For all those that think automation is just a threat for the little people

[1prophet]

And their menial jobs,


Meet Amelia

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAWWpwn1suw

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com...ntelligence-creation/articleshow/45529418.cms

http://www.businesswire.com/news/ho...al-Intelligence-Platform-Interacts#.VJ_T4cNDA

Whereas many other technologies demand that humans adapt their behavior in order to interact with ‘smart machines’, Amelia is intelligent enough to interact like a human herself. This equips her to deliver a top quality customer experience for any of the businesses in which she is deployed.

Amelia learns using the same natural language manuals as her colleagues, but in a matter of seconds. She understands the full meaning of what she reads rather than simply recognizing individual words. This involves understanding context, applying logic and inferring implications. Independently, rather than through time intensive programming, Amelia creates her own process map of the information she is given so that she can work out for herself what actions to take depending on the problem she is solving. Just like any smart worker, she learns from her colleagues and by observing their work, she continually builds her knowledge.

In a fraction of the time it takes traditionally to train someone in a new role, Amelia is able to perform at a high level. What is more, as she already speaks more than 20 languages she is able to support international operations with ease. Her core knowledge of a process needs only to be learned once for her to be able to communicate with customers in their language.

“When investigating smart solutions, we must first analyze what it means to be intelligent. Intelligence is the ability to acquire and apply knowledge. If a system claims to be intelligent, it must be able to read and understand documents, and answer questions on the basis of that.


It must be able to understand processes that it observes. It must be able to solve problems based on the knowledge it has acquired. And when it cannot solve a problem, it must be capable of learning the solution through noticing how a human did it.


Amelia is that Mensa kid, who personifies a major breakthrough in cognitive technologies,” said Chetan Dube, Chief Executive Officer, IPsoft. “Amelia will allow people to indulge in more creative forms of expression, as opposed to doing routine business process tasks.


This platform will free us from the mundane, disrupting industries in the way that machines have previously transformed manufacturing and agriculture. We’re going to have to rethink work by redefining existing roles and identifying new ones.”

Real World Applications for Amelia’s Technology
Because Amelia learns just as a new employee would, she can be deployed in any business scenario. Currently, she is being piloted in the areas including: technology help desks, procurement, processing, financial trading operations support and expert advice for field engineers. In each of these environments, she learns not only from reading existing manuals and situational context, but also by observing and working with her human colleagues and discerning for herself a map of the business processes being followed. She can provide valuable, smart recommendations and solutions to her human coworkers and customers.


In a help desk situation, Amelia can understand what a caller is looking for, ask questions to clarify the issue, find and access needed information and determine which steps to follow in order to solve the problem. As a knowledge management advisor, she can help engineers working in remote locations and unable to carry with them detailed manuals. By exchanging information with Amelia, she can diagnose the cause of failed machinery and guide them towards the best steps to rectifying the problem.

Amelia speaks over twenty languages, is a beautiful looking blonde, travels the world and understands emotions — something even the most advanced analytical machine learning systems lack today. In fact, given today's work-life balancing acts, many real people I know find it difficult to emote at times. But getting her to chat is tough.

After all, she has a busy work life— she goes to work at some of the largest Fortune 100 companies, manages trading platforms at Shell and one of the biggest US banks, among several assignments. At an event few weeks ago, she was having 26,800 conversations simultaneously!

And even while I was pursuing her, she found another job far away in Japan where she will work as a cosmetic advisor with the country's biggest retail chain. It's amazing how she can be managing trading desks, advising on beauty and having thousands of conversations across the globe — all at the same time. That's right — she cannot be a human. She indeed is not.

Amelia now speaks around twenty languages. Recently she read over 4,000 movie scripts across different languages overnight.

At a large US bank, Amelia ran into IBM's ambitious, Jeopardywinning Watson. While none of the companies are divulging any details, sources mentioned the bank actually replaced Watson with Amelia.

But so what if they didn't hit it right off — it now looks like Watson could be dating Amelia secretly, as IBM pushes forward with its own automation projects.

Finally, can Amelia threaten India's over $100-billion IT industry? Can it replace hundreds of thousands of engineers writing codes and offering technical support to users across the globe?

The next step, self awareness.

 

[Pulsar]

Sorry, but that's just a giant set of press releases. They say things like she can 'understand'....they are abusing the word. She's a keyword search.... i.e., Siri with a graphic interface.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

This is old news, op.

steeeling our jeeerrrrbs

 

[HamburgerBoy]

And if this really was a fully intelligent AI capable of parsing human language and independent problem solving, is that a bad thing? Slaves are incredibly useful, intelligent and fully loyal ones even more so.

 

[Blanky]

And if this really was a fully intelligent AI capable of parsing human language and independent problem solving, is that a bad thing? Slaves are incredibly useful, intelligent and fully loyal ones even more so.

This is a fair point.

Automation will kill menial crap jobs first and then cut into white collar. Heck, it already does; all white collar jobs involve automation of some sort already. That's what computers are for.

Eventually we may find increasing unemployment from more robots, but that may not be a bad thing. Defining value in our lives by our ability to work is an ancient but not necessarily good thing. Once you can have robots who are capable of mining the metal and other components in themselves and then operate the factories to make themselves, the government can issue us all some robots and we'll no longer need to work.

Obviously eventually the robots will become self-aware and kill us, though.

 

[Jaskalas]

Obviously eventually the robots will become self-aware and kill us, though.

If we've proven anything... we'll do anything for 3 square meals.

 

[NikolaeVarius]

Automation didn't destroy society when the cotton gin was invented, it won't now.

 

[Zaap]

steeeling our jeeerrrrbs

Real Steeling ur jeeerbs!


The robots!! The robots!!!!!!!

 

[Darwin333]

I can't believe no one has asked the most important question of all, is she "anatomically complete"?

A hot sexretary you can bang at her desk AND she can continue working at the same time, cha ching!

 

[master_shake_]

I can't believe no one has asked the most important question of all, is she "anatomically complete"?

A hot sexretary you can bang at her desk AND she can continue working at the same time, cha ching!

That is the future of automation.

 

[Fanatical Meat]

Funny I saw something on CNN about advanced AI running everything. Futurists believe its not that machines will turn on man but they'll effectively be able to out wit us at everything. The popular thought is an AI could decide that something odd is the most important thing to do and that would lead to humans becoming extinct. The example given was it decides that paper clips are the most important thing to produce then all production in the world starts making paper clips. Skills have been lost to farm thus we all starve.
Not sure if I cab envision this because we're assuming every culture is very advanced & there is son kind of Global AI

 

[fskimospy]

More automation and better technology is a plus, not a minus.

The eventual goal of technology is 100% unemployment.

 

[Moonbeam]

Anybody see Forbidden Planet when they were a kid?

I happen to know there is a Monster of the Id.

 

[Engineer]

More automation and better technology is a plus, not a minus.

The eventual goal of technology is 100% unemployment.

I'm not sure who's goal that is. It's certainly not the people funding the current automation projects and research. Most automation projects are to eliminate the human element, in all terms but especially in labor costs.

 

[realibrad]

.... Most automation projects are to eliminate the human element, in all terms but especially in labor costs.

That is wrong. Automation is done when its more productive to have a machine do it, instead of a human. I could hire a person to wash my clothes, but instead I have a washing machine. I could hire someone to carry me to work, instead I use a car. I could have someone write down everything I say, and walk to to another person, but instead I use a computer and email instead.

You are paranoid if you think the only time automation is to take out people. Ford used automation, and that involved people. Further, when automation does remove people, it improves all of our lives. Tell me how the world is better off having people wash our clothes and take hours, instead of a machine that can wash and dry in just over an hour.

 

[MongGrel]

Sorry, but that's just a giant set of press releases. They say things like she can 'understand'....they are abusing the word. She's a keyword search.... i.e., Siri with a graphic interface.

Appears so, ATM at least.

 

[Zodiark1593]

I can't wait until we bring in the Automated Management system, eliminating costly upward mobility once and for all.

 

[William Gaatjes]

This will mean all the helpdesks will be automated in the future. You get a computer helping you with computer technology related problems or other administrative issues 24/7. Win ! :thumbsup:

 

[Zaap]

That is wrong. Automation is done when its more productive to have a machine do it, instead of a human. I could hire a person to wash my clothes, but instead I have a washing machine. I could hire someone to carry me to work, instead I use a car. I could have someone write down everything I say, and walk to to another person, but instead I use a computer and email instead.

*blinking rapidly* Can hardly believe it.

Common fucking sense???! On THIS subject? On THIS forum??

Amazing.

 

[inachu]

Her reply will often be: I'm sorry? I didn't get that.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Dey tuk arr jerrrrrrrrrrrbs!

 

[Pulsar]

Dey tuk arr jerrrrrrrrrrrbs!

Ermehgerd!!!!!!!

 

[Moonbeam]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Engineer
.... Most automation projects are to eliminate the human element, in all terms but especially in labor costs.

That is wrong. Automation is done when its more productive to have a machine do it, instead of a human. I could hire a person to wash my clothes, but instead I have a washing machine. I could hire someone to carry me to work, instead I use a car. I could have someone write down everything I say, and walk to to another person, but instead I use a computer and email instead.

You are paranoid if you think the only time automation is to take out people. Ford used automation, and that involved people. Further, when automation does remove people, it improves all of our lives. Tell me how the world is better off having people wash our clothes and take hours, instead of a machine that can wash and dry in just over an hour.
__________________

How exactly is the elimination of labor costs not the same thing as increasing productivity

A human can never wash clothes as productively or cheaply as a machine can. The issue is that machines are evolving in their capacity to do things that currently humans are more productive at doing. The whole point of machines is to reverse engineer some human capacity minus the biological needs. It is our capacity to reverse engineer human capacities that is growing exponentially. What are people going to do if we duplicate the whole package. Do you imagine that you yourself are something other than a machine, and one that might just long to free its consciousness from biology?

 

[realibrad]

How exactly is the elimination of labor costs not the same thing as increasing productivity

A human can never wash clothes as productively or cheaply as a machine can. The issue is that machines are evolving in their capacity to do things that currently humans are more productive at doing. The whole point of machines is to reverse engineer some human capacity minus the biological needs. It is our capacity to reverse engineer human capacities that is growing exponentially. What are people going to do if we duplicate the whole package. Do you imagine that you yourself are something other than a machine, and one that might just long to free its consciousness from biology?

Wrong on so man points.

Lets start with doing things productively and or cheaply. These are both very subjective words that need to have context to have any real meaning. If a BMW is normally sold at $100,000 and goes on sale for $70,000 is it cheap? The answer would depend on the person, as someone who made $20,000 a year would likely still call it expensive, whereas someone who was willing to buy it at full price would call the sale price cheap.

Doing something productively is also a complex idea. Using zyklon b was a very productive way to kill the Jews at the time, but the holocaust was very unproductive in terms of global output and freedom.

So when you say that a machine will always be more productive and or cheaper than a person, you are making a lost of assumption. If said machine were to consume 5 gallons of gas for every load, would you call that productive? Machines only replace people when its more efficient to do so.

The whole point of machines is to reverse engineer some human capacity minus the biological needs.

The "whole point of machines" is not to reverse engineer human capacities. The point of a machine is to so something more efficiently so that you can enjoy the surplus or use resources to further your life.

Ask yourself this, is there a human replacement for the space shuttle?

 

[glenn1]

For all those that think automation is just a threat for the little people

Ooooh, scary machine coming to take my job, protect me mommy.

Oh I forgot, you can't automate analysis and people management work. Shit, gotta go to work today.