Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#41

Post by 1971genocide » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 2:58 PM UTC

Al-Khwarizmi wrote: post #37

miralabs wrote: post #2

if everything gets replaced by bots, how will the economy run given that much of it is because of employees getting paid and in turn spending that money?

At some point, we will have to accept that a society based on the assumption that everyone should find a full-time job just doesn't make sense anymore. In Europe this is starting to become obvious, as we have high structural unemployment (very high in some countries) in spite of the jobs we keep just for the sake of it. Jobs like gas station operators or supermarket cashiers are mostly unnecessary and just kept becau…

Speaking as an bum student :

Your job security is MORE guaranteed even more than before.

All the online MIT lectures still have a high bar in terms of understanding what they talking about.

You cannot just do quantum mechanics by watching some online videos.

The online materials ( Internet, Forums ), increases the size of your market.

Notice the exponential rise of cost of college education. Its driven because more people are understanding the importance of studying in Uni. You will be surprised by how many people in the world still do not know basic arithmetic, and are still growing potatoes.

Its the american idea that winner takes all but that is very false.

Its about raising the average.

If we took a time machine and transported you 200 years in the past your worth to society would be of less importance since people would think you are a crazy person or a witch.

As no one would understand your work, notation, etc.

This is why as more and more of the 3 billion people that still operate outside of the mainstream economy enter it the value of the people doing average work in the mainstream economy increases.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#42

Post by ekianjo » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:01 PM UTC

Always coming back to this silliness:

> They all float the idea of basic guaranteed incomes for everyone, or tax credits to supplement low-wage workers.

Yeah, just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach. It's so disappointing to see otherwise smart people ending up with these kind of conclusions.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#43

Post by jqm » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:11 PM UTC

Roritharr wrote: post #5

miralabs wrote: post #2

if everything gets replaced by bots, how will the economy run given that much of it is because of employees getting paid and in turn spending that money?

More Bullshit Jobs.

Indeed. That is the answer.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#44

Post by tachyonbeam » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:13 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #42

Always coming back to this silliness: > They all float the idea of basic guaranteed incomes for everyone, or tax credits to supplement low-wage workers. Yeah, just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach. It's so disappointing to see otherwise smart people ending up with these kind of conclusions.

There is a difference though. Tractors can take away some farm jobs. Robots will become increasingly versatile. They'll eventually be able to take away all retail jobs, all the low skill jobs. Then eventually, higher skill jobs too.

What will be left for humans to do? Art? Sex work? We might be able to build robots to do that as well.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#45

Post by falcolas » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:17 PM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #42

Always coming back to this silliness: > They all float the idea of basic guaranteed incomes for everyone, or tax credits to supplement low-wage workers. Yeah, just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach. It's so disappointing to see otherwise smart people ending up with these kind of conclusions.

> just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach

Early retirement wasn't an option for those farmers - they had to find a way to support themselves or their families. As a result they took up desk jobs (many of which are, in the broader view of things unnecessary) in the city. When those desk jobs go away, where will they go next? Into manual labor? That's pretty ripe for automation as well.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#46

Post by jjoonathan » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:29 PM UTC

bsbechtel wrote: post #30

jjoonathan wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most interesting possibility: there will be an inflection point in the way we do production & distribution. The capital costs and inefficiencies of distributed production fall every day (internet to distribute knowledge, ever-advancing low-N fabrication technology) while the disadvantages of centralized production increase (capital is becoming more important, labor less important, meaning the average split of the pro…

There are lots of unknowns left in this world, and lots of exploring left to do. Space, curing disease, and finding additional sources of clean water and energy are all areas that require lots of work and human ingenuity. The challenge is getting people educated to do work in these fields and allocating capital properly. The unskilled labor market was known as the illiterate labor market 100 years ago, and we overcam…

Yes, there are undiscovered future uses for labor and the capital/labor imbalance could be alleviated (or exacerbated) by discovering them. It is still utterly absurd to bind the wellbeing of our society to a gamble on the rate of discovery and the extent of these untapped resources.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#47

Post by ekianjo » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:30 PM UTC

falcolas wrote: post #45

ekianjo wrote: post #42

Always coming back to this silliness: > They all float the idea of basic guaranteed incomes for everyone, or tax credits to supplement low-wage workers. Yeah, just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach. It's so disappointing to see otherwise smart people ending up with these kind of conclusions.

> just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach Early retirement wasn't an option for those farmers - they had to find a way to support themselves or their families. As a result they took up desk jobs (many of which are, in the broader view of things unnecessary) in the city. When those desk jobs go away, where will they go next? In…

> When those desk jobs go away, where will they go next? Into manual labor? That's pretty ripe for automation as well.

The service industry is not going to be replaced by robots anytime soon. Many jobs wont even be replaced because robots wont be economical enough to do so (hairdressers robots anyone?).

And the more you have robots out there, the more you will need maintenance people, industries to manufacture robots, and the whole lot of engineering that goes with it. Because, like it or not, we have not discovered a way to do super smart robots than can design themselves just yet.

And just like farmers got more education in order to do desk jobs, the ones at the lower end who get more educated to do the jobs that are needed, because you know, the job market is dynamic.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#48

Post by ekianjo » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:34 PM UTC

tachyonbeam wrote: post #44

ekianjo wrote: post #42

Always coming back to this silliness: > They all float the idea of basic guaranteed incomes for everyone, or tax credits to supplement low-wage workers. Yeah, just like tractors made 90% of farmers permanently unemployed and they decided to take early retirement and spend time on the beach. It's so disappointing to see otherwise smart people ending up with these kind of conclusions.

There is a difference though. Tractors can take away some farm jobs. Robots will become increasingly versatile. They'll eventually be able to take away all retail jobs, all the low skill jobs. Then eventually, higher skill jobs too. What will be left for humans to do? Art? Sex work? We might be able to build robots to do that as well.

No difference whatsoever. Robots don't build themselves yet, and don't program themselves either, so you'll still need a bunch of humans to do that work in the back. Or you will have people who will be willing to pay more to have a human touch instead of robots.

Robots may become more versatile, but the day they can be as versatile as humans is not going to be in your or my lifetime. I hope you realize that, unless you are a member of the "Church of Singularity" :)

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#49

Post by jjoonathan » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:42 PM UTC

SixSigma wrote: post #40

jjoonathan wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most interesting possibility: there will be an inflection point in the way we do production & distribution. The capital costs and inefficiencies of distributed production fall every day (internet to distribute knowledge, ever-advancing low-N fabrication technology) while the disadvantages of centralized production increase (capital is becoming more important, labor less important, meaning the average split of the pro…

We have a similar idea to those communes already, they are called "businesses".

Does the business you work for produce the goods and services you consume, or at least the goods and services you need to survive? Does the business you work for have a recipe for turning unskilled labor into the goods & services required for those people to lead a similarly comfortable life?

If so, that's good news, because it means that your business is in a position to alleviate the economic nightmare scenario we are all worrying about.

FWIW I agree that the "communes of the future" will be businesses, but I disagree that the businesses of the present are the same as the proposed communes of the future. Current businesses are specialized and have customers different from their employees. "Commune" businesses would be relatively generalized and have employees as their primary customers. It's a substantially different structure and, I believe, one that provides considerably fewer opportunities to reliably deleverage large chunks of the human population.

Re: Robots are leaving the factory floor and heading for your desk – and your job

#50

Post by falcolas » Sat, Jun 20, 2015, 3:43 PM UTC

adventured wrote: post #31

Qantourisc wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well at this point "labour" is free. The only logical solution I see at this point is basically communism. The only work left will be politics/ethics. But politics is what we should replace first in my opinion :D Side effect of free labour: prices going down a lot.

No the labor isn't free, it's extremely expensive: R&D, installation, maintenance, replacement, operation, electricity, shelter, transport, insurance. There will never be a scenario under any circumstances in which labor is free. It rests on a principle that guarantees that: energy will never be free, nor will all the other requirements such as materials, buildings, et al.

Compared to the cost of a human doing the same job, it's a lot closer to free than the cost of the human:

Human wages for a clerical role: ~$60,000 a year.

EC2 m4-10xl instance for a year: ~$13,000

The lack of a need for breaks, management, HR, bathrooms, kitchens, break rooms, lighting, HVAC, 60+ sq feet per employee... The costs for maintenance, energy and R&D are suddenly small peanuts; you can do a lot of R&D for the difference between the cost of a human and a machine.