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Machines taking over jobs

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Originally posted by: Legendary
Who will make the machines?

Eventually other machines will. They'll make them from metal mined, smelted, and cast by machines and plastic made by machines from oil drilled and pumped by machines. When the machines break down, other machines will service them and each other. I dunno if it will be good or bad for humanity, but it could happen someday.
 
Originally posted by: RedSquirrel
Originally posted by: Quintox
Originally posted by: So
Originally posted by: Quintox
Seems like machines are a future 'problem' of taking human jobs. With majority of cars now built by machines for example, that is so many less people with jobs.

Take a look at this for example (thx to Patt for the vid, saw it in another thread). Now even though these are only 2 examples, it seems inevitable that computers/machines are going to take away tons and tons of jobs in the future. Heck, just look at newspapers/magazines. Newspaper companies are having a lot of trouble these days, one in Seattle even shut down and went online only.

Kinda worrisome.

edit: after re-reading my post, it was worded poorly, but I think you all know what I mean.

Welcome to the 1830's. Machines taking over old jobs is a good thing. Those people can then get training in new jobs, and everyone is more productive.

But what new jobs?


Someone needs to maintain those machines.

Best of all, it requires someone who actually knows what they're doing, so that rules out outsourced resources.

If you have a hundred people maunfacturing ipods, and you build a robot that can make an ipod with one tech to maintain it, then you can take the other 99 workers and give them jobs maintaining new robotic ipod factories. Suddenly, the labor cost of ipods drops by 99% and 10x more people can afford them.

Imagine a society where we refused to allow machines to take jobs that people could do. Everyone would be a "highly paid" ditch digger, living in abject poverty because the total economic output of society would be a tiny fraction of the total we have today.
 
Originally posted by: Quintox
Seems like machines are a future 'problem' of taking human jobs. With majority of cars now built by machines for example, that is so many less people with jobs.

Take a look at this for example (thx to Patt for the vid, saw it in another thread). Now even though these are only 2 examples, it seems inevitable that computers/machines are going to take away tons and tons of jobs in the future. Heck, just look at newspapers/magazines. Newspaper companies are having a lot of trouble these days, one in Seattle even shut down and went online only.

Kinda worrisome.

edit: after re-reading my post, it was worded poorly, but I think you all know what I mean.

even a machine can't post for you.
 
To be honest, considering how fucking slow humans manage large-scale warehouse distribution, and the horrible efficiency of said act, I welcome our SkyNet overlords.
 
Machines "taking jobs" is a blessing, not a problem. It frees up people to do smarter, more productive things. There is nothing new here. Take a look over the last 100 years...
 
Originally posted by: SlitheryDee
Originally posted by: Legendary
Who will make the machines?

Eventually other machines will. They'll make them from metal mined, smelted, and cast by machines and plastic made by machines from oil drilled and pumped by machines. When the machines break down, other machines will service them and each other. I dunno if it will be good or bad for humanity, but it could happen someday.

Eventually, people will all have "thinking" jobs, and there will be no manual labor jobs, except for those few kept up because people want people doing them (customer service? waiter? hair stylist?).
 
Originally posted by: So
If you have a hundred people maunfacturing ipods, and you build a robot that can make an ipod with one tech to maintain it, then you can take the other 99 workers and give them jobs maintaining new robotic ipod factories. Suddenly, the labor cost of ipods drops by 99% and 10x more people can afford them.


I just think it's more likely that apple will simply absorb 10X the profit on each ipod than sell them for less.

I mean, Nike didn't start selling sneakers for less just because they were paying little 3rd world country kids to make them.. Why should it be any different when its robots making them?
 
Originally posted by: SlitheryDee
Unemployment may be up in the short term, but overall isn't employment way higher than it was in the days before mechanization? So what happens if machines take ALL the jobs? With no one earning money, who will buy the products the machines are making? With automation so commonplace, why aren't we already seeing the devastating effects of an idle workforce?

To be absolutely frank, I don't foresee in our lifetimes computers becoming advanced enough to take the place of a business exec - and when they do the machines will undoubtedly be the dominant species. Electronics will, however, continue to phase out lots of mindless, easily automated grunt work. The reality is it's best not to sit around bitching about the oncoming apocalypse, but instead to simply realize it's not going to change and your best bet is to adapt to the future.

As a society, it will become harder and harder for the undereducated to get these jobs that are easily replaced by machines, and the best thing you can do is simply push yourself to become better than a machine. I have little sympathy for someone losing a job to a robot when they sit all day on a stool and drill a hole in a piece of sheet metal; the reality of the situation is society as a whole has allowed us to consider such low levels of ability as acceptable. Only when we break out of our current downward spiral of rapid increases in ignorance and unskilled labor and start pressing ourselves as a species will we overcome this.

Evolve, or grow smarter. Everyone has the capability to do one or the other.
 
Originally posted by: mxyzptlk
Originally posted by: So
If you have a hundred people maunfacturing ipods, and you build a robot that can make an ipod with one tech to maintain it, then you can take the other 99 workers and give them jobs maintaining new robotic ipod factories. Suddenly, the labor cost of ipods drops by 99% and 10x more people can afford them.


I just think it's more likely that apple will simply absorb 10X the profit on each ipod than sell them for less.

I mean, Nike didn't start selling sneakers for less just because they were paying little 3rd world country kids to make them.. Why should it be any different when its robots making them?

Sure, some of it will go to profits, but much of it will be rolled back into capital investment, or go into the bank, where, again, it will get loaned out and increase the size of the economy, and thus jobs.

There are more nike shoes today than there were in 1989.
 
Originally posted by: Quintox
But what new jobs?
Don't know. The economy will do what it has always done: Adapt.


Originally posted by: her209
Originally posted by: IGBT
..the bots create ET and engineering jobs. they all need to be maintained and calibrated.
What if someone creates a robot to maintain and calibrate other robots?

Oh noes!!!1
Fortunately, Japan is working on robots to take care of older people, and presumably they'd be able to assist and serve anyone else. All we need is a good exercise-in-a-pill drug and we'll be set. 😀



Robots to serve us, robots to work for us, robots to fight our wars - all we'll have left to do is commit ourselves to math, science, and art. 🙂

 
nm, this post doesnt make any sense now that I think about it.

but it was so popular..

I get paranoid that sometimes I sound like some kind of loon. I may well be a loon, but I just want to clarify anyway.. I like progress. I too welcome machines replacing as many jobs as possible. I like to think that I'll end one as of the lucky ones, the 'haves'. One of the people smart enough to have a job overseeing the machines. I just also see that the 'have-nots' are definitely in for a deep dickin'.
 
Originally posted by: mxyzptlk
Originally posted by: CrimsonWolf
Machines "taking jobs" is a blessing, not a problem. It frees up people to do smarter, more productive things. There is nothing new here. Take a look over the last 100 years...

I get paranoid that sometimes I sound like some kind of loon. I may well be a loon, but I just want to clarify anyway.. I like progress. I too welcome machines replacing as many jobs as possible. I like to think that I'll end one as of the lucky ones, the 'haves'. One of the people smart enough to have a job overseeing the machines. I just also see that the 'have-nots' are definitely in for a deep dickin'.

Thanks to state sponsored education, the "have nots" are largely going to be the "don't want tos"
 
Originally posted by: mxyzptlk
Originally posted by: CrimsonWolf
Machines "taking jobs" is a blessing, not a problem. It frees up people to do smarter, more productive things. There is nothing new here. Take a look over the last 100 years...

I get paranoid that sometimes I sound like some kind of loon. I may well be a loon, but I just want to clarify anyway.. I like progress. I too welcome machines replacing as many jobs as possible. I like to think that I'll end one as of the lucky ones, the 'haves'. One of the people smart enough to have a job overseeing the machines. I just also see that the 'have-nots' are definitely in for a deep dickin'.
Though I'd imagine that the standard of living for the "have-nots" could still be much higher than what we have today. They'd probably even have the lube warmed up before the daily dickin'.

Seriously, pre-warmed lube. What the hell more could you possibly want?

😛




 
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: mxyzptlk
Originally posted by: CrimsonWolf
Machines "taking jobs" is a blessing, not a problem. It frees up people to do smarter, more productive things. There is nothing new here. Take a look over the last 100 years...

I get paranoid that sometimes I sound like some kind of loon. I may well be a loon, but I just want to clarify anyway.. I like progress. I too welcome machines replacing as many jobs as possible. I like to think that I'll end one as of the lucky ones, the 'haves'. One of the people smart enough to have a job overseeing the machines. I just also see that the 'have-nots' are definitely in for a deep dickin'.
Though I'd imagine that the standard of living for the "have-nots" could still be much higher than what we have today. They'd probably even have the lube warmed up before the daily dickin'.

Seriously, pre-warmed lube. What the hell more could you possibly want?

😛

What have I started....
 
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: mxyzptlk
Originally posted by: CrimsonWolf
Machines "taking jobs" is a blessing, not a problem. It frees up people to do smarter, more productive things. There is nothing new here. Take a look over the last 100 years...

I get paranoid that sometimes I sound like some kind of loon. I may well be a loon, but I just want to clarify anyway.. I like progress. I too welcome machines replacing as many jobs as possible. I like to think that I'll end one as of the lucky ones, the 'haves'. One of the people smart enough to have a job overseeing the machines. I just also see that the 'have-nots' are definitely in for a deep dickin'.
Though I'd imagine that the standard of living for the "have-nots" could still be much higher than what we have today. They'd probably even have the lube warmed up before the daily dickin'.

Seriously, pre-warmed lube. What the hell more could you possibly want?

😛

That's pretty much guaranteed, so long as we make sure that the robots feel bad about killing off the have nots.
 
There are still many things machines just can't do and probably won't be able to for hundreds of years, work that needs a judgement call rather than a repetitive task or maneuvering with high precision based on current conditions. Agriculture/cultivating come to mind. Machines are just tools to do the job - throw them something they don't know what to do with and they stop.
 
Originally posted by: Quintox
Seems like machines are a future 'problem' of taking human jobs. With majority of cars now built by machines for example, that is so many less people with jobs.

Take a look at this for example (thx to Patt for the vid, saw it in another thread). Now even though these are only 2 examples, it seems inevitable that computers/machines are going to take away tons and tons of jobs in the future. Heck, just look at newspapers/magazines. Newspaper companies are having a lot of trouble these days, one in Seattle even shut down and went online only.

Kinda worrisome.

edit: after re-reading my post, it was worded poorly, but I think you all know what I mean.

That kiva system doesn't seem particularly fast.

Also, I don't see the connection between newspapers/magazines and automation.
 
Originally posted by: her209
Originally posted by: IGBT
..the bots create ET and engineering jobs. they all need to be maintained and calibrated.
What if someone creates a robot to maintain and calibrate other robots?

Oh noes!!!1


..you still need an ET/engin. to set up/calib/maintain the maintainer. And on site ET's to troubleshoot failures.
 
Originally posted by: spidey07
There are still many things machines just can't do and probably won't be able to for hundreds of years, work that needs a judgement call rather than a repetitive task or maneuvering with high precision based on current conditions. Agriculture/cultivating come to mind. Machines are just tools to do the job - throw them something they don't know what to do with and they stop.

adaptive and evolving ai
 
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