AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables • Hacker News Board

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#41

Post by Akronymus » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 4:33 AM UTC

myself248 wrote: post #23

Ekaros wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like we need similar legislation as tobacco packaging. Dedicate 40-60% of product to machine readable identification of what type of recycling it is.

Or just go Aldi's route and put enormous barcodes covering entire sides of the package. Scan rate goes up _immensely_ when you don't have to give even half a hoot about orientation. Before we tried to use AI and cameras for this task, bottle-return machines have just used barcode scanners. They're fast, deadly accurate, and take zero intelligence to program. The achilles' heel is certain jerkface brands that use whit…

Aldi seems to have figured out packaging the best out of ANY store I have been to. And the empty boxes for your groceries are always useful if you forget to grab a basket beforehand.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#42

Post by bergenty » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 4:34 AM UTC

evanthayer wrote: post #40

This is a solution without a problem? The global recycling industry has collapsed. It never broke 10% btw, and is currently at 4%. China doesn’t want our trash anymore. No one is buying, regardless of marginal cost.

Sorting has always been our worst enemy. We can’t recycle everything but can recycle a lot of materials really, really well.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#43

Post by bergenty » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 4:36 AM UTC

langsoul-com wrote: post #38

I wonder, if the AI could identify recyclable items, then just lighting up items so humans could sort would be eaiser. Lights and hands cost way less than complicated grip machines.

Why? Make the investment at centralized locations. No human should have to do a mind numbing job like that. Can’t even relax, it will be stressful too.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#44

Post by ycombiredd » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 4:59 AM UTC

I’ve been automating processes and systems (with software, not robotics) since my early days as a sysadmin. I would later mentor many juniors over the years and was often challenged by them about how good for our careers doing such a thing was. I would always respond that I felt our jobs were to try to automate ourselves out of being necessary, because then we could move on to bigger more challenging problems, now that we had gotten common repeatable issues out of the way. “There will always be bigger, better work for those with the skills required to automate their jobs out of existence”, I would tell them.

Now 25 years later I find myself saying similar things when discussing the topic with people who fear automation displacing workers, and my initial response to this article was much the same.

Then, a memory of a commercial I used to see as a kid popped into my head and for the first and only time I’ve felt myself being pulled to an anti-automation sentiment - and this is an isolated use case of automation I am feeling this way about, and it is all because of this commercial that apparently still occupies a place in my mind probably 40 years since it aired.

https://youtu.be/CSiz6kbIZkw

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#45

Post by asvitkine » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 5:01 AM UTC

Animats wrote: post #20

sschueller wrote: post #4

What I find sad is to see startups here in Switzerland where we already separate and recycle extensively that offer a service where you just toss everything that can be recycled in the same bag. So batteries are mixed with plastic and cans. These bags compete with government collection facilities and are "reprogramming" people to be lazy. Regular trash is very expensive here and people who want to safe are forced to…

Centralizing this does not scale . Sure it does.[1] What doesn't scale is manual sorting. It complicates collection, because there are all those bins to empty,the trucks are more complicated, and humans aren't good at separating the different types of plastics. That's easy with multispectral imaging, but humans lack that capability. Bulk Handling Systems seems to be the US leader in this. Robots are used but do under…

The cost of recycling needs to be built into the cost of the product, for example via a portion of the sales tax.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#46

Post by adrianN » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 5:12 AM UTC

ycombiredd wrote: post #44

I’ve been automating processes and systems (with software, not robotics) since my early days as a sysadmin. I would later mentor many juniors over the years and was often challenged by them about how good for our careers doing such a thing was. I would always respond that I felt our jobs were to try to automate ourselves out of being necessary, because then we could move on to bigger more challenging problems, now th…

It's only a matter of time until automation replaces humans with normal IQ in a way that they're permanently out of jobs.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#47

Post by deelowe » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 5:13 AM UTC

hedora wrote: post #36

Here's an idea: Charge product manufacturers enough tax to get recycling of their packaging to 95%. Aluminum and clear glass would immediately become more popular (they are mechanically sortable). I'm guessing the manufacturers would quickly standardize on a small number of plastics for everything else.

And the price of everything would go up in response. probably not politically feasible in this climate.

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#48

Post by ljlolel » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 5:49 AM UTC

geuis wrote: post #3

I wish articles like this would just get to the point. We don't need yet another explanation of how recycling works, how it has low recovery rates, etc. Given the audience, take it as a given the reader has the basics down. Further down the author finally starts to talk about their topic (trash picking robots), but then digresses yet again. It's a really terrible writing style. State what your topic is up front with…

You all would enjoy the density of Twitter more

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#49

Post by throwaway473825 » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 5:49 AM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #46

ycombiredd wrote: post #44

I’ve been automating processes and systems (with software, not robotics) since my early days as a sysadmin. I would later mentor many juniors over the years and was often challenged by them about how good for our careers doing such a thing was. I would always respond that I felt our jobs were to try to automate ourselves out of being necessary, because then we could move on to bigger more challenging problems, now th…

It's only a matter of time until automation replaces humans with normal IQ in a way that they're permanently out of jobs.

So far automation has only created more jobs. Why would this suddenly change?

Re: AI-guided robots are ready to sort recyclables

#50

Post by jl2718 » Sun, Jun 26, 2022, 6:05 AM UTC

ycombiredd wrote: post #44

I’ve been automating processes and systems (with software, not robotics) since my early days as a sysadmin. I would later mentor many juniors over the years and was often challenged by them about how good for our careers doing such a thing was. I would always respond that I felt our jobs were to try to automate ourselves out of being necessary, because then we could move on to bigger more challenging problems, now th…

I had a ‘special’ mailman at NASA Ames in 2007-2009. This guy was the best mailman ever; he was 100% focused on his job and did it with the seriousness of handling CBRN materials. You might wonder how someone can go from good to great at mail handling, especially to someone that doesn’t send or receive much mail. There were lots of unexpected things. Address errors always got to me. Mail was sorted by ‘importance’ in the box. Hand delivery of government mail and warnings about anything anomalous. I got the feeling that you could give this guy any small job and he would study the minutiae intensely, finding ways to get better long after any ‘normal’ person would have gotten bored and started thinking about something else. I see a lot of problems when people don’t employ them well. They often live institutionalized and do odd jobs part-time like grocery bagging. At Stop’n’Shop, they are switched around and perform poorly. At the Westford Market Basket, there was a special bagger that had a rough first few years, but learned everything about the store, and ended up managing it, superlatively imo. 100% focus on whatever they are told to do for years at a time. My mailman would have made a great project manager, a set of well-defined human tasks that are almost always ignored and subverted because of the power that comes with the position. Imagine a person in a power role that was actually focused on doing their job right.