201–210 of 314 posts
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your typical consumer will receive very little or no direct benefit from this change Eh? I've shopped at Uniqlo in SF. Compared to buying clothes at hipster boutiques, it was shockingly affordable. I'd say whatever they are doing is unquestionably offering a direct benefit to the consumer.
You already receive that benefit. Will prices go down as a result of this automation? Will the freed resources be cleanly rerouted to other activities? Hell no, if there wasn't an article you'd never have noticed.
Can you name a single instance where prices did _not_ go down due to automation? You're saying process won't go down tomorrow, but of course that's not how any of this works.
Modern societies are going to have a very real problem to grapple with as this replacement goes from newsworthy to the norm. This could result in significant worker displacement with massive bottom-line ROI for companies in the next decade or two, particularly as minimum wages rise. I'm not of the opinion that this automation will create an equal number of jobs for the ones they replace. Even if they do, it is unlike…
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Software engineering seems safe, if that is what you are primarily thinking of in your question. Developing software at the same level of a skilled engineer is a problem we'd only be able to solve with general AI. Even if program synthesizers (things that take declarative high level requirements and produce code) worked (and they don't at the level required for an non-technical user to use), most engineers today must…
It's not at all clear that software engineering is safe. Sure there will probably always be a few programmers, but as tools (and soon I expect AI) gets better those programmers can do more and more of the work. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find the number of software engineers decreasing in the not too distant future. The only reason it hasn't already is that we've managed to grow the number of things software d…
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And what is Econ 201's solution to pervasive unemployment, or lack of spending power due to underemployment? Is that also classified as "societal value"?
They teach you economic history and show that predictions of pervasive unemployment and lack of spending power caused by technical innovation have been made every decade and never been borne out as new ways of delivering societal value are constantly being invented. In Econ 301 they teach you to never say never. Whether this time is different than the previous rounds of automation or will have larger dislocative effe…
Why the huge discrepancy with the official rate? Well some of it's stay at home parents and early retirees, but a large chunk of that is prison and disabled which have both quietly ballooned over time.
These numbers look worse when you include women and older men, but here is the long term trend: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LREM25MAUSA156S
How about instead of selling robots to companies to replace their laborers, we sell robots to the workers to do their jobs. You keep getting paid as long as you keep your robot running.
Workers don't have the capital or the know-how... that's why they are selling labor in the first place.
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I’d say the recent experience in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan runs counter to your claims.
Not really. The US followed certain rules of engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan that a truly ruthless military would not. For example the Battle of Fallujah was fought with Vietnam level tactics. There were about 100 KIA for the US side. The battle could have been fought differently with zero US losses.
I love uniqlo doubling down on tech. One thing I found really interesting is that inside the labels are small rfid (I think?) chips. At the cashier, the person just folds them nicely, puts the pile of cloth on a metal pad and the system tells you how many items and how much it is. No manual code scanning!! The first time I noticed that I felt like a kid again discovering something magical. The next step was to have p…
I love uniqlo doubling down on tech. One thing I found really interesting is that inside the labels are small rfid (I think?) chips. At the cashier, the person just folds them nicely, puts the pile of cloth on a metal pad and the system tells you how many items and how much it is. No manual code scanning!! The first time I noticed that I felt like a kid again discovering something magical. The next step was to have p…
There's half a dozen of these automated checkouts, and 1 staff person elsewhere at a desk for support, questions, info, etc.
There's also terminals all over the library that you can use to search for books, games, DVDs, etc, and it'll tell you where they are and if they're available or checked out, and if checked out, when they're due back so you can reserve them.
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Not really. The US followed certain rules of engagement in Iraq and Afghanistan that a truly ruthless military would not. For example the Battle of Fallujah was fought with Vietnam level tactics. There were about 100 KIA for the US side. The battle could have been fought differently with zero US losses.
So you imagine a scenario where the US military would annihilate it’s own citizens ruthlessly to preserve insane wealth disparity. Ok.