Earlier quoted context omitted.
You sound like a terrible employer.
Why? Because we want people who act like humans instead of corporate robots? Because we care about people who care about each other?
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Coders Automating Their Own Job
291–300 of 499 posts
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#292Many programmers who automate portions of their workload will use the extra time they gain to place bugs in the systems. When those systems fail, they quickly fix them and look like a savior. If they are on after-hours standby, they make extra money from the callouts. They thus reduce the stress in their own jobs, but increase the stress in other peoples jobs.
Wow we don't live in the same world here, programmer actually is mainly the job of automating tasks, so when I'm finished automating things, I automate other things.
I'm not placing bugs that would be so easy to uncover by my peers using the most rudimentary source control, and make me look like a fraud in front of all the company...
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#293You know how sometimes you love an article so much that you are annoyed you didn't write it? This does a better job than I could have of tieing together a dozen threads of conversation that I've had with various friends for years. I actually believe that there's a culture war implied in this debate; the question of who deserves to reap the gains of automation is more than just philosophy or ethics. The question "is t…
> ...whether you believe that someone's refusal to work should condemn them to destitution.
I don't understand what you're getting at there. If someone refuses to work, that would seem to mean that they are able to work but choose not to.
We're not talking about someone who is actually unable to work because of some physical or mental limitation and may need assistance of some sort. We're taking about someone who could work but doesn't want to.
What possible obligation do I have toward that person? I don't see any. Of course I don't think they should be, as you put it, condemned to destitution. But what on earth makes it my responsibility to give them anything at all? Do I owe them a living, simply because they refuse to work?
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#294Earlier quoted context omitted.
> there exists a large contingent of people who believe with all of their heart that God wanted them to find it, that the person who lost it should have been more careful, that they are just having a lucky day. A large part of how America sees work, poverty and wealth was historically influenced by the Protestant Work Ethic, and I think that lingers quite a bit today. I think it's why a lot of people view the poor as…
> I think it's why a lot of people view the poor as lazy (because obviously if they weren't lazy, they wouldn't be poor, right?). There's a sleeps-on-the-street homeless guy living in my neighborhood. I talk to him on occasion. A couple days ago he said he was bored off his ass, and that he was thinking of getting a part time job. I did not verbally respond to his potential quest for employment, but I did find myself…
Getting sober and finding a shower aint as hard as it would seem.
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#295Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Why didn't this employee share this system with the others? Because the consequences of him doing that are unclear. And since one potential (if not likely) consequence is management would simply retain 1/4 of staff doing this work and fire the rest, why would he share that? Was there a huge sign at his workplace outlining the consequences of automating anything? An explicit policy that would alleviate such (reasonab…
If someone with this attitude worked for me, I'd get rid of them ASAP. We don't want people sitting around saying 'thats not my job' or 'I'm not going to look for ways to do things in a better way' or 'I wasnt hired for that' Our company culture is the complete opposite of that. We want people to help each other. We want people to challenge how things are done. We want to change things all the time, experiment, see w…
Any potential employee of your company will be asking "what's in it for me"? Do you pay well above market wage to make this extra effort worthwhile? If I automate or eliminate a lot of work how am I compensated for that extra effort?
Every company says they want people like you describe but few actually put the incentives in place.
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#296Easy to understand if you are cheating by automating your job and spending now freed time for leisure: if your contract says that you are paid by an hour or for fixed number of hours a week/month then you are cheating. Of course, not paying you for overtime can also be considered cheating from your employer.
The only way to not be cheating by automating your job is to spend now extra available free time for other duties mentioned in your contract, perfecting your professional abilities, or moving to a contract which is goal based, not work-hour based.
It is a pity that somebody can be clever enough to automate his/her job but don't see implications regarding the contract signed with the employer.
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#297It should be noted that programmers are not automating themselves out of programming jobs . They're automating themselves out of data entry, or testing, or any number of other mindless tasks easily done by computers.
Bluntly put, smarter programmers than you are automating you out of a programming job. Not pretending for a second I'm safe.
I remember that someone was considering making a program to automate a co-workers job, since it was just simple data entry. They never actually did it though.
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#298You know how sometimes you love an article so much that you are annoyed you didn't write it? This does a better job than I could have of tieing together a dozen threads of conversation that I've had with various friends for years. I actually believe that there's a culture war implied in this debate; the question of who deserves to reap the gains of automation is more than just philosophy or ethics. The question "is t…
Having a good worth ethic is respectable. However, working smart can be as effective as working hard. Still, lying about doing work is unethical in my opinion, even if it's clever. Depending on the situation though, I think that letting your employer know that a job can be automated may lead to better opportunities in the future... maybe?
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#299Earlier quoted context omitted.
Looking at the history of religious thought in the US, it's not the Protestant work ethic per se, but in large part the "prosperity gospel" or prosperity theology [1] -- this belief that God will reward the right kind of Christians with material wealth. There are strong currents in Protestantism that posit that rewards are for the afterlife and that one may have to endure poverty in this earthly life and that's ok. […
It's cultural and more pragmatic. Those who work hard, a positive outlook, maintain themselves and their families, are resourceful ... will likely be healthy and abundant. The farmer who idles away doing not much will have a bad crop. The farmer who is responsible and diligent, mends his fences, ploughs well, keeps his equipment clean and proper and minds the livestock ... will likely do well. Except in case of disas…
> Except in case of disaster of course, and then maybe some kind of metaphysical excuses might come into play!
Re: Coders Automating Their Own Job
#300Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's a nice thought, but do you have any evidence to back this up? The notion that religious people are less likely to do bad things is highly problematic, objectively and logically - and it carries the unfortunate assumption that non-religious people are more likely to do bad things. People should not need to subscribe to a paranormal belief system to understand that theft, rape and murder are bad.
See my comments below for links to articles. There is overwhelming evidence that religious people, particularly those who attend services are less likely to be involved in criminal activity. Your assertion that the religious or church attenders are mostly about 'belief in paranormal activity' is really quite missing the ball, to the point that it's almost offensive - though it's a common misunderstanding. Most classi…
I actually am the OP, and I just wanted to say that while I suspect we disagree on some fundamentals... I am extremely impressed by the quality, tone and effort to link to research evidenced in your two replies.
As you deduced, I missed your initial reply because we both posted at the same time.
For what it's worth, I'm also in Canada and my best friend is a Christian. She was not born into it and has always been really great about being willing to admit when she doesn't know the answers to something. This has, in turn, inspired me to be less of a judgemental asshole.
Don't get me wrong: I still have a really hard time with the idea that intelligent people can justify worshipping malevolent invisible sky wizards. And a lot of my bias against religious influence in modern society comes from the organizations themselves, and not their members. Evil priests, etc are over-staying their welcome.
However, I am heartened to know that research suggests religious people are less likely to be criminals. Happy to acknowledge that I learned something. I do wonder if causation/correlation are skewed, here... as in, would those people still be good if they'd grown up in secular families?
Anyhow... great chat. Feel free to update if you think of anything else.