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Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

businessinsider.com

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Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#51

Post by hotpotamus »

hkpack wrote: post #45
quickthrowman wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What do these laid off warehouse pickers do instead? What did all of the laid off agricultural workers do when farming was mechanized and industrialized? This isn’t the first time we’re facing technology taking jobs away from people.

I see this thinking all the time, that if something worked ok in the past, then it is absolutely guaranteed to work next time. And it is absolutely not. People live as they are protected by some divine power over the consequences of their collective actions.

> People live as they are protected by some divine power over the consequences of their collective actions.

I mean, most people in the world are religious, aren't they? I sometimes forget that fact working in tech where everyone seems to be an atheist (myself among them), but it seems like a very helpful psychological adaptation to living an uncertain and finite existence.

I do think it will eventually doom us however as we create problems beyond our ability to manage. I was thinking it would be climate change that will doom human civilization if not the species itself, but AI (even just the economics effects rather than some rogue intelligence) also seems like a contender.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#52

Post by bluGill »

bhpm wrote: post #5
prepend wrote: post #2

I expect workers like this. Warehouse picking is grueling work and no one really likes it per se. So having a robot do it is good to allow humans to do other things. I don’t think the solution is to keep grueling jobs or pay more to make people do things they don’t want to do. Of course more money is good, but at the end of the day, it’s a repetitive job that doesn’t require much thought. What’s interesting is that i…

There are a few keywords in this article that make me think this isn’t coming to a home near you any time soon: “eventually.” “Plus software overhead” … “Amazon.” For that last one, keep in mind that Amazon can afford to invest millions to billions and also totally control the working environment. Warehouse workers are practically robots already with the structure that is imposed on their work. A home isn’t like that…

Except that some of the investment that Amazon does goes to code that is also useful for the home robot. Amazon can afford it - probably saves money - so they make the investment. then they come along later and realize that the home robot is in some way affordable as so many of the parts needed already exist.

Of course I cannot say when it will affordable. It may be Amazon has to solve the last remaining hard problems and then the R&D is paid for: all that remains is packaging and marketing, it may be thousands of hard problems remain. (I'm guessing someplace in between) I also don't state what the home robot will do. May the home robot just picks up the kids toys when they are done but can't do laundry - even though I want the laundry robot more the toys only one is still useful.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#54

Post by pc86 »

prepend wrote: post #2

I expect workers like this. Warehouse picking is grueling work and no one really likes it per se. So having a robot do it is good to allow humans to do other things. I don’t think the solution is to keep grueling jobs or pay more to make people do things they don’t want to do. Of course more money is good, but at the end of the day, it’s a repetitive job that doesn’t require much thought. What’s interesting is that i…

The only thing middle class people (as in somewhat close to the median income) spend $125k on in their lives is their house. And I'm not sure how well something optimized for ~10k hours of 24/7 warehouse picking and packing work is going to translate to housekeeping work.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#55

Post by pc86 »

karaterobot wrote: post #23
prepend wrote: post #2

I expect workers like this. Warehouse picking is grueling work and no one really likes it per se. So having a robot do it is good to allow humans to do other things. I don’t think the solution is to keep grueling jobs or pay more to make people do things they don’t want to do. Of course more money is good, but at the end of the day, it’s a repetitive job that doesn’t require much thought. What’s interesting is that i…

What do these laid off warehouse pickers do instead? Go back to their old jobs as cloud infrastructure architects, or hedge fund managers? I agree that most people don't want to work as pickers, and I think that's the point: in general, if you've got a shitty job, it's because it's the best available to you. They don't want to work that job, true, but they sort of have to, and if it goes away they'll have to get an e…

They do something else, as has happened hundreds - thousands - of times throughout human history when some innovation has made entire classes of occupations obsolete.

Nobody's making textiles on looms anymore but the mechanization of that work eliminated a lot of jobs, but it created jobs both higher in numbers and more economically valuable.

Eliminating the need to humans to pick a box off of a shelf and put it into a slightly larger box to get put on a truck is an objectively good goal for the economy (which is probably obvious) and for people, including those doing that job now (definitely less obvious).

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#56

Post by pc86 »

hkpack wrote: post #45
quickthrowman wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What do these laid off warehouse pickers do instead? What did all of the laid off agricultural workers do when farming was mechanized and industrialized? This isn’t the first time we’re facing technology taking jobs away from people.

I see this thinking all the time, that if something worked ok in the past, then it is absolutely guaranteed to work next time. And it is absolutely not. People live as they are protected by some divine power over the consequences of their collective actions.

Nobody is saying that it's a 100% certainty, but when this is exactly what has happened many many times throughout human history, the burden of proof that this time is different kind of falls on you, doesn't it?

You could absolutely be right but I see zero evidence that this technological advancement will be any different than the countless before over the last thousand years.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#57

Post by hkpack »

pc86 wrote: post #56
hkpack wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this thinking all the time, that if something worked ok in the past, then it is absolutely guaranteed to work next time. And it is absolutely not. People live as they are protected by some divine power over the consequences of their collective actions.

Nobody is saying that it's a 100% certainty, but when this is exactly what has happened many many times throughout human history, the burden of proof that this time is different kind of falls on you, doesn't it? You could absolutely be right but I see zero evidence that this technological advancement will be any different than the countless before over the last thousand years.

We literally had world wars with millions dead because of the technological breakthroughs.

You should be blind not to see how technological advancements driving the increasing gap between classes and put pressure on governments in developed countries all over the world.

No one says that people will go extinct, but throughout the thousands of years you mentioned we had periods of very very bad times. It is very naive to think that high paying tech job will protect from the outcomes of other people losing their jobs en masses.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#58

Post by wintogreen74 »

francisofascii wrote: post #19
prepend wrote: post #2

I expect workers like this. Warehouse picking is grueling work and no one really likes it per se. So having a robot do it is good to allow humans to do other things. I don’t think the solution is to keep grueling jobs or pay more to make people do things they don’t want to do. Of course more money is good, but at the end of the day, it’s a repetitive job that doesn’t require much thought. What’s interesting is that i…

A positive spin is each human worker gets a robot to supervise and delegate tasks to.

I assumed the robots were the supervisors

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#59

Post by wintogreen74 »

trident5000 wrote: post #28

Nobody will miss these jobs just like nobody misses picking cotton by hand in a hot field.

Maybe not on an individual basis, but that doesn't eliminate the huge impact both past and current societies experience based on this type of disruption. The American South is still trying to reach some sort of parity with the rest of the country on almost every metric, and the huge population centers built around these jobs will experience a similar collapse.

Re: Amazon's humanoid robots will eventually cost only $3 per hour to operate

#60

Post by wintogreen74 »

okasaki wrote: post #37

I wonder what the purpose is for making them "humanoid" rather than some simpler form with tracks and claws.

A big reason is typically because the world is already optimized for humans, but this being Amazon I'd expect them to make their human workers adapt to a machine-centric environment.
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