provided counselling and swathed its factories with nets to catch anyone leaping from a window. And, for comparison, the WHO gives numbers that are…

IIRC, foxconn provides on campus housing for the workers, so everything happens at the plant

Re: Robots Don't Complain or Demand Higher Wages or Kill Themselves...

#59

Post by TeMPOraL »

zizee wrote: post #38
zizee wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you have brainwashed the tank crews (which admittedly does happen in the military).

In this situation a tank crew would be attacking their fellow country men, so one would hope hope they would be questioning their orders to fire on civilians. If they didn't question the orders you would have to question whether they were brainwashed into thinking the fellow country men were deserving of attack. A lot of militaries train their soldiers to not question the orders of their superiors. I believe the US m…

You don't have to look too hard for a real-life example of this scenario. Just look at what happened in Libya and other countries affected by the Arab Uprising - how military behaved in different countries. They're facing this dilemma right now.
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