Would You Want This Job? Hard work, middle of Kansas • Hacker News Board

Re: Would You Want This Job? Hard work, middle of Kansas

#41

Post by icky » Tue, May 27, 2008, 8:12 PM UTC

menloparkbum wrote: post #33

jimbokun wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Why, aren't there robots or something doing such things?" I'm actually kind of curious about what is preventing this equipment from actually becoming a robot: '“I can teach them easily,” he says. “My equipment is goof proof, it has to be.” By that, he means that an employee need not even know how to drive straight, the tractor is guided by a sophisticated guidance sytem hooked into three satellites. “If I overlap si…

They need humans driving the tractor for the same reasons we aren't all commuting to work in robot cars and buses.

(Because people can't stand the thought of robots touching their food with their shiny metal robo-claws!)

Farming on private property is an entirely different scenario than having robot vehicles on public roads. I doubt he'd need anybody's approval to set things up that way.

Re: Would You Want This Job? Hard work, middle of Kansas

#42

Post by menloparkbum » Tue, May 27, 2008, 8:26 PM UTC

icky wrote: post #41

menloparkbum wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They need humans driving the tractor for the same reasons we aren't all commuting to work in robot cars and buses.

(Because people can't stand the thought of robots touching their food with their shiny metal robo-claws!) Farming on private property is an entirely different scenario than having robot vehicles on public roads. I doubt he'd need anybody's approval to set things up that way.

It would also help if robots that could do the work actually existed.

Re: Would You Want This Job? Hard work, middle of Kansas

#43

Post by icky » Tue, May 27, 2008, 8:29 PM UTC

menloparkbum wrote: post #42

icky wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Because people can't stand the thought of robots touching their food with their shiny metal robo-claws!) Farming on private property is an entirely different scenario than having robot vehicles on public roads. I doubt he'd need anybody's approval to set things up that way.

It would also help if robots that could do the work actually existed.

In most scenarios where robots would be replacing human labor (especially in safety-critical areas like trucking), the engineering problems are a lot more tractable than the political ones.

GPS-guided farming seems like one of the simpler scenarios, and if finding labor is as difficult as the original post claims, one of the more likely ones, as well.