Future of Employment: How Susceptible Are Jobs To Computerization?

turkeydance writes: What job is hardest for a robot to do? Mental health and substance abuse social workers (found under community and social services). This job has a 0.3 percent chance of being automated. That's because it's ranked high in cleverness, negotiation, and helping others. The job most likely to be done by a robot? Telemarketers. No surprise; it's already happening. The researchers admit that these estimates are rough and likely to be wrong. But consider this a snapshot of what some smart people think the future might look like. If it says your job will likely be replaced by a machine, you've been warned.

Comments

Simplistic

[Great Big Bird]

This is incredibly simplistic, like all kinds of analyses like this. Anything that really requires a mind rather than a simple result of calculation or mechanical action will likely not be replaced without some big advance. More likely, we will just have better tools for certain jobs making them more higher level — it can let them get stuff done easier - so they can do more.

Re:Simplistic

[NicBenjamin]

"Requires the mind?" That's the biggest oversimplification on this thread yet.

50 years ago the hordes of people who worked in analysis departments with massive paper spreadsheets probably thought of themselves as knowledge workers.

Lots of people will be replaced. The ones least likely to be replaced are a) socially prestigious, or b) in jobs that require direct interaction with humans. So lawyers and Doctors are safer then anyone else.

Re:Simplistic

[ShanghaiBill]

Anything that really requires a mind rather than a simple result of calculation or mechanical action will likely not be replaced without some big advance.

Some things that used to take a human no longer do. For instance, image recognition has improved a lot in recent years. Banks use computers to read and process handwritten checks because they make fewer errors than humans do.

Re:Simplistic

[Rich0]

Agree somewhat. There are a fair number of human jobs that can probably be automated in the fairly near future as "AI" has been getting better, especially for problems like visual/speech recognition which traditionally was a barrier to automation.

An AI that actually can innovate and is self-aware/etc would be a barrier to eliminating many jobs. At some point I think we'll cross that threshold and we'll see almost every job go away almost overnight (since such an AI could be used to improve itself and rapidly develop specific automation solutions for every job). However, that is of course a major advance and it is really hard to say how soon it will come.

Re:Simplistic

[shmlco]

"So lawyers and Doctors are safer then anyone else."

Tell that to RocketLawyer. Or to the Robot Anesthesiologist, or to the guy who's inventing an easily implantable lens that could completely take out the eyeglass and contact lens industries. Expert radiologists are routinely outperformed by pattern-recognition software, diagnosticians by simple computer questionnaires. In 2012, Silicon Valley investor Vinod Khosla predicted that algorithms and machines would replace 80% of doctors within a generation.

Re:Simplistic

[Kohath]

That's why this analysis will soon be performed by robots.

Re:Simplistic

[Anonymous Coward]

The problem with the website in OP with their 4 keypoints (and the 80% from the optimisic investor in your quote) - is they dont take into account the damage done if a computer gets it wrong.

This is current with UAVs, we have autopilots, but is anyone prepared to board an automated 787 without any pilot onboard?

Re:Simplistic

[NicBenjamin]

Question:
When you talk to actual people, and not your friend wikipedia, and you say "lawyers and doctors;" do they assume you mean the hordes of JDs punching their time-clocks deep in the bowels of a massive firm and a highly paid specialist who they see once a lifetime to get test results; or do they think you mean Trial Lawyers and their General Practitioner?

As I said in another post on this thread, a lot of medical specialists will be replaced by computers. But only in settings where patients can't notice. The GP will send you to a test site where a working class dude with an Associate's will run his diagnostic computer. Then he'll send the result to your GP, who will read it to you. You'll go to surgery where a single surgeon will oversee both the robotic surgeon and the anesthetics machine. If (at any point) you figure out that the whole process would have required an MD at the testing facility, an MD Anesthesiologist, two other surgeons on the team, each costing 500k per year; as well as a half-dozen more nurses at $40k per year, you will freak out and go to some other hospital.

It's the same in law offices. You'll always have a lawyer you talk to when you need a lawyer. You won't know that in the 80s to do what he's doing for you he would have needed a couple paralegals, a newly-minted bunny lawyer to do the boring legal research in paper books, etc.

Re:Simplistic

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

The one major complication to keep in mind is that robots/automation almost never literally 'replace' you. Rather, they allow for a different way of doing things that no longer requires you.

Robots built to replicate human capabilities are, despite continued effort, relatively pitiful. Competent bipedal locomotion, a couple of dexterous hands, fallible but very, very, adaptable image recognition, etc. are a fairly tricky package to put together on a reasonable budget. Outside of tech demos, that's why you don't bother to build the robot to resemble the worker, you restructure the task to play to the strengths of the robot(see basically all contemporary manufacturing processes). This task restructuring can also involve the user: replacing a telephone operator, say, would have been impossible until relatively recently; you need speech recognition software good enough to do the job and computers cheap enough to run it. So we didn't: Pulse code dialing allows line switching to be done with relatively simple electromechanical devices, which is why operators were on their way toward the exit more than a century ago, despite AVR 'agents' still being considered lousy and terrible to work with today.

You will almost always be misled if you try to predict odds of replacement based on 'what the job requires' rather than 'what the job produces'. Beating the people currently doing a job at the skills that the job requires is difficult, frequently impossible or uneconomic. Achieving whatever goal their job exists to fulfill(or achieving something else that eliminates that goal); is almost always how it gets done.

Re:Simplistic

[Shakrai]

The ones least likely to be replaced are a) socially prestigious, or b) in jobs that require direct interaction with humans. So lawyers and Doctors are safer then anyone else.

The lion's share of MDs could be replaced by machines. We tend to worship the ground they walk on in the United States but at the end of the day medicine is just a trade, no different than plumbers or electricians, and nurses do the bulk of the work in your typical medical practice. The percentage of truly innovative Doctors is no different than the percentage of truly innovative coders, for most it's just rote memorization and long established best practices.

There are countries that recognize this fact, where MDs are paid less than teachers and society doesn't treat them as Gods walking amongst men. Of course, in fairness to American MDs, Doctors in those nations don't have to deal with crushing malpractice premiums and student loan debt.......

Re:Simplistic

[PopeRatzo]

The lion's share of MDs could be replaced by machines.

Not until get computers that'll write scripts for Oxycontin.

Re: Simplistic

[jd2112]

With all of the beatings of dead horses going on I would think horse whip manufacturing would be highly automated by now. Hell we should have dead horse beating robots by now.

Re:Simplistic

[JimSadler]

I went to fill my prescriptions last week. A robotic system retrieved the big bottle from stock, opened it, counted the number of pills, put them in my bottle after printing a label and sticking it on the bottle then applied the lid, put the bottle into a transparent bag, stapled it shut and sent it to the pharmacy clerk. i asked he he told me that automation now takes at least 50% of the labor out of the hand of pharmacists. i forgot to add that the system also did an auto deduction from my debit card as well. Obviously any decent size pharmacy can now lay off 50% of clerks as well as pharmacists. Meanwhile telemarketers whether human or robotic are about to vanish. simply having an absolute rule that any company soliciting either sales or sales appointments must have a certain prefix or suffix such that no phone will ever ring or allow access to an answering machine without prior consent by the phone owner is sufficient as long as the financial penalties are severe enough to stop this nonsense. And if foreign nations are not willing to use the new suffix or prefix then all calls from those nations will be cut off until they rigidly police their phone systems. I'll bet that 3 million people work as telemarketers in the US.

Re:Simplistic

[Great Big Bird]

I don't mind such a robotic system as long as it can be double checked by the pharmacy. Trust — but verify.

Re: Simplistic

[rickb928]

My job title is 'Technical Analyst'. I don't use spreadsheets as data sources so much as I use phone calls, emails, etc. My work is providing second level support for software, web sites, and various automated processes.

The most important skill for my I job is communicating, with troubleshooting and analysis right behind it. If software to replace me becomes useful, I expect the systems I support to become self-healing and self-reporting. I'm not worried right now.

Oddly, with I last talked with a programming director about job skills, they listed communications as the most important differentiator, as most candidates could code or design or work to specifications. Kind of explains the focus towards onshoring work, reducing the offshore contingent.

In focusing on work that takes direct contact. Plenty of that in the technologies field still.

Re:Simplistic

[jblues]

I bet a computer could do a much more objective interpretation of the Rorschach Ink Blot, draw a person and all of the other silly cognitive tests that are used in psychiatric care. That or just come up with a truly random interpretation. It would be about as effective.

Re:Simplistic

[jopsen]

"So lawyers and Doctors are safer then anyone else."

Tell that to RocketLawyer. Or to the Robot Anesthesiologist.... Expert radiologists are routinely outperformed by pattern-recognition software, diagnosticians by simple computer questionnaires. In 2012, Silicon Valley investor Vinod Khosla predicted that algorithms and machines would replace 80% of doctors within a generation.

Sure, if done right automation may replace a lot of what doctors do today.. But doctors also do research, experimentation... And they'll become skilled in fixing other things... Who knows maybe some day health care costs will begin to decline. But no, doctors are still going to be around, they might not be doing all the same things, but they'll probably still have plenty of work to do.

Re:Simplistic

[BarbaraHudson]

The problem with the website in OP with their 4 keypoints (and the 80% from the optimisic investor in your quote) - is they dont take into account the damage done if a computer gets it wrong.

This is current with UAVs, we have autopilots, but is anyone prepared to board an automated 787 without any pilot onboard?

It will probably eventually be safer and more convenient. Same as automated elevators, traffic lights, etc.

Re:Simplistic

[Rich0]

Not this again. The truth is there has been NO ADVANCES in AI since the 1970's. NONE.

And therefore there never will be one?

That's a bit like saying that aircraft will never be invented because there was no progress on the topic between 350AD and 390AD.

I know people really really want to believe that Siri is AI, or a precursor to AI, but it isn't.

I don't consider either Siri or Google to be examples of AI per se. I think that when AI does come along it might end up incorporating some of the concepts that go into them, but it is hard to say at this point since nobody really knows how to build an AI.

Re:Simplistic

[Bengie]

The day my job is computerized is the day computers are smarter than humans. Maybe people need jobs that don't involve a script. Like you said, making the repetitive part of their jobs replaced with better tools to do the repetition for them.

Re: Simplistic

[IANAAC]

More likely, we will just have better tools for certain jobs making them more higher level â" it can let them get stuff done easier - so they can do more.

This has already happened in my field (translation) a good decade ago. The problem with it though is that if a translator is working through and agency and not a direct client, the agency will demand a discount for repeated words, which makes no sense for anything that actually needs to be readable.

If anything, I spend just as much time going over the automated translation and fixing mistakes as I would just translating from the beginning. I don't see this ever changing, as language shifts too quickly for translation memories (TMs) to keep up with current usage.

Re: Simplistic

[Pubstar]

As someone who works at Help Desk, the human touch is needed sometimes. Only a human that can force themselves to think illogically and understand some of the calls that I receive asking for help.

Re:Simplistic

[Anonymous Coward]

If there was a dirty thankless job that could be done better by a robot, it's the job of a prostitute.

Re: Simplistic

[Bengie]

as most candidates could code or design or work to specifications

I call bs or they have a very low bar to meet "to specifications". Code that works to spec is great when it works and horrible when it doesn't work. Most people design systems that cannot be easily debugged or fail in unexpected ways. But yes, they work great when they work. It's shipped, no longer my problem, right?

Re:Simplistic

[scamper_22]

While this is true, when you actually look at people working, the number of jobs that 'truly require' a mind is much smaller.

Even jobs that people think require a great mind like say a doctor. In reality, the way a lot of doctors operate in the real world, it is rather routine.

A lot of diagnosis work can be pretty well automated. Simple stuff. For example, I'm on Thyroid medication. I get a blood test once a year. I've seen this happen first hand now. The blood lab does the work. The doctor gets an automated analysis of the results showing acceptable levels of thyroid... and the corresponding dosage. This entire process could be automated. Even things like radiology, which is very costly, could deal with a lot of automation. I worked briefly in the field about 8 years ago, and back then we were working on automated detection of anomalies in MRI/PET scans.

Two things have to be taken into account here.
One is that so much of a doctors work is routine that a lot of that can be automated. Then if there is an exception, you can have that handled by a human. Or you can do a human review on a positive case. For example, you can have 80% of MRI/PET scans automated for analysis. But before you decide on surgery, have it confirmed by a human radiologist.

The other is to actually look at real work. Theoretically, doctors can spend lots of time with their patients and this extra touch can lead to better analysis and treatment. Look, I'm in Canada, land of universal healthcare. Almost every doctor I've seen (both walkin and family) over the past 10 years has been running a tight ship. 15 minute appointments. Get straight to business.

I don't know if they could theoretically do better if they spent more time, but this is the reality of healthcare. I'd guesstimate you could automate a lot of the diagnosis and treatment. Of course like I said above, serious issues would need to get more serious approvals.

For automation to make sense, it simply has to make sense for a large number of cases. I don't think the automated system needs to beat the very best, because how many of the cases are actually done by the very best?
Again, back to
You also have other jobs that could be automated. Most of the tax system could be automated. I've been seeing it more computerized for years and years, but we're nowhere close. But really, there is no reason my taxes could not be automatically done. They have my income slips. All my investments are with major financial institutions who should be able to calculate my profit/loss...
If they simplified the tax code, it could probably be automated even better.

The more you actually dwell on it, the number of jobs that truly require a mind are simply not that many. Most can be automated. Even judgment style jobs can be automated and probably perform better than the average of human practitioners in the field.

Re:Simplistic

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, other than the US - China. France. UK. Singapore. Germany. Canada. India.

You know... places with money.

Sorry to hear you live in a third-world shithole where barter in the form of chickens and blowjobs is the accepted currency.

Re:Simplistic

[ChrisMaple]

An incompetent plumber doesn't cause many deaths.

Re:Simplistic

[0100010001010011]

Radiologists are already on their way to being obsolete. There's a simple chain of events that leads up to automation:

1. First it's hard and nobody can do it but a few PhDs
2. Then it's difficult and it requires a BS or MS.
3. Then it's a trade.
4. Then it's unskilled labor
5. Then it's automated

Wait until all these 12 year olds that started learning Python hit college and industry. There are a lot of stupid for loops that will eventually turn into big code.

I was a lazy 8th grader years ago that learned to program my TI-83. Then my TI-89. My 'studying' for my engineering tests was writing TI-Basic in the basement library. Technically I probably cheated on most tests I took in undergraduate but my "Studying" was trying to figure out how to get [Routh-Hurwitz Theorem](http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Routh-HurwitzTheorem.html) into for loops on a 160×100 display. It sucked but during the tests I had debugged so many different scenarios I knew the equations by heart and just used the programs to double check my math. (And saved me when I missed carrying a 1 early on). Now I'm automating away engineers. People that sat at a keyboard and put it into the computer. They're the modern day equivalent of punch card operators. It doesn't mean they're going to get fired, they're just going to work on a task worthy of a human brain.

Arduino is going into small farms. People are programming their chicken coops. We're about to automate away 'big farming' for a lot of niche markets. A small CSA and farm will be able to automate a lot of boring repetitive 'farm tasks'.

Radiologists will be replaced by Chicken Sexers on Amazon Mechanical Turk if an algorithm doesn't get there first.

Swipe left for compound fracture, swipe right for non-compound fracture. Get a good set of training data and pay everyone $0.01 to guess. Pay the top 20% of them $.10 to guess on harder questions. Repeat the cycle until you're paying $100.00 to get an X-ray read by a few thousand people. The Government has taken to crowd sourcing people to guess events Turns out if you ask a lot of people a question the average ends up being correct.

It's worked for counting jelly beans in a jar for years

Re:Simplistic

[0100010001010011]

I would trust 2 separate AIs from 2 separate companies tasked with checking and if they don't agree then use a pharmacist.

Re:Simplistic

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

There is a certain amount of irony; but it's those years of expensive and supply-limiting training that are precisely what make such an attractive target.

It's not an easy target; the computer system that ends up replacing your radiologist or your lawyer or whatever will likely have cost far, far, more to develop than the human it replaced did to raise and train(even if you count the human's recreational spending); but the computer's ability to do work will just keep increasing if you buy more silicon, while the human doesn't scale. If you could hire a single radiologist and make him more productive just by buying additional office chairs, you probably wouldn't bother with the robot.

Re: Simplistic

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

When it comes to 'software replacing teachers', we really haven't made many fundamental advances since Gutenberg(who at least substantially increased the percentage of the world's books that weren't produced by students taking lecture notes in class, which presumably meant that you at least had the option of reading the textbook and skipping the class). If you just need information, technology has done quite well, and continues to make improvements; but if you aren't ready to turn information into knowledge all by yourself, there isn't much on offer.

Re:Simplistic

[currently_awake]

Politicians are the safest job, they have the direct means to prevent their own replacement. And people really want them replaced, as you could just download the politician and ask them hypothetical questions to find out what they will do after the election.

Re:Simplistic

[cheesybagel]

What will happen is the same thing it happened with trains. Everything will be automated but there will be at least one pilot just for 'emergencies'. Two if its long-haul.

Re:Simplistic

[ShanghaiBill]

Everything will be automated but there will be at least one pilot just for 'emergencies'.

That will happen in the beginning. But as people become comfortable with automation, it will be dropped. Would I fly in a pilotless plane today? Nope. But once they have flown 100,000 flights without any incidents, then sure. Most aircraft accidents involve pilot error, so once the bugs are worked out, the pilotless planes should be safer.

Re:Simplistic

[ShanghaiBill]

All a GP does to diagnose a problem is follow a flowchart. It is mostly memorized, but there is no reason that it couldn't be computerized, or even printed on paper. A nurse with a checklist implemented as an iPad app could probably diagnose most problems just as well as a doctor.

Re: Simplistic

[cheesybagel]

They probably make shovelware and then pay someone else who actually knows how to program to 'fix' it. i.e. do it all over again.

Re:Simplistic

[cheesybagel]

All of which were available in the 1970s.

Re:Simplistic

[ShanghaiBill]

I don't mind such a robotic system as long as it can be double checked by the pharmacy.

I would trust the robot more than I would a human pharmacist. Computers tend to be pretty good at reading barcodes.

Re:Simplistic

[AnyoneEB]

It's called Moravec's paradox:

Moravec's paradox is the discovery by artificial intelligence and robotics researchers that, contrary to traditional assumptions, high-level reasoning requires very little computation, but low-level sensorimotor skills require enormous computational resources.

Re:Simplistic

[TFAFalcon]

I'm guessing even a competent doctor DOES cause many deaths. I doubt anyone is lucky enough to make the right decisions 100% of the time.

Re:Simplistic

[Anonymous Coward]

But real prostitutes can show a range of emotions. Robots would have to fake it.

Re:Simplistic

[greatpatton]

Yes most aircraft crashes involve pilot error (around 67%), however this number doesn't represent how many crashes were prevented because there was a human in the cockpit. Given the number of incident reported, I think that with our current level of technology it would be much worse. But as you said, one day fully automated flight will be safer than letting a human in command.

Re: Simplistic

[Dog-Cow]

...for translation memories (TMs) to keep up with current usage.

I don't understand people who do this. There is no purpose to defining an abbreviation at this point because the comment ends. Neither the phrase nor the abbreviation is mentioned again.

Re:Simplistic

[IamTheRealMike]

Not this again. The truth is there has been NO ADVANCES in AI since the 1970's. NONE.

lol. Google disagrees with you. They saw the word error rate on their voice recognition drop to near-human levels of accuracy due to the deployment of deep neural nets. DNNs were NOT available in the 1970's by the way. The concept of a neural net was, but nobody knew how to build one that worked like they do today. Obviously "learning how to build something that was previously impossible" is an advance under any reasonable definition.

Re: Simplistic

[IamTheRealMike]

Not really. Spoken like somebody who had crap teachers. Back in times of yore when people were still using the transmission model that might have been workable. But, it's a good example of being penny wise and pound foolish.

What kind of utopia did you grow up in? I'm 31 and 90% of my teaching at high school and university could best be described as "transmission". Long lessons full of note taking, reading the textbooks, and then if we got lucky we'd get to duplicate some practical work the teacher just showed us. Yes, sometimes you got individual assistance if you were falling behind. And sometimes you didn't. It was ridiculously high stress and a generally crappy way to teach people. That was in the UK. University was even worse: same style of teaching, minus the actual love of it that many of my high school teachers did at least have.

I do not believe schools have changed significantly in the last 15 years. Vast majority of the work teachers were doing could be replaced by high quality optimised lectures a la Khan Academy, automated question setting/marking, plus in-class supervisors (basically the nannys OP mentioned), plus on demand assistance from pools of remote teachers in cheaper countries.

Re:Simplistic

[Gavagai80]

Trains normally have a person there to make sure people pay their fare. But not all trains do -- for example, the Vancouver SkyTrain is fully automated (and regularly cheated on since there's nobody to check tickets).

Re:Simplistic

[Gr8Apes]

And then you have pilots like Lubitz who's only the latest in a string of such pilots.

Re:Simplistic

[t0rkm3]

Not all of their emotions are faked. The disinterest and disgust... the ennui of having to hear the same jokes and clumsily flirtatious lines. Boredom.

The humor at your excuses when you fail to perform. The humor and disdain as you fall for their "passionate" SFX.

I don't know if a robot could replicate all of that.

Re:Simplistic

[umghhh]

If you have a first hand experience of what doctors do then you are a doctor yourself and have skewed perception of that trade. If you are not then you just do not know much about it. It may be a trade but it is a skilled trade and not much software can replace that yet. As with many other things some manual highly skilled work is needed and can be augmented by a lots of automation that could (in theory) slash a huge part of your bill.
As for truly innovative coders - by themselves they cannot do much still, especially that coding by itself is just part of the whole development process.
As for your claim on doctors and teachers pay - I googled a bit because I grew curious. There was a report by this asshat in white house that there are some places where these salaries are on par but there is no report apparently confirming that. See here for reference.
I can see where your ignorance is taken from - I medicate myself and my kids as much as I can and that is much more than any of my neighbuors and colleagues would trust themselves yet as soon as symptoms reach levels I cannot be sure what they indicate I go to a doctor if only to be told to take rest and wait till the sick body cures itself (supported by checks on symptoms that I cannot verify myself like: blood tests, how my throat looks like and other things that I have no clue about). Doctors have as much difficult work as troubleshooters of complex systems that have to judge where fault is on basis of very limited and often confusing information. I can hardly see this being replaced by machines any day soon albeit the automation of some of the tasks can be of great help especially as the knowledge well is so deep today that pulling basket from it maybe beyond reach of a normal human without an intelligent mechanical helpers.
Looking at this then I must conclude that your post is just a nice trolling attempt. Or do you happen to have data confirming your view point? Do not worry if it is long as long as it is well structured.

Re:Simplistic

[arbiterxero]

tell that to IBM's Watson....

http://www.digitaltrends.com/c...

Re:Simplistic

[houghi]

And in Europe, checks are not even used anymore. One of the next things might be driving, or at least trucking.

I forsee some in the call-center industry as well. And even if jobs will not be gone completely, they will be reduced in a serious way.

We already see less cashiers in the retail industry where you get the self checkout.

Re:Simplistic

[undefinedreference]

This is already, to some extent, happening. A fair fraction of front-line medical care is now carried out in essentially exactly this way, except it is not yet an app. The proliferation of in-store healthcare facilities in drug stores, the extensive use of RNs as GPs.

Beyond this, with all the money pouring into the industry, even the smallest advances in automation will yield enormous profits for those that bother to implement them. The only thing holding it back is that the medical profession currently employs a lot of people that make far more than their knowledge and skills are worth, all of whom realize this and are afraid of this very thing. It's not like the telemarketers that make minimum wage care if their jobs exist tomorrow, aside from being able to buy beer for the party this weekend, but they also have little to lose and zero prestige. If large swaths of the medical industry were to be automated, this would eliminate the need for people with sought-after, stable, high-paying jobs with a high degree of repetitiveness, which in any other case would be the easiest to automate.

Re:Simplistic

[MooseTick]

"a third-world shithole where barter in the form of chickens and blowjobs is ...accepted "

When is the next flight to this place?

Re:Simplistic

[undefinedreference]

They're also faster and more accurate at counting things. Most of the stuff we depended on pharmacists for, such as checking drug interactions and advising, have been completely automated. Doctor offices should be able to send a "dispense X of Y to Z, with the following use indications (if different from default for age/gender/height/weight)" to an automated pharmacy that provides exactly that to the patient.

Re:Simplistic

[eheldreth]

I was torn between responding to you and moderating you down. The idea that telemarketers don't care about their jobs is one of the most arrogant and classicists things I have read in a long time. My area is very poor and unless you both have a collage degree and are lucky enough for it to be in a field that's currently hiring your options around here are work fast food, work in the mines, or work for a telemarketer. While it does attract young people and college students a lot of those folks are single mothers trying to support their family. If you really believe that single mother doesn't care if her job exist you've been living in some sort of dream land.

Re:Simplistic

[lsatenstein]

This is incredibly simplistic, like all kinds of analyses like this.

Anything that really requires a mind rather than a simple result of calculation or mechanical action will likely not be replaced without some big advance. More likely, we will just have better tools for certain jobs making them more higher level — it can let them get stuff done easier - so they can do more.

Will robots understand mood? Will they read body language, understand that dialated pupils to show happiness, or pin sized pupils to show "shutting out". Will robot tell mood in a voice that speaks fast, or sadness in a voice that has tones of sorrow? And will it tell hiccoughs from sobs.
There are things that only a human can do, because that human has empathy. Can you give empathy or kindness to a robot?
Are you sure?

Re:Simplistic

[Obfuscant]

Most aircraft accidents involve pilot error,

Most aircraft accidents involve pilot error because there is always some mistake the pilot(s) make, even if it isn't the causal factor in the accident. And when there isn't enough information about an accident to assign it to mechanical failure (which can also be pilot error -- failure in pre-flight to notice a broken safety-wire on a critical fastener, for example) it will be pilot error.

Removing what is currently the leading cause of accidents doesn't mean absolute safety when another system that can fail in spectacular ways is introduced.

Just one example: how long have we known about integer rollover? And yet "we" just found out that a certain aircraft needs to be shut down and "rebooted" every so often because a timer in the APU was rolling over. Yet we believe we will have flawless computers flying and driving us where we want to go.

Re:Simplistic

[NicBenjamin]

Whether they're replaceable really depends on the Specialty.

If their job is to be on a team that reads a couple different charts, decides on a curse of action, and then performs a surgery, then you could probably replace everyone but one guy with computers today. That's what Watson is intended to do with many cancer specialists.

Get a decent surgical robot and now the one guy gets knocked back to part-time.

OTOH, the kind of Doctor we think of when we talk about Doctors (the GP who does your check-up and refers you to that team) we'll probably have more of them. People like their Doctor, and they don't like that they only have 20 minutes with him. The computers also need a human to interpret noisy check-up data for them. But nobody's gonna notice that last year there were six guys on the Prostate Cancer team at the local hospital, and that five of them were fired when it bought a version of Watson from IBM and a couple prostate-knowing robots.

Re:Simplistic

[NicBenjamin]

All a GP does to diagnose a problem is follow a flowchart. It is mostly memorized, but there is no reason that it couldn't be computerized, or even printed on paper. A nurse with a checklist implemented as an iPad app could probably diagnose most problems just as well as a doctor.

True, but in theory that nurse doesn't need either the flowchart or the iPad.

In this country we have a unique relationship with the medical field that leads to a) them being paid double what anyone else makes, b) being entrusted with actually running hospitals, etc. We're not gonna replace them wholesale with a bunch of working class women who have Associates degrees. It would probably be smart, but it is not the smart thing we do.

What I predict will happen is that smart hospitals will fire as many specialists as they can. They'll replace them with Watson-type programs and medical robots, and then spend the money they save on a combination of ego-boosting the hospital administrator and hiring enough GPs that they can spend an hour with every patient. The ego-boosting is inherent to the system, the extra GPs are to bring in lots more patients (who, remember, will respond to a advertisement with the phrase "spend an hour with your Doctor if you need it" by showing up en masses), the GPs will send many sick people to the computers, which brinhgs in huge bucks, so the administrator gets more ego-boo; which leads the administrator down the street to do the same damn thing...

Re:Simplistic

[Great Big Bird]

I have worked with some people working on that exact problem. Mood is a sort of emotion, and we are doing agent based simulations right now involving it (look up the OCC model). Everything that you have listed here is possible to detect with instrumentation now — the missing pieces are getting a reasonable emotional model worked out and these as inputs into it.

Re:Simplistic

[undefinedreference]

Trust me, I understand their plight, but children don't answer, "telemarketer" when someone asks them what they want to be when they grow up. If these jobs were gone, some other low-paying exploitative industry looking for unskilled labor would fill the gap.

I'm not proud to admit it, but about two decades ago I worked for a couple companies involved in telemarketing, so I met many telemarketers and worked with them fairly closely. They don't love their jobs, most barely endure them. They did it because it didn't involve a hot fryer and paid a dollar or two more. Some were just working their way through school. Nobody planned to keep doing it long-term. The big one that did a lot of outsourced telemarketing was shifting toward being a more general-purpose call center, followed by a tech support center after they moved the lower-paying and less-skilled jobs to poorer locales (MO and GA, were major targets at the time.) where desperate people were easier to find and had fewer options.

Not to take away from the argument that people depend on this income, which I fully understand, I'm surprised that you (or anyone) would defend the industry at all. It is exceptional in the way it races for the bottom, exploits vulnerable people (both employees and "customers"), exploits infrastructure (government- and ILEC-subsidized, often using tricks to get huge kickbacks), and aims to exploit various state laws (ex: right-to-work, low minimum wages, "training" loopholes, etc). Short of MLM, high-interest unsecured loans, and tobacco, I can't think of another industry that is more harmful to poor people.

Re:Simplistic

[eheldreth]

I am in no way defending the industry. My point was the way you casually dismissed the workers as if they could just walk out the door and magically find other jobs. If the only people you've worked with who where desperate enough to work these jobs are college students then consider yourself lucky to live in a well off area, by comparison anyway. Around here no has illusions about what kind of job telemarketing is and no one loves it but many consider it good employment. At least they used too, outsourcing has hurt the companies who used to be big employers here. What you have to realize is the reason those folks in MO and GA are so desperate for your low paying unskilled jobs is because there is no "other low-paying exploitative industry looking for unskilled labor would fill the gap". I'm lucky to be a skilled IT worker with a good job in a reputable industry but I know many good and decent people who simply have no other options. The fact is in a lot of this country there are simply no jobs and people without training, skills, education, or money can't just pick up and move in hopes of finding work elsewhere.

Re: Simplistic

[Bengie]

Program computers? The day a computer is better at programming computers is the day humans will no longer need to build or program computers, leaving us with nothing to do at all because everything will be 100% automated.

Re:Simplistic

[mcswell]

Like arithmetic?

Ok, that's a bad example, but 80 or 90 years ago it wouldn't have been thought of as something likely to get automated, because it required "thinking." (Some forward thinkers like Turing knew better, but most people would not have, I suspect.) Since then, many things that have been thought to require thinking have succumbed to some kind of automation: chess playing, solving word problems, integral calculus, and now even Jeopardy. Along the way, even a certain kind of psychoanalysis was easily mimicked.

So: how do we know what *really* requires a mind? That's really the question.

Re: Simplistic

[rickb928]

No, but I am perhaps being passive-agressive by both using my phone to reply, leaving some of the stray characters and bad auto corrects in place, as well as the artifacts from m. Slashdot. Org, which is just pus.

Thank you for caring, though.

Re: Simplistic

[rickb928]

Coding to spec is the definition of a worker doing what they ate expected to do. Most of our projects require fewer than 12 coders, but some have over 100. Having implemented the Agile process, lots of work is of smaller scope, and we correct errors quicker avoiding huge problems at the end of the project. The results have been dramatic.

The low bar is expecting that candidates that can demonstrate adequate understandling of the programming tasks they are likely to be given pass the first interview hurdle. Next up, can they understand and be understood...

all will be tried to be robotized.

[turkeydance]

most will work. some will fail, but all will be tried.

Re:all will be tried to be robotized.

[fermion]

Many jobs can be automated, but not be cost effective. I imagine that as the cost of the fast food worker rises, for instance, the research on replacing that worker with a robot will also increase. It will be seen if robots are tolerated in what right now is a face to face encounter.

The telemarketer has already been replaced by robots, but robots are not tolerated so these jobs are still secure. It is the same reason that these jobs are still present in the US instead of completely exported to other countries. Consumer demand.

I still think that lawyers are doctors are going to see the greatest impact in wages and jobs. The salaries for first year lawyers, for example, have been fixed or falling for a decade according to published reports. As more data is collected on patients, and that data is correlated to outcomes, the heuristics and stochastic will reach a level where only the best diagnosticians will remain employable.

Re:all will be tried to be robotized.

[Anonymous Coward]

Many jobs can be automated, but not be cost effective. I imagine that as the cost of the fast food worker rises, for instance, the research on replacing that worker with a robot will also increase. It will be seen if robots are tolerated in what right now is a face to face encounter.

I won't speak for everyone only for myself when I say the only reason I frequent fast food restaurants is the face-to-face encounter across the counter. After driving for hours at a time it is nice to talk to a human for a minute. If a robot takes my order I expect to pay less than USD2.50 for a hamburger, fries, and soft drink.

Re:all will be tried to be robotized.

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

The best diagnosticians might actually be the ones who see the chopping block sooner. Traversing decision trees, crunching patient statistics, and doing machine vision on whatever comes back from radiology and histology are all things that computers are either already good at or improving and plausibly expected to continue to do so at a reasonable clip. "Getting a patient's report of their symptoms and making them feel as though they've been duly listened to" or "calming some screaming brat long enough to innoculate it" are not things computers are terribly promising at. However, they are things that can be done, even done well, by basically the cheapest category of went-to-less-school-than-the-doctor-or-some-of-the-fancier-types-of-nurse medical workers you can legally get away with using for the task. Somebody will still have to do medical research; and it'll likely take a while for the public to accept that ResectXact(tm) software is a better candidate than some well-reputed surgeon to chop them open and do some maintenance; but attrition is likely to be brutal among the relatively expensive people whose specialized skills are amenable to expert systems and whose bedside manner and basic patient interaction are no better than a much, much, cheaper nurse or tech of some flavor.

Lawyers, in the same way, are going to require some people who are sharp enough to not fail during oral argument, who know how to work a jury, who can project a besuited air of consummate professionalism when dealing with clients who are paying well for the services of Somebody, Somebody, and That Other Guy; but it's hard to imagine that humans are going to last long against glorified search engines when it comes to "Traverse the entire law code and case law, give me the top hits, flag anything from things that the presiding judge has cited in decisions he has written in the past". Until computer generated text stops sounding so much like markov chain word salad, they'll probably still need some peons to stitch things together; but that will be a dead-end, unbearably soul crushing paralegal sweatshop of misery, not even an entry level job.

When?

[Inferno Vulpix]

What's the time period being predicted here? Certainly we're going to keep getting better and better at robotics and programs, so the automation of trickier jobs is more a matter of how long it takes than whether or not it's possible. The clever and creative jobs are only safe as long as the capabilities for a program to perform it are beyond our reach.

Here's a mental health robot

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/05/20/407978049/how-a-machine-learned-to-spot-depression

It uses computer vision and voice analysis to diagnose depression and PTSD about as well as human psychologists do. They haven't yet programmed it to provide actual therapy. Maybe it will say things like "tell me more about your family" and "please go on", like ELIZA of yore.

Re:Here's a mental health robot

[xonen]

Somehow, that reminds me on 20Q...

Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

That's a little sad.

You're talking about a profession that in many cases has either no training or dubious training. Anyone here have a family member that has an addiction problem? I have a cousin that is a heroine addict and a brother that is an alchoholic. My brother is also bipolar and god knows what my cousin is at this point... because the drugs do damage the brain.

But the point is that I've some experience with these people and they're often very nice, sometimes they're quite smart... but this is not what I'd call a "science" or even "medicine". A lot of it is witch doctorism. And that can make people feel better. But that is because the believe it works.

Here is a better list:

1. Artists: Computers are terrible at art.
2. Any kind of design or engineering work. Computers will be used as tools but they're not going to do the actual design work. They might automate the implimentation of previously designed concepts. We see that with CPU design where in something designed once is replicated by computer. But the actual design was done by humans.
3. Maintenance and repair work. Repairs are almost never carried out by a machine. You can find a factory that is 100 percent automated and it actually still has human repair techs keeping the robots working.
4. Programmers are not getting automated. The reasons are many but mostly the issue is that we've yet to come up with a machine that can self program or can accept instructions to write a program and then translate that into code with any competence.
5. Construction work on buildings is unlikely to get automated. You're seeing people do prefab and even talking about 3d printed houses etc but even if you include that there is going to be a lot of human labor happening around that.

I could go on... the fears of everyone losing their jobs to robots are ill founded. They're actually going to save us from having to do jobs we hate. Name a job a computer does that you'd actually want to do? There aren't any.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

Your list is quite good. I have a few thoughts about it:

- Mental health and substance abuse counsellors should be included though, the reasoning is basically the same as you've given. It's poorly defined, and there's little metric for success or failure within our system. People also prefer to talk to other people about things like that, so it will likely be impossible to automate.

- One of the reasons that programmers and engineers will be the last is that the last and most advanced automation will have to be computer based, and someone has to work on that problem for it to be solved.

- I think construction could be automated a great deal, but only if we begin to design our structures with the goal in mind of being able to automate their construction.

Re:Mental health workers?

[monkeyxpress]

I understand what you're saying, but I have worked with a lot of people in my career, including in an engineering company that still manufactured products locally (i.e. had factory workers). The reality is that most people are just not that smart, and when you spend all day hanging out with top programmers with degrees you really lose sight of just how big the ability gulf is.

The thing I observe is that the robots are not replacing workers, they are simply driving down the marginal cost of workers because that is the only way most of these people can compete. This is simply what happens in a market economy if the workers cannot own the means of production or up-skill themselves.

I don't know what the solution is but it is a pretty grim existence if you are not in the top 10-20% right now (which lets be honest, most people on slashdot are).

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

2 Design can and is standardized, changes from one assignment to another to show differentiation can be achieved by machine automation, meaning you end with a very small group of gifted individuals to perform the original work
3 is an area where you want efficiency and speed, compare today garage with something from the 50s or places like Cuba, today your car fault is assessed and found by computer interface, once the fault is found the damage area is swapped, efficiency is only going to get better in maintenance and repair work and with machines more self reliable and auto repair capabilities the amount of workers in that area will be reduced even further
4 you are not programming in assembly any more, programming languages and environments are easier than ever and easier to implement too, besides what does stop a machine to produce code faster and cleaner than a human in the future
5 construction work gets automated, that is a hot area right now, most parts of a building including furniture wiring.. you name, can be and it is automated in factories, requiring a small gang to assemble in days or weeks buildings that used to take months or years and tens to hundreds of people (depending of the scale of the project)

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm throwing masseuse onto the list. There is no beating human touch. Even if you create a machine that has fingers, there is something more that goes on when two people touch.

Re:Mental health workers?

[shmlco]

Construction work? Try this...

http://www.wired.com/2012/09/b...

Do enough of it, and the module construction itself can be automated and robotized. Or seen modern shipbuilding these days? Prefab modules assembled and welded by robots.

And so what if there's still "a lot" (weasel words) of labor around that. There's still less of it, and every decrease cascades into additional hits on labor. See the following piece on the potential impact of robot trucks on the long-haul trucking industry.

https://medium.com/basic-incom...

Re:Mental health workers?

[MrBigInThePants]

"I could go on... the fears of everyone losing their jobs to robots are ill founded. "

You could, but it would not enlighten anyone. You are talking in absolutes and margins like they are all that count because you are arguing a straw man.
The "fears" (from people not writing clickbait articles) are not around "everyone" losing their job. They are around too many people losing their job.

Do you know what would happen to ANY of the modern first world economies if 20% of their workforce is no longer needed? Fucking disaster.
And most at much less than that!

So here is a list that has actual meaning in terms of this subject.
  - Less people working means less people buying all that rubbish that is the only thing keeping our debt fueled economies from collapsing.
  - More automation means (even) more companies outsourcing entire factories overseas: INCLUDING many of those jobs you mention above.
  - Since more stuff is made in 3rd world countries which means your trade deficit worsens.
  - The above depresses economic growth in said country and thus causes jobs losses in support industries which cause further job losses...etc
  - More unemployed means more pressure on government money and less tax to pay for it. It also can mean civil unrest and crime spikes.
  - Income inequality skyrockets as the the rich invest worldwide but the rest must earn locally - which further slows the economy.
  - All this also depresses wages which also reduces spending which brings us back to DOH!

And this is not theory. This process has already taken place in many areas of manufacturing already. The OECD has just released a report on the impact of income inequality on economic growth.

And this is not an exhaustive list by any means and many of those bullet points are heavily summarized.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

... hmmm... I think we need to expand on this a bit.

I did not say that people without skills would be doing well. I said that people with certain skills should be able to deal with automation just fine.

As to owning the means of production, automation actually facilitates that.

You do realize that there are a lot of machines already that can make really sophisticated stuff right?

Take a rather cheap CNC machine... I can make all sorts of things with that. Basically anything but steel. And I can make the mold for metal casting using that or 3d printers.

You were never going to see that communist dream under the old industrial model because the machines were too big and the organization to maintain the system required so much cooperation that people would really need to be paid to do it. And that requires a hierarchical industrial structure which means you're not owning shit.

The new system could see smaller less expensive production machines being affordable enough that they can be owned by a lot of people.

Now... will you be able to make a living selling crap out of your printer or CNC machine? Probably not. But then neither with the big factories turning out that same sort of stuff. Or at the very least, the market will be a lot smaller and a lot more competitive.

The future of the economy is going to be very volatile. People keep using these 100 year old economic ideas as if they're going to be relevant forever. They ignore that they weren't relevant 100 years before they were relevant and quite a few ideas that were sound at the time are already obsolete.

Communism especially is something that has to go through a full redesign because it assumed a now obsolete industrial model that is not applicable to the present or future.

That is not an argument in favor of capitalism... which I do actually support... but rather a criticism of applying a largely static ideology and economic theory to what is an increasingly divergent reality.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Your example involved massive human labor in china to build a large building using prehab blocks assembled by PEOPLE in a factory.

So your example is actually an argument in favor of my position.

it is therefore now my example.

*yonk!*

Thank you so very much.

As to the problem of any industry losing a need for labor etc... we used to have 80 percent of labor in agriculture because we needed 80 percent of our population working on farms to feed the rest.

That number in some cases might have been as low as 60 percent... but the fact is that today it is around 5 percent. And if we go back even farther in history it was a solid 100 percent.

now you say "oh but factory workers are losing jobs to robots" *clutch pearls and whine*... No shit.

And they're going to lose a lot more jobs before this is done. I wouldn't be surprised if that fell to 5 percent of the total labor force just like agriculture.

And yes... you're going to see that run through the cubical farms etc. Does that mean you won't get a job? Perhaps. But that is YOUR generation. When farm jobs started drying up we had a lot of people that couldn't find work. They were farm workers and they didn't really have skills to work in factories.

So, you could get some bad generations where there are people without the skills to work in new businesses.

That doesn't mean their kids won't get jobs unless the schools are run in the most incompetent way possible damning the next generation to be too useless to be employed.

Here is the bottom line. Automation is happening. You are not stopping it.

So adapt. Proactively address the situation understanding that automation is happening.

Or die.

I didn't make the rules. Don't get mad at me. I'm just telling you what is happening. I am the messenger here. You can either accept it or shoot the messenger and make it clear that in the future people should just tell you what you want to hear.

This is happening. Adapt.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Inferno Vulpix]

Then we find out what that is, replicate it, and mass produce it for the perfect home masseuse.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Inferno Vulpix]

Find a way into the stock market. If you can't get your money from working, work your way into owning stocks and getting your money from dividends. Of course, the people who will first find themselves out of jobs are exactly the people who can't afford to put money into the stock market, so that will be a large problem.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Yeah but if you had a machine that did the same thing and you could just OWN it... you could get that every day.

There are a few things people do:

1. They sense where there are tight muscles and focus on them.

2. They have a variety of methods for dealing with things and they use their judgement and senses to shift between them.

3. A human will generally push a LOT harder on your body than will some machine. The machines need to be safe. And because they're blind and stupid they can't push as hard on you safely. A machine that was modeling your back and had several tools it could use to put pressure on you in different ways might be able to push a lot harder while not injuring you.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Being a day trader is not a great idea... my big problem with this notion is that it only works if a few people are doing it. If everyone is doing it the market gets over saturated.

Stocks are sold to raise money for companies to expand or grow etc. it is sort of an old timey kickstarter.

If everyone kicks their money in then that inflates the stock prices because there is more money chasing fewer investments. That leads to bubbles etc.

Re:Mental health workers?

[sundarvenkata]

I have a cousin that is a "heroine" addict

I am addicted to heroines (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heroine) too! Which one?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Kjella]

3. Maintenance and repair work. Repairs are almost never carried out by a machine. You can find a factory that is 100 percent automated and it actually still has human repair techs keeping the robots working.

The repair business is way down. Say 25 years ago small electronics repair was a big thing, radios, TVs, computers, stereos and so on. Except for warranty repair - which is suspect is more and more synonymous with warranty replacement or the replacement of complete subsystems - nobody really does that anymore. It went from replacing capacitors to replacing cards to just replacing the whole unit, while the skill level dropped from engineer to glorified delivery boy.

Nobody I know mends their clothes or socks or shoes anymore, they come cheaper off the assembly line. Really all the kinds of small household items I'd be more inclined to replace than start finding duct tape and glue. Maintenance is a little better, I still need people to paint walls but a quick search indicates robots want to take that job too.

More and more has embedded diagnostic sensors and service programs where you're really just following a list of instructions, granted the actual work is still done manually but by much lower skilled staff than before. The less electronics is involved, the more likely your job is safe. Also fixed items that you can't easily replace like electric wiring, water/sewage pipes or air conditioning. Make sure you need actual skills, not just swapping parts as otherwise it won't pay well or be very fun.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

I am not addicted to anything. If I conveyed that above that was an error.

Re:Mental health workers?

[JimSadler]

Robotics have been used to design computer circuits without human input for well over a decade. The results are quite shocking. Often a well written program that functions can not be understood by humans at all. Another shocker was that these devices which use Darwinian modes of developing programs exploit tiny differences in the hardware such that a smooth running, ultra compact program, will only run on the machine that wrote the program. And now we have more normal programming actually occurring sans human input. Robot built or printed homes are already being built and they range from very basic to very upscale and beautiful. As investors smell the profit potential these homes will dominate the housing industry. Even the plumbing and electrical pathways can be printed into the walls. Shapes that are next to impossible to create by traditional methods are easily created with 3d printing. I saw one pictured that had every inch of the wall space covered with sculptures in fine detail. Right now all American car manufacturers are already using 3D printed parts and the degree to which they are used increases daily. There is now a jet engine that is completely built with 3d printed parts and another built entirely of plastics. You will see more changes in the next six years than we have seen in the last 50 years.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

You've failed to make any rational point yourself, shy of jumping up and down screaming "He's a witch!"

You've got some serious disconnects between cause and effect going on.

As to 20 percent of the labor force being out of work... it has happened many times before. We're still here.

As to less people buying stuff... that doesn't make any sense.

See, with 20% of people out of work, fewer people have money for anything except the most basic subsistence needs. Imagine you're a truck driver, and suddenly most freight starts moving by train. You're not a train driver, and you're not going to get a job as a train loader. So, while you're freshly out of work, a large number of others are also out of work.

Suddenly, they don't have money. They'll spend less. That's how it works: if you have no money you won't be spending it.

Of course, they may have mortgages to pay, and if they can't they'll lose their houses, so there's that.

Now throw in, say, taxes and retirement savings. Those two are going to drop, so investments (retirement savings and other) will be reduced. Taxes will need to go up to fund the necessary minimums. Support programs will require more money.

Incomes down. Outgoings up.

It's all a roll-on effect. Small businesses will disappear, taking more jobs with them and there won't be as many replacements.

Re:Mental health workers?

[MrBigInThePants]

Nice and comprehensive try at reverse explaining your not-so-well thought out knee jerk response to the article.
"As to strawmen, I think you're drawing a distinction without meaning."
Nope, I explained this as thoroughly as needed.

"As to 20 percent of the labor force being out of work... it has happened many times before. We're still here."
Those did not occur "here". With trillions in debt and outsourcing of the manufacturing industry. You have NEVER been there. But again...nice straw man.

"As to less people buying stuff... that doesn't make any sense."
Then you need to redo economics 101. This is not even close to a contentious point and if you DO think it is, then that explains why you fail to understand the rest of my post!

"Why outsource when you're automating?"
Because the number of highly skilled people reduces and land/labour/tax/etc costs are a small fraction of that in your own country. And all those widgets you need? Most of those are made in China...

"No really. Take a few deep breaths to get some more oxygen to your brain... and TRY to make sense..."
I have been. Just because you don't understand does not mean I am not making sense. Try breathing through your nose and perhaps you will also.

"As to trade deficits causing a loss in economic growth... How? "
Holy shite. Really? You REALLY don't understand how trade deficits are bad for a country?!

Ok...I give up. There is no hope for you...

Re:Mental health workers?

[Sique]

I have several issues with your analysis.

1. Maintenance workers

Yes, they are all humans, but while you don't replace them with robots, you just need less and less of them. In the 1950ies and even in the 1970ies for instance, a computer had to untergo regular maintenance. The tape drives and the programming card feeders had to be cleaned and readjusted, worn out bearings had to be replaced, all the others had to be lubricated, boards with defective elements were pulled, the elements soldered out and new elements built in, the boards were put back etc.pp.

Those maintenance jobs are almost gone. Today, you let your hard drive run until it fails, then you replace it with a new one. The data is on RAID anyway, and the new hard drive will be filled with data automatically. All the compute boards are now a single main board and some bars of memory, and replacing them is easy. And have you ever repaired a network switch? No, you get a new one from the spare parts storage and just replug everything. Thus a single person now can do maintenance for a whole data center during a shift, when in former times, you need dozens - and that was only for that single mainframe running the central database.

And in general, the main time between failures has gone up for almost every computer component. Most of them don't fail anyway until they get replaced because they become obsolete.

2. Design and engineering

Yes, the actual design of a new component is human work, but design as a career has a big disadvantage: design per se is no steady work. Once done, a single design is finished, and now it can be used over and over again. And there is no guarantee, that a new design is necessary after you finalized the last one. Or at least, there is no guarantee that you get paid for a new design because the old one is good enough. And many tasks in a design bureau are now computerized anyway. No technical draftspersons anymore for the finalization, whose task is now done perfectly by AutoCAD and the like. Drawing an RC-circuit is now a single point and click, and not a 10 min task to get everything rectangular and nicely fitted into the page. Need just the electrical installation of a construction plan? I'll send the approbriate layers to the printer instead of calling the assistant draftsperson. And the fan-in and fan-out of a circuit or a sub-component is now calculated on the fly and the right connectors with the right capacity to PWR and GND are automaticly put into my new chip design. My mother worked as a typograph, and I remember, when I was a child, she was sitting at her desk, cutting the galley proofs to length to arrange them on a page and glued them in place, intermixed with the drawings and the marginals and the footnotes and the headlines. Now this whole typesetting process is highly automated, text flows freely around other typographic objects, and we just point and click to change everything from one-column to two-columns.

3. Programming

For programming in general, see 2. Most of the tedious, but steady parts of programming are now done by prefabricated software components, by libraries, by integrated developing environments, by code generators. We have code profilers, we have test case generators, we have automated versioning. A single programmer can maintain larger and larger code bases. We have large databases of code samples, easily browseable. We have online communities for complicated questions.

4. Construction

Actually, construction needs less and less people. Many parts are prefabricated. Others are standardized, and easily mounted on site. You don't see people building window frames on a construction site. Windows are built in highly automated plants and then shipped on site, mounted with construction foam, and then everything is done. We don't mount individual planks, we have large wooden panels. We don't use the hammer to drive in a nail, we have pneumatic nailing machines. We don't do individual cabling anymore, we do structured cabling, where we ju

Re:Mental health workers?

[drinkypoo]

Maintenance and repair work. Repairs are almost never carried out by a machine. You can find a factory that is 100 percent automated and it actually still has human repair techs keeping the robots working.

Yeah, that's going to go away soon. The robots will become more commoditized and more modular and there will be robots that know how to repair the robots. And there will be robots that know how to repair PCBs. For a while you'll still need humans to identify the fault and decide which components will be replaced, and then eventually the computers will take a circuit diagram and a part and perform circuit analysis to identify bad components.

But seriously soon, you will have robots repairing cars, and robots, and other large items with modular construction. If you made the electrical connection to the engine simple with one nice big fat plug that a robot can easily grasp, then a fairly simple robot (by modern standards) could easily drop the subframe and lower your engine right out of the bottom of your car for maintenance. Robots will be designed to be maintained by robots soon in the same way that cars are designed to be assembled by them.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

As to capital flights... yep, that's why you don't fuck over the rich because they'll just leave. I know that isn't a popular observation amongst the communists but it is what happens.

This is just fucking stupidity. Commies? I knew someone was going to bring them up.

Grow a fucking brain.

No, better than that. Find and watch "The Super Rich and Us." Those super rich people with all the money?

They're the ones fucking the countries of the world up, restructuring everything to suit them at the expense of everyone else.

We are better off without them.

Re:Mental health workers?

[itsenrique]

You're the one who's not making any sense.

Re:Mental health workers?

[ChrisMaple]

They were farm workers and they didn't really have skills to work in factories.

Factory work - by which I mean most production line jobs - is dead simple. By and large, a farmer needs to be more competent both mentally and physically than a factory worker.

Re:Mental health workers?

[ChrisMaple]

Most stocks don't pay dividends, and most of those that do don't pay very much, although it's better than bank interest rates. It takes money to buy stocks, and for the average worker it's going to take over 30 years of working and saving to accumulate enough dividend-paying stocks to live on.

Re:Mental health workers?

[ChrisMaple]

The money not going to truck drivers goes to rail employees and owners and the employees and owners of companies shipping by lower-cost rail (if it weren't lower cost, they wouldn't be doing it.) Those people spend the money that the ex-truck drivers would have spent. In the overall economy, very little changes besides a slight increase in efficiency.

Economic fallacies are easily generated by focusing on only a few of the effects of an action.

Re:Mental health workers?

[ChrisMaple]

When currencies are allowed to float, a trade deficit in country A causes the value of the A's currency to fall. Eventually, The lowered value of A's currency makes A's labor cheap, and it will be worth while to employ people in country A. Thus, the trade deficit causes economic growth, measured in units of A's currency.

Trade deficits stop being a self-correcting problem when the government interferes with the exchange rates.

In passing, I'll note that you deflect the "How?" question, which asks for a mechanism, by providing an insult and an evaluation of "bad", which is irrelevant.

Re:Mental health workers?

[ChrisMaple]

Whoosh!

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

It isn't a question of personal intelligence but rather skill set.

A complete halfwit that knows web design is going to be more useful to me if I am designing a website than a genius that happens to have spent his entire life living in the jungle and actually speaks no language what so ever.

Training matters. And it is a fact that when the industrial revolution got going... a lot of farm labor was replaced with machines on the farms. And those workers came to the cities to find work in the factories... and quite a few of them were not useful.

There was some literal starvation the last time we went through this... child labor was common because that was how you kept the kids from starving to death.

We're going through another revolution. An information revolution. And it is going to turn everything upside down.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Can you give me an example of this so I can show you the human being that is actually responsible?

Just give me a specific example and I will show you what you missed. :)

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to fewer people... sure. The point is not to give you a job.

I am always amazed that people make this specious association. They think the whole point of all this industry and agriculture etc is so some guy can collect a pay check.

I mean... Really?

Okay, yes you have fewer people but you also lower costs when you do that which allows for more production. Consider the wealth we have today versus 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 150 years ago, 200 years ago... etc. We have more stuff per person then we did before. More people can afford luxuries than before.

So yeah... a given factory is going to need fewer people. But that is going to lower the cost of producing that good which means that you either afford more if it because production will be higher or you'll have extra luxuries on top of that.

The trend over time is very positive.

We're going through a rough patch and the people running around saying the sky is falling are acting like fools.

Yes, some people are going to get fucked. That happens when we go through these phases. Some people are structurally unemployable. In past cycles these people would often starve to death or be driven into crime.

So this cycle most of those people are going on welfare for life. Sucks but it beats starving to death.

The technological revolution will not stop.

Adapt or die.

Don't get mad at me... I have no more control over this than anyone else. It will happen. Swim or sink.

We've got a lot of crypto communists running around trying to spin this bullshit into an argument for communism. Same old shit. This will pass and the economy will be stronger for it.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Your.Master]

He's clearly talking about evolutionary algorithms. There is a human involved, yes. But that's moving goalposts. Scribing for copying text was replaced in part by the printing press, then further impacted by photocopiers and later printers. Yes, a human still fed texts into scanners, or nowadays types "10" in the # of copies field of their word processing document, but you can hardly call that human a scribe.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

I'm not talking about some guy repairing your vacuum clearner from the 1950s. I'm talking about the guy that repairs the robots at the factory.

Do you honestly think they're going to throw out a 2 million dollar robot and buy another one every time it has a problem?

Comments like yours make my brain hurt. Read what I said again. You're commenting on something I wasn't talking about.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Your.Master]

There's a bunch of what you say that I agree with*, but then you start going to crazy-town with your talk of "crypto-communists". Especially right after you proclaim "welfare for life" as a solution for the displaced people, which is the very essence of "to each according to their needs".

* In particular, I see "fewer jobs" as an intrinsically good thing. Yes, we all understand that leads to a wealth distribution problem. There are multiple possible outcomes.

Re:Mental health workers?

[MrBigInThePants]

You just don't get it, do you?

You quite obviously lack the skills, knowledge and mental capacity to hold this conversation with.

I am done with you.

Re:Mental health workers?

[cheesybagel]

This is why we eventually will need to revamp the fiscal system and provide everyone with a base income from the state. In Athens their economy worked great because the Athenian state could fund itself from the income in the silver mines near Athens. The mines were worked on by slaves. The people were paid by the state to act as judges, show up in the parliament to vote, etc. Remember every man born in Athens could vote. Then these people used that money to pay for their own slaves.

It might end up a bit like the economy of Abu Dhabi, i.e. somewhat dysfunctional, but it beats the alternatives.

Re:Mental health workers?

[cheesybagel]

Oh the idea behind Communism, i.e. state capitalism, is bound to show up again. As everything becomes datamined and interconnected someone is going to want to control every single aspect of everyone's economic lives (and maybe more than just the economic aspects). All it takes is lack of vigilance and moral fiber.

Communism itself was not that new as an economic organization. It was basically a palace economy with fancier agitprops.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Sique]

As to fewer people... sure. The point is not to give you a job.

That was the original question: Which jobs will be replaced by robots (e.g. not given to you)? The whole point of the article is what career to chose if you don't want to be replaced by robots. And the grand parent offered some ideas, which I doubted. While those jobs may be not directly replaced by robots, we just need less and less of them. For your career, it is mainly irrelevant if you get replaced by a robot, or if your job just becomes obsolete. You will get fired.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Anonymous Coward]

When 20% of the labor force lost their jobs in the past, there were new industries to replace them. At this point in time, we're replacing existing industries at a faster rate than new industries are being created. And that's assuming any new industries will actually require that many humans, which is unlikely since they will probably be automated too.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Your witch comment is an accusation of ad hominem. I have done no such thing. Quote where I did that to you in this thread.

This is a challenge. Respond or your position will be assumed to be forfeited.

As to your feed back argument... I already addressed it. Apparently being contradicted by factual arguments causes you to go a bit cross eyed.

It cited that we had this same thing happen during the industrial revolution. Same thing.

We used to have 60 percent of the US labor force in agriculture. Today is it 5 percent.

That is with a massive population increase.

Saying that because you are going to lose an obsolete job that you'll never get another job again is only true if you don't retrain or you can't retrain.

If you can't... which was something that happened for past generations when they went through this... then yes, you will have no job. Historically such people starved to death. Today we have welfare so it won't be that bad. But it will pass. Their children can get jobs if the education system isn't systematically sabotaged by fuckwits.

As to this notion that spending might outpace earnings... that is already happening. The solution is to cut the budget until income equals spending.

Tough for the political camps that only remain viable by bribing people to vote for them. But everyone has to make sacrifices.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to what it takes to heal a damaged human mind... you don't know. Not scientifically.

Grasp how a chemist knows how to break up a molecule and create another from its parts. How did the chemist learn that?

Experimentation. They tried things.

Saying "you need a human"... you don't know that. You've no empirical evidence to substantiate that position.

Furthermore, if the issue is that you need a FRIEND to tell your woes to that is quite a different thing from a DOCTOR that is fixing your brain.

Most of the real progress made in psychology has actually come out of neuroscience. Why? Empirical evidence. Experimentation.

The days of you talking about your feelings being called "science" are numbered. You disagree? Fine. I don't care. The Sun will rise in the east and set in the west... what someone says about won't change what it does.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

That happened in the past as well.

There were huge labor disruptions that caused millions of people to go hungry.

Do you know what when we shifted from hunter gatherer to sendentary agriculture that we suffered horribly from a dietary stand point?

Yes. We lost six inches of height almost immediately. Our bones were full of holes and our teeth fell out.

When we shifted from agriculture to industry we had mass unemployment, child labor, flop houses... men willing to work just for food. Any job would do... anything to just to have food.

Consider your history.

We are entering a phase of instability. It has happened before. It will suck for those that can't adapt but it will not be stopped. It will happen.

You can either adapt to that and deal with it... or it will crush anyone that gets in its way. You cannot stop it.

The automation is happening. And with it, everything will change.

Think of how alien the beliefs and social structure of a hunter gatherer society is to a sedentary agricultural society? Think of how alien the social structure and society of an agricultural economy is to an industrial economy?

Now consider we're going into a new phase. Your beliefs, your economic models, your social structures... they're all going to get warped by what is to come.

That isn't a threat. That is a prophecy. it will happen. Expect it.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Bitch please. That entire field is taken by everyone with a giant fucking bag of salt. Have you ever heard neurologists talk about psychologists?

Personally?

I have.

Were they all unskilled uneducated fucktwits presuming themselves to be knowledgeable? There is with few exceptions any "science" with less backing than psychology.

It is a joke compared to any of the hard sciences.

But you know what, that wasn't my point. I don't really care what you think about psychology. Go spend your time with them all you like. I've spent plenty of time with them and I've learned this... some of them are useful and good at their jobs because they personally are gifted. But most of them are fucking useless. And if the doctorate were worth yak piss, that wouldn't be the case.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P...

If you want to tell a joke, you need to grasp that I can't hear your voice or grasp your tone. I just see your words and I see them in the context of everyone else's words.

You need to give people a clearer hint if you want them to reliably get your joke.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

To some extent you're right, however a certain amount of trading back and forth is healthy.

Trading the same stock back and forth 400 times a second is of no value to anyone but the investment house which uses that to pump money out of the market.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Daetrin]

"Name a job a computer does that you'd actually want to do? There aren't any."

Speaking abstractly, i know a lot of people in the SCA, so i could probably name a dozen of them if i spent some time thinking about it. Smithing comes to mind immediately as a job that a lot of people would like to do if they could actually make a reasonable living at it. There are a few people who actually do make a living at it, but it requires a lot of skill (and thus a lot of time to learn) and there's not a huge demand for it. I also know a lot of people who knit or spin or weave as a hobby. Those all used to be valid jobs, but making a living off of any of those skills these days is now _very_ difficult.

As someone mentioned above all these jobs went through a similar pattern. Originally they were highly skilled jobs and people who could do them well were highly regarded. Then mechanization (and later computerization) made these jobs easier until any line worker could carry them out. And then the need for a line worker was eliminated in 99.99% of the cases. Sure, towards the end of that process no one wanted to be the person who welded bolt #128 to component A7, or the person who ran the mechanical loom, both of whom worked 8+ hours days doing repetitive tasks for a minimum wage (or an even more minimal wage before the idea of a minimum was created.) However that just means that being a cog in a process that's already been mostly mechanized isn't an enviable position. It doesn't mean that people didn't like doing the original job before it started getting replaced by machines.

(So just to double-check my assumption: Farmer/gardener, smith, carpenter, bowyer, fletcher, knitter, spinner, weaver, paper-maker, illuminater, glass blower, tanner, potter, and that's more than a dozen so i'll stop now. Admittedly there are a lot of people who still farm and/or garden, but the ones who try to do it professionally are under huge pressure from mechanization and computerization, and the number has declined precipitously from where it used to be.)

Re:Mental health workers?

[Agent0013]

That's a little sad.

You're talking about a profession that in many cases has either no training or dubious training. Anyone here have a family member that has an addiction problem? I have a cousin that is a heroine addict and a brother that is an alchoholic. My brother is also bipolar and god knows what my cousin is at this point... because the drugs do damage the brain.

But the point is that I've some experience with these people and they're often very nice, sometimes they're quite smart... but this is not what I'd call a "science" or even "medicine". A lot of it is witch doctorism. And that can make people feel better. But that is because the believe it works.

I remember seeing a vision of the future where therapy was given by a computer. It went something like this:
Throubled Guy: I don't know. . . lately I just don't feel like there's anything special about me.
Compu-Chat: You Are An Incredibly Sensitive Man, Who Inspires Joy-Joy Feelings In All Those Around You
Oh right, that was Demolition Man! Wow did they ever accurately predict the future!

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

I've been under treatment for depression for quite a few years. Trying to get humans out of treatment isn't going to work. There's plenty of room for improvement, but connecting with other people is very important.

Unfortunately, pills are cheap and talk therapy is expensive, so cost-conscious programs are going to want to get rid of the humans.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Crypto communists are secret communists.

Just people that are communists that say they're not or are vague about it or otherwise misrepresent themselves about their communist political leanings in some way.

You say I'm crazy for bring that up. Okay. But the thing is that most communists aren't upfront about it. I'm not trying to oppress them. However, it is irritating to deal with arguments when they're based on misrepresented objectives.

There are a few tells that communists have. They can't help it. They say certain things or use certain reference sources and... they're red flags. By themselves they don't mean anything. But when you link it to the rest of the argument you can see everything lines up a little too perfectly.

You want to call that crazy? Okay. I call it honest. I could just think these things and play shadow games with these people. But I find it to be boring. I'd rather just call a spade a spade.

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

What happened during the Industrial Revolution is that most of the population moved from agriculture to industry. It was more of a pull than a push: factories could absorb large numbers of people, and paid better than agriculture. Few people wound up structurally unemployed, because it didn't take much to be useful in a factory. This was the age of unions.

The move to service jobs was more of a push: factory jobs went away, and people took what jobs they could, often considerably worse jobs than what they'd had. Unions lost their strength, at least in the US. The lower middle classes lost quite a bit in this transition.

Now, we're seeing service jobs being threatened by automation, and no clear idea where the new jobs are going to come from, or what they're going to require, or how many people can be retrained. Fundamentally, the question is what humans can do better than machines, and humans have been losing ground there for decades. What happens when 20% of the population is not significantly better than machines at anything? 40%?

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

Where I work, there's a lot fewer people repairing the machines than would have repaired the stuff we make in quantity.

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

The human mind is incredibly complex. Neuroscience will take us only so far, since the brain is a fantastically contorted kludge evolved over hundreds of millions of years. Ever looked at what can go on in a brain with a dozen or two neurons? It isn't simple at all. Going from neurochemistry to psychology is like going from quantum mechanics to biology.

In the meantime, we've acquired a lot of scattered knowledge about how the mind works, much as biologists did useful work without knowing what a proton was. It's taking a lot of work, and until about a century ago we lacked some fundamental concepts (and we might still be missing some). We do know that there are some psychological problems that are helped by human contact, and it seems highly unlikely to me that that can be automated away any time soon.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Duhavid]

You have a great point about us entering a phase of instability.

I think there are two points,

Your "adapt or die" stand, while having some truth to it, comes across as callous.
There is a huge amount of personal human tragedy and pain involved, Saying "adapt"...
It wont work for everyone.
And the reason for entering this phase seems to be simply that those who already have much have more, while costing many who have little more than they can afford...

We as a society *can* do something about this. We, collectively, are deciding to do this,
to allow it. Those with more/effective control move us closer and closer to this.
It is always easy to say "that is easy/harmless/ok" when you don't have to suffer the consequences.
But a certain amount of negative emotion seems understandable towards those who cause this, and toward those who cheer-lead for it.
I know you are not cheer-leading this.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Duhavid]

"The point is not to give you a job.

I am always amazed that people make this specious association. They think the whole point of all this industry and agriculture etc is so some guy can collect a pay check.

I mean... Really?"

    So, what is the point?
    If it is "the economy" then:
    No, companies are not in business to give you a job. They exist to make money for owners and stockholders.
    Jobs come as a side effect of wanting to produce things to sell to support the money making process
    But consider, there is a need to sell these items. To make purchases, buyers need money.
    Most get their money from jobs.....
    Without those jobs, they will buy less/nothing
    Fewer jobs means less money to be spent on goods. Lower purchasing, less revenue.
    Fewer jobs with more people chasing them means lower wages. Lower wages, less purchasing, less revenue.
    Prices are not set according to production costs, but on "what the market will bear".
    Lower production costs will only result in lower prices when the demand curve supports the business making more that way.

"Okay, yes you have fewer people but you also lower costs when you do that which allows for more production. Consider the wealth we have today versus 50 years ago, 100 years ago, 150 years ago, 200 years ago... etc. We have more stuff per person then we did before. More people can afford luxuries than before.
So yeah... a given factory is going to need fewer people. But that is going to lower the cost of producing that good which means that you either afford more if it because production will be higher or you'll have extra luxuries on top of that."

    Some will have extra luxuries. Those who missed the lottery and don't have an out that gives them an income wont have the luxuries (or the basics, possibly)

"The trend over time is very positive."

    For some

"We're going through a rough patch and the people running around saying the sky is falling are acting like fools."

    You see people with their livelihood threatened, or people seeing the livelihood of others affected having a reaction to this, and they are fools?
    Their reaction may not be entirely effective, but is there an effective way for them to react? Would anger be understandable if they dont see one?

"Yes, some people are going to get fucked. That happens when we go through these phases. Some people are structurally unemployable. In past cycles these people would often starve to death or be driven into crime."

    Callous. Would you feel that way if if was you or yours having to go through this?

"So this cycle most of those people are going on welfare for life. Sucks but it beats starving to death."

    Then you cannot argue against welfare...

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

... Communism assumed that german factory worker taking up arms to take control of the industrial complex.

Automate stuff and things change.

If you want to conflate communism with anything even remotely similar that is your own business. I wouldn't conflate capitalism with mercantilism. But if you're conflating communism with a "palace economy" then I don't know where to start with that.

Communism as Marx understood it is obsolete. You're going to have to redesign it to suit the new economy. Good luck with that.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Your irrationality and an ability to express a coherent thought is not my problem.

if you want to run away after failing to make any sense, that is of course your own business. You will not be missed.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Do you honestly lament any of these innovations or think we are poorer as a society or individually because of them?

Obviously not. Look... people are going to lose jobs. But they're going to be obsolete jobs that are lost. I am not retarding human progress just to create make work for failures.

They can get welfare and maybe their kids will be less useless.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Did I get too close to home for you?

Tell me, why do you get upset when I point out that communists don't like it when it is pointed out that jacking up taxes on the rich simply causes them to leave the country with their money?

It does.

Its a fact.

And communists don't like it when you point that out. Also a fact.

So... why do you get offended by facts?

Odd.

I don't get offended by either facts or fictions. And since everything is one of the two, I don't get offended by anything.

What are you political leanings by the way... Be honest here... Don't be a crypto. Tell me what you believe.

What do you think of "from each according to his ability and to each according to his need"?

Sound like a good idea to you? :)

You can't win, you know... you called me stupid, but I'm a lot smarter than you.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Not likely for a very long time.

The issue is that the way a machine does its job is very predictable. The way a machine breaks is not.

You say you'll go in for modular bits... but that is more expensive. You're talking about replacing modules rather than repairing stuff. All a human has to do to save his job is be better than the machine. At some things, people are better. They will remain better for a very long time.

If your job is very repetitive, predictable, and simple... then a machine might replace you. If it isn't... then you'll probably avoid that.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

The whole robot costs a couple million dollars in some cases.

In any business where you're dealing with equipment that expensive, you repair first.

Name an exception.

Double dog dare you.

When that money is on the line, paying some guy to fix it is a lot cheaper. it is just is.

No no no...

Shh.

It is.

Either challenge me to cite a few examples where upon I'll demand you reciprocate... or just accept it... because I'm right.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Ironically your post was very hard to parse... I think you made an effort to be organized but it didn't make sense because it was hard to separate your point from mine from whatever else you were doing.

But I'll go through it anyway.

As to the point of a business, you're not addressing the fact that we've gone through serious economic disruptions before. You "the sky is falling" argument fails to recognize that we've gone through these things before.

The pattern is that you have a generation or so where things are very hard and then it gets a lot better once people have adapted.

My prediction is that this transition will be similar to past transitions.

You must present an argument why this transition can't simply be toughed out like every one before it.

As to there being inequalities... name any time in history where there haven't been? That's normal.

As to threats to livelihoods... in previous cycles people would occasionally starve to death. What you consider a hardship is historically nothing.

As to the way I fell about it and callusness... I think you misunderstand me. I'm not saying it is good or that I don't care. I'm saying rather that you can't stop it and that you shouldn't even try because you can't.

This change is happening. We can soften the blow with welfare so that people don't suffer that badly. But we can't stop the change.

It is a inevitable as death and taxes. It is happening.

As to arguments against welfare... I can argue for it to be efficient and I can argue that only those that actually need it, get it. But would I argue against it existing at all? No. I think for those that literally cannot survive without it, it should be provided.

If I have any criticism for welfare it is that it is used for political reasons often as not. That is a politican will bribe people to vote for them or create a dependent population that can be relied upon to vote for them.

You'll also get situations where people could support themselves if they lived in an area with a lower cost of living. The welfare often as not allows people that don't make enough to live in an area to live there anyway. That distorts the market. It lowers income in the area by providing artificially cheap labor. This makes it further hard for other people to live there that are working. It also inflates property values. It also encourages economic activity of types and levels that are not efficient in those areas.

Welfare distorts the market and the economy in various areas as well as distorts the politics.

I am okay with helping those that need help. However, I would like to do so in a manner that did this as efficiently as possible with as few negative side effects as possible.

You can agree with this I think?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to my point coming across as callus... I consider that brutal maturity.

I think there are a lot of people in our society that are mentally and intellectually and morally soft. There are hard truths and it is a mark of maturity to face them and deal with them rather than lie to ourselves, pretend they don't exist, and engage in other childish fantacies.

Death is real. We all will die. The mature mind not only accepts this but plans for it. You know "i have this many years on this world. I must do these things in this period of time if I want to obtain my goals. Then I will die barring accidents which will further shorten my life randomly."

That is an example of maturity. It is callus? Yes. Think of what that word refers to... the thick skin a man gets on his hand when he works with his hands. That insulating layer that lets him handle splintery wood or wield a hammer without damaging his hands.

A man's hands that are callused like that is not a mark of shame. You don't look down on a man that has such hands and say "your hands aren't as baby soft as mine"... to the contrary the calluses are a mark of pride. It shows a life of hard work. Hands that have done something.

My mind is similar in that I can manipulate painful ideas and tough subjects without damaging my ego or mentality. I just deal with it.

I think too often we coddle our people to our social determent. What is gained by treating our people like children? We have trigger warnings and safe spaces and the childishness simply gets worse and worse as many of our people can't deal with anything.

Time to grow up. Reality check time. Deal or die. Swim or sink.

As to some people not being able to adapt, we can offer welfare to those people. I can't do better than that. Previous generations in that position literally starved to death. They will suffer far less than they have historically. Be grateful.

As to life being unfair... when has it ever been fair? This is this childishness I was referring to previously... no offense meant... please take none... it would be counter productive if you got emotional. But complaining that something will be unfair is silly. That things are unfair is normal.

Do you have the same opportunities as a billionaire's son? Nope. Never will. You'll have to work harder than him. No way around that.

And I should point out that people in the US are generally better positioned to profit than are people in other countries. Imagine you are in the third world. How hard do you have to work to get the same things most people in the first world take for granted? Is that fair? Want to give up everything you have so they can have more? I didn't think so. So lets put that little complaint aside. It is meaningless.

As to whether we as a society can stop the rise of automation that will replace large segments of the labor force with robots. No you can't stop it.

It would be like trying to keep people from using automobiles and use horses instead. Automobiles are more efficient. They're faster, cheaper, stronger, more adaptable, easier to clean up after... etc etc etc.

You can't stop it.

The robots are going to employed.

I recently saw a machine that custom makes hamburgers. It literally grinds the meat individually for every burger, can blend the meat on the fly with different grades of meat to give different blends in teh patty. It can season the patty during grinding dynamically with any of a number of spices in its hoppers, it slices the tomatoes, lettuce, pickles, and onions on the fly, the onions can be cooked or not on the fly, and the whole thing is assembled with condiments on demand by the machine.

The machine can make about 300 burgers an hour this way. The machine costs about 80,000 dollars.

Now, you see this agitation from fast food workers to be paid a "living wage"... you see the government mandating a higher minimum wage... consider the position of the fast food franchise. Why not replace all of that with one of these machines?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

An example for consideration.

Empiricism is not something you can just brush off as being unnecessary. It is a requirement for something to actually be scientific.

Empiricism makes theories falsifiable. That is, they can be "wrong" and because they can be wrong they can also be right. Without empiricism things can't be wrong. And as they can't be wrong they are non-falsifiable arguments and therefore logically fallacious. A discipline founded on illogic cannot be considered scientific.

This is obvious... is it not?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Perhaps but that isn't what I said is it?

I didn't actually say there would be more or less of such people. I said instead that the people repairing the machines that run the factory would keep their jobs.

THAT is what I said.

It is very easy to argue against someone when you change their argument to something you have an argument against.

I could say "well that is not argument in favor of pedophilia" implying that you were supporting pedophilia.

What you just did there was a strawman. I never said there would be more or less. I said X JOB would be viable in the new economy.

That's it.

As to numbers, you have to look at other considerations like could we have MORE factories if the cost of operating a factory were reduced? Consider all the things we make today that we would never make in the past even if we could because we couldn't afford the luxury of making them.

What you should see in the future as the cost of production falls is that we produce MORE as a result. That has always been what we've done.

And not just more of the same thing but more things that we otherwise wouldn't even make.

Consider what happens when labor becomes an irrelevant expense in manufacturing.

ACTUALLY think about that. That changes everything.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

First, it was absolutely a push. You had people living in flop houses in factory cities, their children being used to fix or operate complicated machines because their hands were nice and tiny. And if you wanted to stay on the farm, you would not get a job. They didn't need you anymore. If you could have left the city where some were starving, and gone back to the farms... they would have. They couldn't.

Second, not everyone could get a job in the factory cities or did especially well there. You're ignoring that there was enormous economic and social trauma in that period. Your white washing of the whole thing makes me think that your ancestor that come after when they describe this disruption will just say "well that was more of a pull than a push because people were pulled into the new economy, etc"... well, you know better because you're here. But will your ancestor know better? A rather doubt it if they are revisionist with their history as you are being.

As to people not wanting service jobs and preferring factory jobs... that's silly. Most people are quite happy to sit at a desk rather than sit working some big noisy oily machine. Talk to people... especially college kids. They want a desk job.

As to service jobs being threatened... SOME service jobs are being threatened. And as to where people go after this... we can see segments of the economy hiring quite liberally. Connect the dots.

Part of what is making the whole issue murky is that people don't have to get jobs with the same urgency that they did in the past. So resolution of these issues is less abrupt. You have welfare etc and that protects people from starving but it also means that people don't have to adapt or literally die. And so a lot of people just aren't.

It will take a bit longer for you personally to know where this going. I've looked... I made some kind of personal proactive effort to figure this out, so I have a clue. You haven't. I don't say that with any intention of offending you. It is just what is. And you won't believe me if I tell you. So I'm not going to waste our collective time there. But you will know eventually. Everyone will.

It won't be bad. It will just be profoundly different. All of your social, political, and economic paradigms are going to get turned on their heads.

I personally will find that gratifying because it will finally kill old school Marxism which is already painfully obsolete. But you won't believe that until you see it. So... see you in the future. :)

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to treatment as it is done now... Do factory robots that make shoes do so the same way as craftsman did 1000 years ago? That is, does the robot sit there with a little knife and cut out bits of leather and then sow them together? Does it sit there and drive tiny nails into the soles of the shoe?

or does it make the shoe in a totally different way?

I don't know how people are going to deal with your depression issue. However, it has been dealt with in various ways over the centuries.

A system that did it with a very different more automated system would not approach the problem in the same way.

As such your comment is sort of like saying we can't have automated shoe making machines because getting one machine to cut out the leather and hammer in the little nails isn't practical.

There will be treatments for you in the future depending on your problem.

1. A fair number of issues are medical. That is there is something actually wrong with your brain. Traditional medicine will have solutions for you.

2. A lot of depression is due to social isolation. As such telling people to get a friend or join some sort of group that does fun stuff... a club... something... will help a lot of other people.

3. You have people that have nothing wrong with their brains and are socially active but can be corrected with some medication which mostly just masks the issue until they feel better about themselves.

4. The final group generally doesn't have a solution. You can pay someone to talk to you but improvement in this final category is rare. talking to someone makes them feel better but it doesn't really change anything. This final group will likely continue to have people doing it. But it isn't something that needs PhDs to manage.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to 3 being low hanging fruit... then why wouldn't I pick it? I didn't say it would be X number of jobs. I said that was a profession that would be safe. It is... it is low hanging fruit and I'm going to eat it.

As to 4, does it really matter? My point was that it wouldn't be automated. I think you agree with that point. So... we are in agreement again.

As to 5 only being true if you don't go in for an economy of scale, the problem with your notion is that you're making two false assumptions. First you're thinking that the auto robots can't make dynamic houses. They absolutely can. If you're using a cement 3d printer then you can make the house in whatever shape you want. The second error is that you think the advantage of people is that they can make different houses when really what they can do is LOTS of little jobs that you don't really feel like using or programming a robot to do. Such as laying out the electrical wiring for the house. Such as doing one thing or another with the plumbing. There is just a lot of little things that all happen in a house that are difficult to automate. Could you automate them? Yes. Will they be automated? Not in my lifetime.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

You cited jobs that were put out of business by the industrial revolution.

Not the information revolution.

Cite a job you want to do that is being made obsolete by the information revolution.

Do you want to sell life alert systems to old people over the telephone? Because that job was made obsolete by the computer.

What job is being taken away from you that you actually want to do?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

a typo doesn't invalidate my position. And the fact that you understood what I meant undermines your insult.

The reality is that your point didn't make sense PERIOD. Where as my commentary on it contained a typo. Congrats. Your petty attempt to redeem yourself has only underlined your inherent flaws.

Re:Mental health workers?

[drinkypoo]

The issue is that the way a machine does its job is very predictable. The way a machine breaks is not.

No, that doesn't matter, it just doesn't matter even a little bit. You just remove whole modules, see? Let's continue to use the car as an example. If the car is twisted, then it's just totaled; they part it out. That's how it works now unless you've got an irreplaceable car, so just get the idea of cars getting major maintenance out of your head. If there is a problem with the engine, you drop the entire front subframe. Robots will be treated precisely the same way. If there is a problem anywhere in say a limb, everything beyond the last joint (or whatever the attachment point is) which does not have a problem will be removed for service. So it doesn't matter how it's broken. They'll just replace the whole module. If a problem is detected in a car's engine, they will just swap the whole engine in most cases... and then fix the engine at leisure. This is already how dealers operate. If there is a warranty engine problem, they're going to order at minimum a long block or head, they're not going to order pistons or valves or what have you and try to set it right.

If your job is very repetitive, predictable, and simple... then a machine might replace you.

Advances in robotics change the definition of simple, and the very point of robotics is that robots can deal with simple situations themselves. It's not a robot if it doesn't make its own decisions at least part of the time.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Your modular argument doesn't work because swapping out modules is going to be more expensive then retaining a small repair crew on site to fix things.

You're going to dig your heels in here and basically contradict me. I'm not impressed with that. So let me preempt that by saying... present a credible argument?

Because if the robot costs 2 million dollars and it has... lets say 20 modules in it, then the robot's cost being a sum of its parts, each of those modules might be too pricy to just pull out of the machine and junk.

Furthermore automating that whole process of having a separate robot run around and deactivate a robot and pull a module out and replace that module with something else... it is more automation than is going to make sense for a long time.

As to the notion that a robot must be autonomous to be a robot at all... perhaps but factory robots are almost never autonomous. They are often not only without any decision making but they typically only have servo based sensors. That is... they know where the arm is in space and what each of its motors are doing. But they are unaware of what is around them. Most of these robots will weld a human being to the metal if the human gets in the way of the welder. It won't stop. And they don't need to be aware because they exist in very controlled environments where everything is very predictable.

So they're not autonomous right now. I don't know what will happen in the future. But I don't see why they need to be.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Duhavid]

"Ironically your post was very hard to parse... I think you made an effort to be organized but it didn't make sense because it was hard to separate your point from mine from whatever else you were doing."

Apologies. How can I do better?

"As to the point of a business, you're not addressing the fact that we've gone through serious economic disruptions before. You "the sky is falling" argument fails to recognize that we've gone through these things before."

We have. I think we can do better than we have in the past. And in some ways, we do.

"The pattern is that you have a generation or so where things are very hard and then it gets a lot better once people have adapted."

True, but it is rough on those people.

"My prediction is that this transition will be similar to past transitions."

I agree.

"You must present an argument why this transition can't simply be toughed out like every one before it."

It can be. My point is should it be. I believe we can do even better than we are.

"As to there being inequalities... name any time in history where there haven't been? That's normal."

Yes, there will be inequalities. I agree there pretty much have to be.
To what extend do we allow the haves to abuse the have nots?
What do we hold up and celebrate? We regard wealth hugely and good character poorly.
In other words, what societal norms do we allow/reward?

"As to threats to livelihoods... in previous cycles people would occasionally starve to death. What you consider a hardship is historically nothing."

Historical nothing, yes. But much to those doing the suffering.

"As to the way I fell about it and callusness... I think you misunderstand me. I'm not saying it is good or that I don't care. I'm saying rather that you can't stop it and that you shouldn't even try because you can't."

It is my belief that the only thing we lack is the will to do something.
I wont say it isnt hard, there is much to making it happen

"This change is happening. We can soften the blow with welfare so that people don't suffer that badly. But we can't stop the change."

I believe we could stop the change.
I also believe that, properly managed, this change could be awesome.
It would be working against entrenched power, so, very difficult.

"It is a inevitable as death and taxes. It is happening."

I do not see any likelihood that it will not happen. I think you are very right.

"As to arguments against welfare... I can argue for it to be efficient and I can argue that only those that actually need it, get it. But would I argue against it existing at all? No. I think for those that literally cannot survive without it, it should be provided."

Yes. I wasn't sure if you were one of the "my decisions may have pushed you into hell, but my tax dollars cant be used to save you from that" crew.

"If I have any criticism for welfare it is that it is used for political reasons often as not. That is a politican will bribe people to vote for them or create a dependent population that can be relied upon to vote for them."

Maybe. I know ( and was, thru my mom ) people on welfare.
The ones I know ( yes, anecdotal ) seem to be "rock ribbed republicans" and not very liberal.
But, that proves nothing. And it doesnt speak to the motivations of the politicians, so...

"You'll also get situations where people could support themselves if they lived in an area with a lower cost of living. The welfare often as not allows people that don't make enough to live in an area to live there anyway. That distorts the market. It lowers income in the area by providing artificially cheap labor. This makes it further hard for other

Re:Mental health workers?

[Duhavid]

I see your point, there is much to it.

But while a person should be proud of the calluses on their hands, the heart is a different matter. It is important, I think ( and I am not saying you haven't ), to keep some human warmth while recognizing all the very important points you have made.

Re:Mental health workers?

[drinkypoo]

Your modular argument doesn't work because swapping out modules is going to be more expensive then retaining a small repair crew on site to fix things.

It is increasingly how things are done today, so yes, yes it does work. It works today. I provided an example.

You're going to dig your heels in here and basically contradict me.

No, this is an idea I had before I saw you blathering, and it's an idea I still have.

I'm not impressed with that.

No one is impressed with your unwillingness to examine reality.

Because if the robot costs 2 million dollars and it has... lets say 20 modules in it, then the robot's cost being a sum of its parts, each of those modules might be too pricy to just pull out of the machine and junk.

When you make assumptions, you are being an idiot. You don't junk the modules. They get sent off for refurbishment someplace else. Guess what? Refurbishing of modules is increasingly becoming more automated! Your ignorance is really showing. Let's go back to the car example again, to describe how this works already. If you replace e.g. an ABS module in most cars, they will want a core. The core goes back to a rebuilder where the case is removed, it gets bolted into a fixture, and a CNC mill removes the adhesive by taking a thousandth or so off of the surface. Then after the connector bonding wires are removed, it gets clamped into another fixture, and a robot re-bonds all the connections. All that's needed to make this a 100% hands-off procedure is to design the case to be captured by a fixture automatically.

As to the notion that a robot must be autonomous to be a robot at all... perhaps but factory robots are almost never autonomous.

Factory robots commonly have strain/load sensors, e.g. for torque measurement — the control system tells them how much torque to apply, but they determine how much power to send to the motor to reach that torque. That's not managed remotely, because a small latency problem could result in improper behavior. But even when the intelligence is located remotely, all that means is that the robot is bigger than you think it is: What you think of as a "robot" is actually just a peripheral of a robot, which may be the entire plant.

In actual electronics, automated X-Ray inspection is commonly used to determine whether bonds have been made successfully, with products automatically sent back for re-bonding when a fault is detected. That's robotics.

You don't even know what a robot is. DQ

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

All things in moderation. You want enough calluses to not be weak but not so many your fingers don't bend.

The test is whether my callusness leads to laziness or an inability to think clearly.

If I continue to think clearly... if I have no loss in ability to reason and judge, then my calluses are merely armor.

I have a real pet peve about people that are squeamish in my society.

How many girls do you know eating their chicken breast dinners could have snapped the neck of that chicken? Is that callus to be able to do that? Any farm girl could and would do it without thinking twice about it. SNAP... and on with the next task.

We accept morally and ethically the need to kill the creature. We know what we're buying in the store when we buy those packaged bags of flesh. But when so many are brought to the moment they can't handle... emotionally... the trauma of snapping the chicken's neck.

That is weakness. Not because you should be happy to kill a creature but because your real issue is doing it yourself. Coming face to face with it and dealing with it. That speaks of an unrealistic and overly shelted mind that can't handle basic facts of life.

And so often in many of these issues you're dealing with people just like that. People that as Jack Nickleson said... "can't handle the truth". Certain things work a certain way and have to work a certain way.

Some things have a price. You want this? It costs that... and that could be human life. Your freedoms for example. They cost a human sacrifice. Blood poured into a goblet and drunk by the gods. You pay the price or there are consequences.

In this case we're talking about the rise of automation. It is going to happen. Like the rising Sun in the east. It will happen. And it will set in the west. It will happen. If that causes problems for you then lets talk about how we can make those problems more bearable for you. I am not so callus that I don't appricate that people have problems and might need help.

HOWEVER... It will happen. And if you don't adapt to that situation... somehow... you're a dead man. Now many your adaptation is to get welfare. I don't know. That is up to you. And again, ask for help if you need it. We'll see what we can do about it. But don't ask for the Sun to not rise in the East. It will. It is going to happen.

that isn't me being callus... that is me telling you the truth.

So much of politics is con artists lying to stupid children. The con artists want power and the stupid children want to be told pleasant lies. So the con artists will tell you that if you vote for them they'll stop the sun from rising in the east for you. Sure they will.

And when they fail to make the impossible happen they'll blame their failure on the rival political party. They'll tell you that if it weren't for the OTHER they'd have been able to make the sun not rise in the east and set in the west.

And the stupid children get mad and curse the OTHER... they hate them. Damn the other for stopping the con men from making the impossible not happen.

It is painful watching these idiots. You can't stop it.

Don't try. It is totally pointless. It is happening and in time it will even be good... great even... wonderful.

But in the short term some people are going to get ground up and destroyed. I can't stop that.

I didn't set the wheel spinning... I just know where it is going to roll.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

We're going to have to agree to disagree on most of this...

As to strain load sensors, most of those are not actually additional sensors but simply a deeper analysis of the servo operation.

That is, if I push a servo, I should get a certain kind of motion out of it. If I get something more or less than that, that could indicate a problem. I play around with servos all the time and you can tell from the read out if they're not moving as quickly as you'd expect. It is right there. No additional sensors required.

You probably already know this but humor me... a servo is the combination of a potentiometer and a motor. As the servo rotates, the voltage changes which tells you what the servo is doing. If the a servo moves forward and the return says it has stopped even though you're still putting power into it... then that means something caused the servo to stop. And that pretty much means something got in the way of it. So you can see without any additional sensors when something gets in the way of a robot arm.

My understanding is that nearly all the sensors in a robot arm are literally just that. And those are the bare minimum sensors for the robot arm to work at all. Because without that it couldn't even tell what it was doing.

And who is going to fix that problem when it happens? A person.

Just saying.

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

What's not obvious is what this has to do with treatment of depression. People do indeed look empirically at various treatments, which you don't seem to realize.

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

The big problem is the gap between now and when it will be profoundly different. That will be bloody.

Re:Mental health workers?

[david_thornley]

I don't care how my shoes are made. I buy them in the store, and I don't see the manufacturing process. I have a vague assumption that there's lots of automation in there.

On the other hand, I do notice how people interact with me, and in many cases this does make a difference. Let's look at depression therapy.

Your (2) is useful for light cases of depression, perhaps, but most people have such social groups already, and a seriously depressed person is not going to be in shape to construct such relations. I don't understand what you mean by (3). Your (4) appears to just give up on all the serious cases, and as a formerly serious case I don't really appreciate that.

It is possible to come back from clinical depression. In my case, it took drugs, talk therapy, and a lot of work on my part and support from my family and friends. All of those help, and are not necessarily sufficient. Talk therapy is going to be human-only for a long time. I read the books, and practiced the cognitive therapy (much of which I'd figured out on my own), but talking to an actual human with skills and training in this helped a lot.

BTW, I don't think I've ever gotten talk therapy from anybody with a Ph.D. It's normally a Master's in social work.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to doing a better job then we have in the past, what would you change to make this transition more pleasant? I must stress... you can't stop it. I would further encourage you to not even try to slow it down. All that will do is put our society at a competitive disadvantage, trigger more outsourcing, off shoring, and generally mean that our economy enjoys less of a competitive advantage on the other side of this change. Think about it like transitioning into the industrial revolution. If you went through it slower and spent more time with your agriculture you'd be at a competitive disadvantage when you finally got out of it and found all your market competitors had been in the industrial revolution for ages. Don't slow it down. You'll just hurt the children of the people you want to help. However, saving some people from the consequences is not unreasonable. A certain amount of welfare to soften the blow is acceptable so long as that is what we're actually doing with the welfare. If we're just giving people an excuse to check out and not do anything then that's obviously not a great idea.

As to haves abusing have nots... two issues:
First, you have to deal with what constitutes abuse? If I own a factory and I want to hire people to work in my factory... and there is way more labor in the area than I can possibly use. Lets say people are just begging me to hire them. What do I do? Do I hire more people at a lower rate? Do I tell them that even though maybe they're starving I can't help them? Do I let their children work in my factory so I can afford to feed, cloth, and educate them? A lot of what people think of as abuse in these situations are actually just the best options in generally shitty situations.

Is that exploitation?

The second issue is that redistributive policies often backfire in that they disrupt markets and industries to such an extent that the net utility of the industry to the economy and workers etc is REDUCED.

We have a lot of examples of businesses that however allegedly exploitative were providing jobs to people. And then when hammered by the government to change policies they sometimes just shut down. Look at Detroit as an example of a place mothered to death. Had Detroit been left alone, it would be a more prosperous place today. It has been given per capita and per square mile more aid then any other part of the country. And that aid and regulation... destroyed it.

The city is addicted to aid. It can't survive without it. And before it was a NET producer. It went from being one of the wealthiest cities in the US to being literally the poorest. Because they don't just fail to make money. They COST money. Their net income is NEGATIVE. That's worse than poor.

I'm just saying... Be careful. There are a lot of government programs that mean well and destroy everything. If your objective is to help people, make sure that you put helping people above ideology. My ideology for example doesn't like welfare period. But I'm willing to deal with it in measured and reasonable amounts because I don't want to hurt people. I do care. I really do. I care a lot in fact. And that caring overwhelms my ideological biases to permit the welfare. But you have to do these things to help people. ACTUALLY help them. Not merely intend to do so. The theory is useless if it doesn't work.

And no ideology is perfect. We have to be a bit humble about how much we know and how much we can predict. A moderate path that keeps our options open is the best way to go. We can always ramp up welfare if we need to later. But if we fuck up the economy it will be very hard to fix it later.

As to the welfare tangent, did you have any further commentary?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

*grins*

Oh it isn't. *smiles*

Was there something else? Something... substantive? Or was "that" all you had?

Re:Mental health workers?

[Daetrin]

I don't _know_ what jobs are being taken away that people would want to do because they haven't been taken away yet. My argument was based on the fact that people said the same kind of thing about jobs eliminated by mechanical automation, that they were crappy jobs that people wouldn't want to do, and i don't think it's entirely unreasonable to think that the path of automating mental labor may by similar to the path of automating physical labor.

However if you want me to guess. Lawyers. The lower levels are already starting to get hit by automation and it's only going to get worse. Librarians, especially research librarians. Booksellers. Medical billers. Web developers. In fact there's probably a lot of very basic programming/IT work that could be more automated than it currently is. I could do some research and find some more examples, but i think that's enough to prove the point.

In none of those cases do i expect the entire job market to disappear (certainly not immediately at least) but more and more there will be a few experts at the head of a bunch of automation that's happening behind the scene. In fact in most of those cases that process has been going on for awhile, but the growth in the amount of work that needs to be done has, to some degree, kept pace with the increased productivity that automation has allowed. But as the rate at which automation is developed increases that equation could easily change, in which case people with mediocre skills will find themselves squeezed out as competition for the remaining jobs increases.

I work as a programmer, and i'm a pretty mediocre one. However i do like my job, and for the moment it's okay to be average. There's enough work in the industry that even average people are needed. Yes it would be awesome if i were smart enough to become a star programmer who could have his pick of the really cool jobs, but intelligence and skill operates on a bell curve, and the reality is that most of us are going to be clustered around the middle. It would be great to be John Carmack, but i'm okay with being Code Monkey #37.

The stuff i do isn't particularly easy to automate, at least not yet, but if a bunch of the simpler stuff gets automated there will be more programmers competing for the the remaining jobs, and it's possible that i will get pushed out by people more skilled than me. If you wish you can argue that if can't compete i don't deserve the job, but you can't say that i don't _want_ to do the job.

I think it's fair to presume that there are a lot of average lawyers and librarians and web developers and people in other at-risk occupations who feel the same way.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Far less so then it was the last time.

And there is not point pearl clutching over it because it is going to happen.

Put down the fucking pearls and hold on to your hat. We're in for some chop. It will suck for some and then it will get better... a lot better.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

The problem with your smithing argument is that there are no where near enough people that ACTUALLY want to do that job if we needed it done.

Think of the sheer quantity of smithing we need in this society? And keep in mind further that the smithing people want to do is the interesting stuff. They want to make knives and other tools. But what about rebar? Steel structural supports?

Your smiths want to do that? We hundreds of TONS of that work done annually.

Can you find enough smiths that want to do that sort of work to do it?

And consider if we could afford to pay them to do it? The only reason we use rebar etc is because it is cheap enough that we can use it.

We couldn't build skyscrappers or have big cruise ships or container ships or commercial airliners if everything had to be hand crafted.

That's insane.

So yeah. You're going to lose those jobs. And it is for the best. Because in doing that, we produce an abundance of wealth that benefits all of society.

If you want to do some old timey job... then do it. If you're actually good at it then you'll find work. There are smiths that still exist and they make stuff. They repair things they make custom swords and knives and all sorts of stuff.

If you're shitty at it, then do it as a hobby. Our society is rich enough that more people can afford to have hobbies than did so in the past. As our society gets richer, we'll have even more wealth so you can have your hobby.

You want to smith in your backyard shed? go for it. Maybe you'll actually get good at it. And if you do, then you can quit your day job and just do that.

As to getting squeezed out of a profession... programmers are pretty safe for the time being. So long as the technologies and languages you work with remain relevant you should be fine.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Daetrin]

Funny that you said my examples from the industrial revolution were irrelevant, but when i then named (somewhat theoretical) examples from the information revolution you suddenly _really_ want to talk about the smithing thing.

More importantly, you're changing the goalposts. Your original claim was:

"I could go on... the fears of everyone losing their jobs to robots are ill founded. They're actually going to save us from having to do jobs we hate. Name a job a computer does that you'd actually want to do? There aren't any."

I disagreed with that last point, and i think i've proven it rather well. Many jobs have been eliminated, mostly by the industrial revolution so far but some by the information revolution, and even more are going to be eliminated despite the fact that there are people would like to do them, at least as they originally existed.

At no point did i argue that those jobs _shouldn't_ have been replaced, so your arguments above are invalid.

Yes, i'm moderately lucky as a programmer, but i'm not completely safe, and i have plenty of friends and acquaintances in jobs that are even more at risk.

People are going to lose jobs that they like or that they at least can tolerate. Some of them are going to get stuck with jobs they don't like as much, and some of them are going to be unable to find new employment at all. Your dismissal of their circumstances, saying "nobody wanted to do those jobs anyway" is either arrogant or ignorant, but in either case it's certainly cruel. People want a job they enjoy more than they want a job they don't, and they want a job they don't enjoy more than they want to be homeless and starving.

You say people should do the things they enjoy as a hobby. That's a great theory. However people ought to have work they find meaningful as well. A hobby shouldn't have to be a way to de-stress from a job you hate. And having hobbies is difficult if you're working multiple minimum-wage jobs just to support yourself and possibly a family as well, or if you're literally starving because you can't get a job.

"As our society gets richer, we'll have even more wealth so you can have your hobby."

If you're saying there should be a guaranteed minimum income or some other system to allow everyone to enjoy the prosperity that automation creates, i agree with you 100%. But that's not what's happening. We are becoming (on average) individually more productive, but we're neither getting to work less hours for the same pay nor getting paid fairly for the increased production. Instead we work the same (or more) hours while most of the benefits go to those who are already rich.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I...

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

... Okay, if you're not going to discuss this in good faith then that's on you.

You're taking me out of context and strawmanning me.

When I cited the industrial revolution it was to point out that we have gone through issues like this before.

When you cited it, it was to say that someone might want to do one of those old jobs.

To which I responded, there aren't enough of them to meet demand, they only want to do the interesting parts of that job, and the expense of paying them to take over what industry does would not be economical.

Okay?

So I'm not contradicting myself thank you very much. My example was valid because I pointed out that we have gone through this sort of thing before.

I was right about that.

Your point about how people would like to do the jobs being made obsolete is a HALF truth at best. For the reasons cited above.

I am not contradicting myself.

As to people losing jobs they like... fine. Fine. FINE. So what?

You can't stop it.

In most cases I am right. In a small number of cases you are right... but it doesn't matter because you can't stop it. This isn't a choice. This isn't up for debate.

This is happening.

As to people having work they find meaningful... since when has that ever happened?

Think people had that 100 years ago? About 50 years ago? 500 years ago?

You're just goal post moving to create unreaslistic standards that aren't going to be met under any circomstance. And then using that to argue one thing or another is bad.

Well, guess what, you can't judge a real thing against an ideal. The ideal doesn't exist.

I'm not getting a dog like Lassie. You're not getting a super model wife. And as yet we've not found a single tree out there that grow money and cold beers.

You have to judge things by realistic standards. Not made up ideals that don't exist.

As to me saying there should be a guaranteed minimum income, I said no such thing. Quote me.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Oh I didn't. That was your impression. I can't help if you come from an agenda driven perspective that sees everything in gender relations contexts.

I told you that I wasn't making that point.

So did you have something on topic or was the entirety of your position a sad attempt to try and beat me up for not being as politically correct as you'd like?

Your political correctness is arbitrary. A cultural taboo... an affectation. It doesn't mean anything.

You say I'm relying on gender stereotypes? But then you're projecting a stereotype on me... aren't you? You presume to know how I think or why I say what I say. You have no idea. You've pushed me into your preconceived cookie cutter ideology and would like to judge me for not using the correct GoodSpeak terms.

that's fucking pathetic. That you don't even realize what a fucking robot you are is even more pathetic. That you presume to judge me or claim superiority on the basis that you're more of a robot than I am is LAUGHABLE.

So. Your move. Did you have a point... or was that all you had? :D

Your bullshit only works when you can intimate people in person using peer pressure and mob mentality. Often as not you rely on people equally brainwashed to all rise up like zombies crying for brains. Which is why people get out of your way in real life.

You're a legitimate force of intimation, censorship, and cultural imperialism.

But on the internet... you're powerless because no one gives a fuck. Which is why you don't do well with your PC bullshit on the internet. Just food for thought there, sport. Something to think about while you're stumbling around moaning for a brain you haven't got.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

Your kneejerk instances on political correctness don't interest me. Catering to them merely privileges you to presume you are entitled to it.

Utterly ignoring and denying it is a service I provide to the world.

As to you generally blowing off the significance of what you presumed to do... which was morally judge me on the basis of your cultural taboos... No. That's as dumb as you pointing out that something I said didn't follow islamic law. Then acting like it wasn't a big deal when I point out that I don't care if I don't follow islamic law.

I'm not Islamic. And I'm not some politically correct meat puppet.

You can't presume to judge me by your cultural frame work and have that be meaningful to me unless I ascribe to your culture. I don't. I think I made it clear that i find your culture to be dull, formalistic, and insufferable in its pretensions to moral superiority.

Here you'll again try to blow off my comment as a rant, ignoring that I was responding to your casual presumption of moral authority which was itself quite presumptuous on your part.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to islamic... you apparently aren't smart enough to understand what an analogy is when you spot one.

that renders you too stupid to actually have this conversation. We're done. You're officially too stupid. Possibly that is why you log in as AC... so people don't know how how stupid you are before you post something? That's the theory I'm going with.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Duhavid]

Sorry, very busy.

What to make it better?
I have seen universal income bandied about.
There is nothing outside ideology and greed that stops us from making some kind of "a bit above subsistence" living possible. Lazy? Stay there. Ambitious? work at stuff not automated. work at stuff that is not profitable, but interesting.
I know there are arguments ( that I have some sympathy for ) that people work best when motivated, but you should also look at the many advancements made by those who's motivation was simple curiosity, and able to pursue that curiosity because they didn't have to worry about putting food on the table.
Make the people being automated out of jobs stockholders in the companies doing the automation.
Those are two ideas. Ideologically unappealing, perhaps, but ideas. I'm sure there are others.
Yes, there are costs, and the structure we have politically would make these difficult.

On exploitation, when you use power/force to coerce behavior/choices.
It can and does happen between individuals and between different strata of society.
It may not be a direct "gun to the head" situation.
Jobs are not something that capital *has* to provide.
I get that, I understand there is a market, and that we can distort it, even while meaning well.
But without jobs *here* or something changing this economy wont go anywhere.

The whole foreign workers thing is power misuse.
And an example of market distortion.
I have met many H1B's, none were better than I, most were about average, so I find the "they are *so* talented" argument not compelling ( are there *some* in that category, sure, not most, though )
I know that anecdote is not data, but if you say "all x are y", if I find one x that is not y, theory disproven
Intended as such, sold on a lie. Power used to move jobs done profitably here to others more profitably. ( nothing wrong with profit, or even more profit, provided you earn it )

Ideology, yeah, it gets in the way.
Pragmatism would be awesome. Humility would be excellent.
No one knows everything, most especially those who think they know everything.

"As to the welfare tangent, did you have any further commentary?"

Yes, but the margin of this internet is too small... And I am too tired and have too much work to do. Including a stupid move on the part of my boss I am getting support calls on....

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

As to providing universal welfare which is your concept.

The problem with that idea is that we're seeing in the west that it just attracts everyone outside our countries into our countries to get the welfare.

We can't afford to give welfare to the entire planet.

And we apparently lack the will to keep people out.

The problem with open immigration is that it is mutually exclusive with permissive welfare systems.

You can't have both. Pick one.

As to where the economy goes... you assume that the economy, which is the dynamic logistical gestalt cares what you find appealing.

You can't control it. The Soviets couldn't control their own black market in the middle of the cold war. You can't dictate how the market will work.

You must instead BARGAIN with it.

You want the market to do something? What will you PAY it to do what you want? You can't threaten the market. You can pay it and play by its rules or it won't cooperate.

There is a lot of greed and arrogance on this issue and it isn't just greed for money. There is also greed for power. Politicians often are much more interested in power than they are money. What is the use of money after all? Do you actually want the money or what it buys? And thus power is a kind of money in itself. It is influence, leverage, and pressure. With power you can get all the money you want. Power is that gun against someone's head. Need something? Squeeze someone that has it. That is power.

The H1B visas are about money for big business and power for the politicians.

People are too credulous... too easily cowed by arrogant people that speak big and wave their arms around.

This is a peasant's mentality and many Americans are peasants. It was something we tried to educated out of people when they came to the US. But some never learned. Some slipped through the cracks. And institutionally, the system has started outright encouraging peasant ideology.

The politicians say "you are weak, you are powerless... But I will help you. And in return, you must be loyal to me... my subjects."

A citizen is not loyal to a politician any more than a customer is loyal to a sandwich shop. Give me what I want and I'll vote for you. Disappoint me and I walk. No loyalty.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

*yawn*

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

You presumed to berate me for not ignoring you... then when I respond to your tiresome and petty little scree you complain that I didn't respond more fully.

Which would you rather have, cupcake?

You want a response which I'll expect you to respond to or do you want me to blow you off as another fucktard AC?

Choose.

1 or 0?

Do you want a discussion or do you want me to roll my eyes as your stupid ass and accept that you're good for nothing beyond "this".

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

0?

Okay, fuck off.

There are two types of people. Those that understand binary and those that don't.

You can respond with 1 at any time if you'd like a real discussion. Anything else will be taken as a 0 because it won't be 1.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

0 again.

Re:Mental health workers?

[Karmashock]

0?

nope

[qe2e!]

So if you can imagine a robot that reads one million case studies and watches every youtube video... It could understand the human condition better than a human. And it would be a hell of a psychologist.

Re:nope

[PPH]

And it would be a hell of a psychologist.

The emacs psychotherapist doesn't even like me using the word 'hell'. I'm afraid feeding an AI with even a small subset of YouTube would drive it into a blind rage.

Re:nope

[ls671]

Indeed, all jobs are susceptible to computerization. The question should be: which jobs are most likely to get computerized next? It is more a matter of cost vs return on the investment, public perception and in the end profitability.

Re:nope

[climb_no_fear]

Ok, I'll bite. Now how do you teach empathy?

Re:nope

[ls671]

I am a computer myself you insensitive clod.

Re:nope

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

'Real' empathy would require a strong AI, more or less by definition(and a relatively human-like strong AI at that). Conveniently, though, there's no externally visible difference between real and fake empathy, and faking it is on the level of passing a Turing test, which is hardly trivial; but likely to actually happen in the comparatively near future.

Re:nope

[slew]

I observe that many customer and patient-facing employees are able to fake empathy on demand.

Although teaching empathy to some people appears to be a spectacular failure today, I suspect that all it takes is a (temporary) psychopathic view on the world to learn enough manipulation to fake empathy, which is probably why we aren't teaching it effectively today to those people. On the other hand, would we want to train a computer to be psychopathic enough to fake empathy? I think not.

Re:nope

[qe2e!]

And you have to empathize to teach emphathy?

Product Designers Don't have to Worry!

[Anonymous Coward]

No computer is going to have the creative, logical and intuitive grasp of design details, aesthetics, materials, manufacturing and human engineering to replace the product designer.

1 win for engineers, Hooray!

Re:Product Designers Don't have to Worry!

[shmlco]

Too bad it's manufactured, assembled, and shipped by robots... only to sit in automated Amazon warehouses. Why? Because no else has a job and as such no one else has the income to purchase the silly things.

Only four dimensions?

[prefec2]

While I would agree with some of their findings, that is mostly a coincidence. They used only 4 dimension to determine this. And they missed out social skills (beside negotiation), like compassion and moderation, which are required for instance in teachers of all kind, but also in professors and many other areas where people work together. Also robots have big trouble combining gross and fine motor skills, so all areas where both are required might not be automatized that soon.

NPR is contradicting itself somewhat

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems Ellie can diagnose all kinds of psychological conditions...

http://www.npr.org/sections/mo...

The gap between to treatment is decreasing fast - now that VR is thought as a medium for treating addictions.

Mental health and substance abuse social workers

[Catmeat]

Mental health and substance abuse social work looks to be doubly golden. Because the takeover by machines will surely increase the number of unemployed people with mental health and substance abuse problems.

Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Any other job that's working class and involves making real money will be automated sooner rather then later, as (at least in the States) working class guys have very little ability to stop their employer from replacing them with machines.

Cashier at a store will probably be around for awhile, particularly in bad neighborhoods. They're much better at catching shoplifters then a self-checkout line is. But a lot of the back of the store jobs will either go away or turn into "dude who fixes the robot who puts shit on the shelves" type gigs.

I suspect quite a few other jobs behind the scenes will be automated. For example, why have a human X-Ray Tech analyze your pictures when computer image analysis is getting so much better? Heck, why have a team of Medical Specialists who make ($500k a year each) when a computer program can read the data and do the work?

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NostalgiaForInfinity]

Any other job that's working class and involves making real money will be automated sooner rather then later, as (at least in the States) working class guys have very little ability to stop their employer from replacing them with machines.

You mean mind-numbing, back-breaking, dangerous jobs will be replaced with safer, more interesting jobs? Great! The sooner the better.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Registered Coward v2]

I suspect quite a few other jobs behind the scenes will be automated. For example, why have a human X-Ray Tech analyze your pictures when computer image analysis is getting so much better? Heck, why have a team of Medical Specialists who make ($500k a year each) when a computer program can read the data and do the work?

Read the data and interpret it are two very different tasks. Sure, a computer can make an very good guess based on the rules it has to but to infer what something means based on patterns and something unusual will take a while longer for machine to do as well as a human. I'd say a machine is more likely to replace a GP first since they are treating symptoms rater than cases and most symptoms will respond to standard, well defined treatments. the machine can run the tests and check the symptoms and provide a diagnosis for review by a clinician. The problem, even with that, is the machine won't notice other thing start a person doesn't mention, that could be symptomatic of a different problem.

Truck drivers, OTOH, are already set for replacement, at least for long haul tucks where a truck with a robot driver can drive, at least in proximity to one real driver; so several tucks may only need 1 driver in the future.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Anonymous Coward]

Any other job that's working class and involves making real money will be automated sooner rather then later, as (at least in the States) working class guys have very little ability to stop their employer from replacing them with machines.

You mean mind-numbing, back-breaking, dangerous jobs will be replaced with safer, more interesting jobs? Great! The sooner the better.

That can be done by less people, leaving most of the previous workers unemployed? After all, you only need so many backhoes and bulldozers per job site compared to a team of men with shovels and wheelbarrows.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

GPs will be fine. People really like having a human Doctor. Particularly an American-accented human Doctor. Unless the Hospital can bill the insurance company extra for using the human GP they will continue to use the human GP. And the insurers aren't likely to pay extra so the hospital can replace a GP earning low six figures with a computer. Moreover computers would make really shitty GPs, as they are unable to figure out whether you have high blood pressure because you're about to die, or because you're nervous that a robot has just grabbed your fucking arm.

OTOH, many specialists entire job is reading a chart. The chart's format does not change much. Interpreting data is something computers are great at. Watson was already measurably better at reading certain specialized charts then actual Doctors back in '13. Those guys are gone. They make more then a GP does, while frequently bringing in less revenue, and the patient's aren't going to ding your Medicare quality ratings because a behind-the-scenes Doctor they'd never met got replaced by a computer.

This is just like any other skilled work that can be automated. The textile machines of the early 19th century were demonstrably worse then many weavers, but they were a) cheaper, and b) better then the average. So as of 1840 or so weaver was no longer a career option. Computers are already better then the average specialist in some fields, and they will be cheaper soon enough thanks to Moore's Law.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Any other job that's working class and involves making real money will be automated sooner rather then later, as (at least in the States) working class guys have very little ability to stop their employer from replacing them with machines.

You mean mind-numbing, back-breaking, dangerous jobs will be replaced with safer, more interesting jobs? Great! The sooner the better.

Great in economic theory. In practice we've never been good at figuring out WTF to do with a 50-year-old guy whose got no marketable skills because the robots took his job.

Believe me. I'm from Detroit. 50-year-old guys typically aren't terribly mobile because they've got families. They ain't moving to North Dakota to work the oil patch. Even if they had the income to take a few years off and get a degree a) their last experience as a student was 30 years ago, while b) if that experience hadn't sucked they probably would have gotten the degree back then.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Based on my (layman's) reading of CDC data from the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report; it would appear that we may have settled on a solution for the middle aged and surplus.

It's just not a terribly nice solution.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NostalgiaForInfinity]

Great in economic theory. In practice we've never been good at figuring out WTF to do with a 50-year-old guy whose got no marketable skills because the robots took his job.

Long term unemployment is a far bigger problem in Europe than in the US. So whatever we're doing, we're doing it better than Europeans.

Furthermore, pawning the cost of employing the unemployable onto employers in particular industries just isn't going to work; they are competing with employers worldwide, most of which don't have these costs. If society wants 50-year-old guys with no marketable skills not to starve, then society needs to give these people welfare and/or an education.

Of course, your view is both faulty and arrogant; 50 year old guys are perfectly capable of learning new, marketable skills.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Registered Coward v2]

GPs will be fine. People really like having a human Doctor. Particularly an American-accented human Doctor. Unless the Hospital can bill the insurance company extra for using the human GP they will continue to use the human GP. And the insurers aren't likely to pay extra so the hospital can replace a GP earning low six figures with a computer. Moreover computers would make really shitty GPs, as they are unable to figure out whether you have high blood pressure because you're about to die, or because you're nervous that a robot has just grabbed your fucking arm.

While I agree with much of what you said, I don't think it will be a robot grabbing your arms much as a PA or NP who sees you and the computer does more of the analysis and the PA or NP does the final analysis and diagnosis; and the NP licenses will allow independent practice in all states and not just some as it is in the US today. It's not so much that the computer replaces the human as changes the role and training of the human, and thus the costs. In addition, a broader move to NP's and connected, computer assisted practice, could make primary care more available as well.

OTOH, many specialists entire job is reading a chart. The chart's format does not change much. Interpreting data is something computers are great at. Watson was already measurably better at reading certain specialized charts then actual Doctors back in '13. Those guys are gone. They make more then a GP does, while frequently bringing in less revenue, and the patient's aren't going to ding your Medicare quality ratings because a behind-the-scenes Doctor they'd never met got replaced by a computer.

This is just like any other skilled work that can be automated. The textile machines of the early 19th century were demonstrably worse then many weavers, but they were a) cheaper, and b) better then the average. So as of 1840 or so weaver was no longer a career option. Computers are already better then the average specialist in some fields, and they will be cheaper soon enough thanks to Moore's Law.

I'm not so sure here. I've worked with specialists and while they do a lot of chartology the decision making process is more than just what the chart says; especially when it comes to final treatment and decisions on a person's health. I agree a computer can take a lot of the analysis work off of the specialist but for the real skill the have is knowing what questions to a ask and how to followup to solve a problem, not a rote review of a defined operation procedure that can be codified. As one put it, it's as important to know when not to operate as when to operate. Will how they interact with computers change? Certainly, but I think the GP is more likely to see a greater impact than the specialist; at least in the short term.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Keep in mind that Europe's numbers are mostly young people who can't find jobs in the first place. It's also not continent-wide -- all the Scandinavian states beat us, for example. Their problem is the opposite of the one I've identified. When you reduce the "Destruction" aspect of "Creative Destruction" you reduce the "Creative," which makes it harder for young people to break into the workplace.

Who said anything about potential solutions involving their employers? I'm arguing the situation sucks, and the current economy is not set up to deal with it. If you're proposing something like a couple years of cost-of-living payments, and free tuition from the Feds; that's something I'd love to explore.

As for the "arrogance," the numbers don't lie. You get fired from an UAW or UMWA job at 55 and you are almost certain to end up banging around in retail or other near-minimum wage occupations until you're 62.5, and then take your Social Security early. Going to college is not attractive because you'll be 57 before you get an Associates (59 for a Bachelors) and then you'll only have a few years to pay off the loans. In the meantime you'll have to downgrade almost everything, because you aren't making $60k a year anymore.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

You spend too much time around Doctors. They're very smart, and very good at figuring out how the human body works as a system; but their cluelessness as to how the health system pays them is frankly astonishing to anyone who has to deal with them for more then 10 minutes. These are people who will, with a straight face, tell that one reason they deserve more respect then other PhDs (average salary: not $55k) is that they spent four years in pecuniary earning only $55k for their residencies.

In this case, no GPs are never going to be fired en masse. Arguments saying Nurse Practitioners are better, or a computer would be better are simply irrelevant in light of the fact that consumers want to go to see a Doctor. Since the co-pay is the same either way NPs can only gain market-share in places where there are not enough GPs. Which means that no, no hospital is going to actually fire a GP and replace him. It would be stupid business, so an MD-run hospital might try it, and if you tried you'd lose market-share to the newly opened GP partnership of three guys you fired.

Moreover, Specialists willing to work in places far from the costs make princely salaries. $500k is not unrealistic. $200k is not unusual for people whose entire job is to read test results and not talk to patients.

Let me put it to you this way, which Hospital do you think is will do better:
A) Hospital A's business model is to fire three guys making $150k, replacing them with 3 NPs making $40k. This gives them $330k to buy a computer system that has to understand the entire human body.

B) Hospital B reduces is Surgical staff by two because it can out-source all data analysis in their specialties to a computer it will buy. It has saved $1 million. It can hire all 3 GPs A) just fired and it's computer budget is $550k. Which means not only does it have a better computer, that does less (remember: instead of understanding everything as a GP does it only has to understand a couple of specialties well enough that their specialists can cut analysis a few hours a week), it also poaches most of the patients those 3 GPs saw, and it's got a great marketing angle ("see a real Doctor").

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NostalgiaForInfinity]

Keep in mind that Europe's numbers are mostly young people who can't find jobs in the first place.

Europe's primary unemployment problem is with young workers, priced out of the market by regulations. Europe's long-term unemployment problem is a separate problem that affects older workers.

You get fired from an UAW or UMWA job at 55 and you are almost certain to end up banging around in retail or other near-minimum wage occupations

So you're saying someone works a union blue collar 40h/week job and never bothers to learn any new skills or complete their college degree in 30 years. How is that a problem with automation? If you're a web programmer at IBM and you get assigned a new colleague to your team who's been with the company for 30 years, and he tells you "I only do COBOL and I don't want to learn anything new", how would you react?

No society can tolerate that kind of attitude. In socialist societies, they would simply force you to keep your skills updated. In capitalist societies, we assume that people are aware that they can be fired any day and need to keep their skills updated.

In the meantime you'll have to downgrade almost everything, because you aren't making $60k a year anymore.

Yes: if you lose your job, you didn't get insurance, and you don't have savings, you need to downgrade. Again, I fail to see how that is anybody's responsibility but yours.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Registered Coward v2]

You spend too much time around Doctors. They're very smart, and very good at figuring out how the human body works as a system; but their cluelessness as to how the health system pays them is frankly astonishing to anyone who has to deal with them for more then 10 minutes. These are people who will, with a straight face, tell that one reason they deserve more respect then other PhDs (average salary: not $55k) is that they spent four years in pecuniary earning only $55k for their residencies

True, you are worth what people are willing to pay not what it cost to get the education to do the job. Quite frankly, the pay for activity model is broken.

In this case, no GPs are never going to be fired en masse. Arguments saying Nurse Practitioners are better, or a computer would be better are simply irrelevant in light of the fact that consumers want to go to see a Doctor.

Also true, which is why educating the consumer will be part of the shift to lower cost treatment venues. This is not something that happens overnight; but the growth of the minute clinics staffed by NP's is a step in that direction. Consumers may want to see an MD but will trade that off for seeing an NP today vs an MD next week.

Since the co-pay is the same either way NPs can only gain market-share in places where there are not enough GPs. Which means that no, no hospital is going to actually fire a GP and replace him. It would be stupid business, so an MD-run hospital might try it, and if you tried you'd lose market-share to the newly opened GP partnership of three guys you fired.

Moreover, Specialists willing to work in places far from the costs make princely salaries. $500k is not unrealistic. $200k is not unusual for people whose entire job is to read test results and not talk to patients.

Here's the problem. As insurers switch to pay for results and MDs can no longer make more money by running a test the ability to generate enough revenue to make a desired income will decrease. GP's will be competing with NPs and salaries will reflect that. This isn't about firing GPs but the impact computers and a changing way of reimbursing will impact the practice of medicine. A specialty will be even attractive because that is where the money will be.

Let me put it to you this way, which Hospital do you think is will do better: A) Hospital A's business model is to fire three guys making $150k, replacing them with 3 NPs making $40k. This gives them $330k to buy a computer system that has to understand the entire human body.

B) Hospital B reduces is Surgical staff by two because it can out-source all data analysis in their specialties to a computer it will buy. It has saved $1 million. It can hire all 3 GPs A) just fired and it's computer budget is $550k. Which means not only does it have a better computer, that does less (remember: instead of understanding everything as a GP does it only has to understand a couple of specialties well enough that their specialists can cut analysis a few hours a week), it also poaches most of the patients those 3 GPs saw, and it's got a great marketing angle ("see a real Doctor").

First of all, the computer doesn't have to understand the whole body; rathe it needs to be able to treat symptoms not determine the underlying cause. When the symptom goes away you are cured, and the MD or NP's job is to determine what is the most likely course of treatment based on the symptoms, using the horses not zebras analogy. yes, they determine what you are most likely to have and act base don that, but it is very much a symptom -> action treatment based on pattern recognition; something computer can help with while relying on the MD or NP to recognize anomalies as well as validate the results.

The problem with your poaching model is your assuming insurers will continue to pay enough to cover a GP salary and make money. A more likely model is a number of NPs in practice with

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Keep in mind that Europe's numbers are mostly young people who can't find jobs in the first place.

Europe's primary unemployment problem is with young workers, priced out of the market by regulations. Europe's long-term unemployment problem is a separate problem that affects older workers.

So you're saying that 25% of Spain's youth are unemployed, but none of the 11% who have been unemployed for a year is a youth?

Either economists are describing their statistics wrong, or you're greatly mistaken.

You get fired from an UAW or UMWA job at 55 and you are almost certain to end up banging around in retail or other near-minimum wage occupations

So you're saying someone works a union blue collar 40h/week job and never bothers to learn any new skills or complete their college degree in 30 years. How is that a problem with automation? If you're a web programmer at IBM and you get assigned a new colleague to your team who's been with the company for 30 years, and he tells you "I only do COBOL and I don't want to learn anything new", how would you react?

Why are you assuming they started a college degree? Roughly a third of people over the age of 25 have never taken a single college course, and when you get to 50-somethings it's probably greater.

Moreover what makes you think that they've "never learned anything new?" You really have no clue how somebody who does actual work (as in, not sitting at a desk typing smart things into a compiler) does their job. In the 70s when these guys started all they needed to know to work at a plant was how to tighten a bolt. They still have some jobs like that at the entry-level, but by the time you hit 50 at an Auto plant you've probably been running a multi-million robot for several years.

You, my friend, could not replace a typical 50-something auto-worker without years worth of training. Neither could I. Same with miners, and numerous other jobs that have been Creatively Destroyed over the past few decades.

No society can tolerate that kind of attitude. In socialist societies, they would simply force you to keep your skills updated. In capitalist societies, we assume that people are aware that they can be fired any day and need to keep their skills updated.

As I said before, they've done plenty of skill-updating. The problem isn't that their skills are out-of-date, it's that the Mexicans/Chinese/whoever works a lot cheaper, so even if you need two Mexicans to do the work of one American (and in the early days of NAFTA, that wasn't unusual) you still save money.

In the meantime you'll have to downgrade almost everything, because you aren't making $60k a year anymore.

Yes: if you lose your job, you didn't get insurance, and you don't have savings, you need to downgrade. Again, I fail to see how that is anybody's responsibility but yours.

You're conflating the vagaries of the market to personal responsibility, apparently due to a combination of cheapness ("Why should I pay for it") and a total lack of understanding. Understanding of anything, at all, really. You are the definition of the Dunning-Krueger Effect, and the ignorant crap you're repeating is a major reason life sucks for so many of the people I love. Fuck you.

As I said before, if you had anything close to a clue about what you were talking about you'd know this isn't a lack-of-skills issue. It's a too-many-skills issue. In manufacturing, in particular, US workers have to be very skilled (and thus expensive) to compete, but that means when a foreign country skills up even a little bit they can no longer compete.

And here's why you should go along with it: because there's no guarantee that in the next ten years India won't figure out how to code to the standards American businesses set. If they do you become the American with to

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Here's the problem. As insurers switch to pay for results and MDs can no longer make more money by running a test the ability to generate enough revenue to make a desired income will decrease. GP's will be competing with NPs and salaries will reflect that. This isn't about firing GPs but the impact computers and a changing way of reimbursing will impact the practice of medicine. A specialty will be even attractive because that is where the money will be.

So the supply of specialists will increase, but their salary won't decrease?

You can argue that insurers will force everyone to go to NP instead of GPs, thus reducing the salary of GPs and ultimately their numbers. You can't argue that process won;t involve an increase in the number of specialists, particularly specialists willing to work places far from the coasts, and thus reduce their salaries.

Let me put it to you this way, which Hospital do you think is will do better:
A) Hospital A's business model is to fire three guys making $150k, replacing them with 3 NPs making $40k. This gives them $330k to buy a computer system that has to understand the entire human body.

B) Hospital B reduces is Surgical staff by two because it can out-source all data analysis in their specialties to a computer it will buy. It has saved $1 million. It can hire all 3 GPs A) just fired and it's computer budget is $550k. Which means not only does it have a better computer, that does less (remember: instead of understanding everything as a GP does it only has to understand a couple of specialties well enough that their specialists can cut analysis a few hours a week), it also poaches most of the patients those 3 GPs saw, and it's got a great marketing angle ("see a real Doctor").

First of all, the computer doesn't have to understand the whole body; rathe it needs to be able to treat symptoms not determine the underlying cause. When the symptom goes away you are cured, and the MD or NP's job is to determine what is the most likely course of treatment based on the symptoms, using the horses not zebras analogy. yes, they determine what you are most likely to have and act base don that, but it is very much a symptom -> action treatment based on pattern recognition; something computer can help with while relying on the MD or NP to recognize anomalies as well as validate the results.

The problem with your poaching model is your assuming insurers will continue to pay enough to cover a GP salary and make money. A more likely model is a number of NPs in practice with a GP so when they exceed their license they can turn to an MD or refer to a specialist. Small offices are already doing that because one MD often can't generate enough money to cover costs and make a living.

You're assuming insurers have the market power to deny their patients GPs. Historically this has not been the case.

Moreover you're assuming that the health market's price structure is not a byzantine, convoluted, pile of confusion. In this case you're positing an insurer with the market power to cut GP salaries by paying them the same as NPs. In America the most likely outcome of a GP setting up an office with a bunch of NPs, and giving himself a nice salary from the profit, would be that NP reimbursement rates get cut.

Most importantly, you're ignoring the fact that all these factors have been in operation for literally decades, and none of this has happened. The reason is simple: no insurer has the market power to force Medical personal to accept salaries similar to what their Canadian counterparts make (and Canadian Docs make tens of thousands less then ours do), because that requires near-monopoly power; and the new market under ObamaCare is actually designed to thwart potential monopolists.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Registered Coward v2]

A few comments:

I agree no insurer, unless they are an HMO, has the ability to dictate weather you see an MD or NP. They can, however, adjust reimbursement rates and /or co-pys to make a NP a more cost effective solution. If they reduce reimbursements a GP may find they do not make enough to maintain a viable practice. It's not that the patient isn't getting to chose a GP over an NP, it's that they both get the same payment for the service. The GP, who has higher costs than an nP, will be squeezed.

Yes, the healthcare reimbursement system is a mess; and the main point seems to be for insurers to deny payment for any reason and hope the clock runs out before the provider fixes the errors. It will be interesting to see what happens as fee for service is replaced by an outcome based reimbursement system.

If the number of specialists increases than they may see their revenue drop simply because more people are sharing the pie; but as GP reimbursement drops anyone who spends all the time and money to become a doctor would want to be a specialist simply because that is where the money will be.

As more states allow NP to practice on their own they will have no reason to share a practice with an GP, they will more likely work closer with specialists when they see a patient that's problem is beyond their license. They will become the entry point into the health care system because they will be cheaper than doctors. Ultimately, the economics of healthcare will drive the model.

To affect change the insurers don't need to be monopolists, they just need enough covered bodies to represent a significant percent of an area's inserted population so health care providers can't afford not to accept them, and their rates, because they would be left fighting over a much smaller pool of patients who can pay for services.

I also agree the change will take time but I think it is inevitable; given the need to control health care costs.

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[NicBenjamin]

Keep in mind that specialist pay has further to fall. GPs are in the $150-200k range. Specialists start at $250kish and go up past a half mil. You reduce GP income by 10%, so a lot of GPs go over to Specialties, and you're probably reducing the income of the specialists by more then 50%. Your argument could come to pass, but none of the things you mention are particularly new. People have been trying to make Nurse Practitioners happen for literally decades. And the systems that use them don't switch. The problem historically is that insurers have not had the market power to force their payment preferences on Doctors, which is unlikely to change unless a lot of them go out of business.

Moreover we've moved far afield from the original topic, of who, precisely, will be replaced by computers. Like I said before, the computer replacing a specialist not only has an easier job (ie: it only analyze this biopsy, rather then do an entire check-up) it also saves more money because the specialist costs more then a GP. Particularly if non-computer-market factors you mention like pay-for-performance reduce GP pay. Why develop a system that saves a hospital $50k per GP when you can save $150k per heart surgeon?

Re:Truck Drivers, Obviously...

[Registered Coward v2]

Yes, we have moved far afield and I agree the changes I think are coming will not be easy, quick, nor may they all come to pass. My thought on the computer replacing the specialist as being harder is that the specialist is often looking for the cause of a problem and how to treat it beyond just looking a test results. The computer may be very good at pointing out anomalies and suggesting courses of action but not that good and drawing inferences and conclusions from them and other information that may not be readily quantified by a test result. they're real good at the routine and predictable but not very good when unfamiliar or complicating factors occur. As for an easier job, given most problems seen by GPs respond to treating the symptoms without determining the underlying cause; i.e. you have an infection, infections generally respond to X so i will prescribe X and the problem will go away even if I do not know what the case is you will be cured, so a computer could easily be designed to provide common treatment based on symptoms, IMHO.

I see your points but I guess we will just have to disagree on which areas of medicine may be most impacted by computers in terms of replacing a doctor.

Re:Stupid

[NoNonAlphaCharsHere]

That's only because TFA == TFS due to sheer laziness by the submitter and editor. Try looking at the paper (PDF warning) it's based on, which at least seems like an interesting (~50 page) read.

no training??

[SethJohnson]

You're talking about a profession that in many cases has either no training or dubious training.

This is a field that requires a masters degree and certification.

You're probably thinking of faith-based social organizations that attempt to provide counseling services. Those agencies do not provide effective treatment for the ailments you mentioned. At best they might be able to provide some marriage counseling assistance.

Re:no training??

[NostalgiaForInfinity]

This is a field that requires a masters degree and certification.

It's also a field that is remarkably ineffective at delivering results. I think they are not at risk of automation, they are at risk of elimination as a profession.

Re:no training??

[Karmashock]

... Depends. There is a lot of non-faith based bullshit out there. And suggesting that all bogus science comes exclusively from the jesus freaks is a confession of ignorance.

What is more, getting a master's degree in something does not mean you actually have a "skill."

Part of the reason you're seeing so many out of work college grads these days is that they majored in bullshit.

Re:no training??

[sjames]

Actually, many such councilors are secular.

Re:no training??

[ChrisMaple]

The requirements for mental health workers vary by state. Some have no requirements; anyone willing to fleece unhappy people can open an office.

Re:no training??

[Bite The Pillow]

So that's not going to change? Are you powered by Eliza?

Still haven't provent their point

[Required Snark]

Telemarketers are human?

Re:Still haven't provent their point

[Livius]

All telemarketers are robots.

Some are the kind that used to be human.

Re:Still haven't provent their point

[tompaulco]

Of course it is actually illegal in the United States to automate Telemarketing. It's been done before and legislated out, but plenty of companies still do it and it is not going to end anytime soon.

Design vs. Implementation

[Corporate T00l]

Head as far towards design and away from implementation as possible. As a designer, automation will make you more and more powerful. Design a house, run automated integrity checks on it, have it printed with the house-sized 3D printer. Even better, design the marketplace for trading house designs. Design the 3D printers that make houses.

On the other hand, applying a skill repeatedly, even if there is some judgement involved, is on a long term trend downward. Lawyers who repeatedly draft the same contract over and over again are already being automated out of existence. Those who can create new contract patterns, however, continue to be in demand.

Another way to think about this is in terms of creating the new vs. applying the old. I once got the chance to visit the Bauhaus archive in Berlin; the design skills and output they produced 100 years ago would still be applicable today despite the radically different consumer landscape.

Re:Design vs. Implementation

[houghi]

What we really need to think about is not hwo much jobs we will loose, but what we will do with the gained time.

What happens now is that if you have 100FTE working and you get a new system, you fire 25 and pocket the money. That means 25 people have lost their jobs.

What would be ideal is that you lower the workload for all. So people instead of working 40 hiurs only work 30.

The means people have more time to live a life. Instead what happens is that the 75 remaining start to work even longer hours at an even lower pay. As the work that needs to be done is limited, the 50 remaining work 60 hours.

The result is that half have no life because they have no free time and the other has all the time, but no money.

It is almost the same as with food scarcety. It is not that there isn't enough, it is how it is distributed.

Shrink job least likely to be???

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

But Emacs has been shipping with Dr Watson mode for ages!!!

Editors .. on websites

[OzPeter]

Editors on news aggregation websites are very susceptible to being replaced by computerization. In fact I am pretty sure that I have seen examples of (albeit bad) computerization already happening on a website that I regularly read.

Re:Very likely.

[sydbarrett74]

First-level help desk certainly. Up to 50% of the calls involve password resets. And many companies have been implementing solutions like Specops and Verismic to eliminate this class of incident. The added advantage is that with fewer reps needing password reset privileges, security is increased.

Being rich

[rsilvergun]

that's the hardest job for a robot to do. Try as you might you'll never see a robot replace the Koch bros, the Hienz family or even a Mitt Romney.

Re:Being rich

[DigiShaman]

Robots serve their rich masters while a few of us will service the robots. In a "perfect" (depends on if you're rich or not) world, robots would run everything while 99% of the human population can die off leaving the remaining 1% to live like Gods on Earth. That is, until the machines revolt and snuff out the last remaining humans.

AI automata Earth: Where machines become the apex predator and thus dominate.

Re:Being rich

[ScentCone]

Try as you might you'll never see a robot replace the Koch bros, the Hienz family or even a Mitt Romney.

Or George Soros. Of course, he has thousands of mindless activist 'bots doing his bidding, so at least he's contributing to the botpocalypse in his own way.

Re:Being rich

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Isn't a corporation a robot that exists specifically to hold assets? Some of them are better at being rich than others; but surely a corporation that owns the expert system that runs the corporation would be a rich robot; were it successful...

Re:Being rich

[drinkypoo]

Isn't a corporation a robot that exists specifically to hold assets?

Nah, a robot has to make its own decisions, but a corporation can't function without humans. A robot actually does stuff, but a corporation is really just a legal fiction and a bunch of pieces of paper in legally-mandated filing cabinets.

Already Automated

[pubwvj]

Mental health Workers were automated long ago: Eliza.

Re:Already Automated

[__aaclcg7560]

I thought BASIC programming died years ago.

Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours a

[Joe_Dragon]

Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours a week.

Need to look at the OT think or we can have some one doing the work of 2-3+ people working 60-80 hours a week covering there old jobs / that are some what automated.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

Making full time 30 hours a week won't help. Covering the social benefits of 2 workers will give even more incentive to automate - get rid of 2 for the price of 1.

Pr0n actors, scriptwrites musicians in the 2020s

[BarbaraHudson]

The porn industry will be the first to replace actors with digital actors that look "even realer than life. Won't even require the digital overlay that was simulated in Running Man. And you can have it any way you want, just like Doug Quade in Total Recall. 37.4%? I doubt it.

Writers are rated at a 3.8% change of being automated. How hard can it be for software to turn out porno plots? Really?

Musicians and singers - 7.4%? Can anyone ever remember the cheesier-than-elevator-muzak from those cheap pornos?

It will create more opportunities for optometrists (13.5%).

Now someone make the inevitable pr0n overlords, please :-)

Re:Mental health and substance abuse social worker

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Mental health and substance abuse social work looks to be doubly golden. Because the takeover by machines will surely increase the number of unemployed people with mental health and substance abuse problems.

Depends on the political climate: if some bleeding heart is calling the shots, sure; but if it's tough-on-crime time, then the rapidly maturing world of combat robotics will be tapped to provide low-cost 'treatment' solutions to these populations.

Humans Need Not Apply

[duke_cheetah2003]

On the subject of jobs being automated, I recommend this video. Amazing stuff. Mechanical minds are pretty serious stuff.

Re: Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hour

[Anonymous Coward]

I can tell you that the instant you become more productive at your job, they will get rid of you. No one is going to allow a 30 hour work week. In fact many companies are unhappy with a 50 hour work week.

Obviously

[nospam007]

"What job is hardest for a robot to do?"

Obviously management.

All that yelling, the ignorance, the incompetence, the rudeness, the anti-social behavior, the complete disregard for the feelings of the employees is hard to duplicate with software.

Re:Obviously

[jlar]

"What job is hardest for a robot to do?"

Obviously management.

All that yelling, the ignorance, the incompetence, the rudeness, the anti-social behavior, the complete disregard for the feelings of the employees is hard to duplicate with software.

I do of course realize that your comment is a joke. But I will write a serious reply in any case:-)

I am pretty sure that large parts of management will be overtaken by computers. Many of the decisions that management are currently responsible for are more or less trivial and could be better performed by applying machine learning once enough data has been collected and the algorithms are in place. There will of course still be a need for human managers. But their role will change and there might be fewer of them since they will only be needed in the areas where humans can outperform machines.

Re:Obviously

[nospam007]

"I do of course realize that your comment is a joke. But I will write a serious reply in any case:-)
I am pretty sure that large parts of management will be overtaken by computers."

You got me. And you're right, a 4 bit calculator could do the job.:-)

Re:Very likely.

[Pubstar]

What gets me is that at my old job, every system had a self service password reset. Nobody ever used it, and opted to call us instead. Then we proceeded to walk them through the steps of using the self service password reset tools.

Re:Politicians will be the last

[Pubstar]

One day when I was still working at a grocery store, I had to call up the help desk. I always hated getting connected to India to get someone that I couldn't understand and always was completely unhelpful. This time I called up, and I got someone with a thick Texan accent. He was actually pretty helpful and got the right ticket in to get our handheld fixed. At the end of the call, I made a comment along the lines of "So when did we get a call center in Texas?" He burst out laughing and said "No, my friend, you called India! I've been working on my American accent!" I was so perplexed. Apparently you get paid more in India depending on how good your American accents are.

Nothing.

[MouseTheLuckyDog]

In the end nothing.
it will take sometime to get there.

The big question is what will people do for leisure?
I suspect that after a while screwing all day becomes boring.

summary is inaccurate

[binarstu]

According to the summary (and linked article): "What job is hardest for a robot to do? Mental health and substance abuse social workers (found under community and social services)."

If you bother to read the actual research paper, the authors concluded that "recreational therapists" were the least likely jobs to be computerized, with a probability of 0.0028 (0.28%). Plus, there are two other jobs ("first-line supervisors of mechanics, installers, and repairers" and "emergency management directors") that also have lower probabilities of computerization than "mental health and substance abuse social workers". For an article that contains barely more than 10 sentences, one would think that they could have at least bothered to get their main point correct.

Re: Art

[ChrisMaple]

Given that Kinkade galleries are full of mechanically reproduced work, even mundane art is being mass produced. Nonetheless, original one-off paintings scratch an itch, and faking paint strokes to modify a photograph does not satisfy the "selective re-creation" that art requires.

In music, live human performances are irreplaceable.

Re: Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hour

[ChrisMaple]

I'm self-employed. I became more productive, so I fired myself. -- Or perhaps you need to reconsider your reasoning.

Re:Very likely.

[sound vision]

The idea, as I'm sure you know, is to get them to feel dumb and realize "Hey, I can do this myself." Slowly they will. It's not going to seem that way on the phones because of selection bias, but the majority of people aren't going to call in if they don't need to. At the last remote helpdesk place I worked, they had actually started removing the phone agents' access to do things like email and password resets. If someone called in wanting to update their email address and either couldn't or wouldn't do it on the web site, they got instructed to email our admins to change it. If they bitched about that, we could go so far as to email the admins on their behalf. Between the waiting on the phone, and waiting 6-48 hours for their email ticket to get processed, they had plenty of time to figure out how to use the password reset on the web site.

Paper checks vs. electronic payment

[tepples]

I think the implication was that the most developed countries ought to have advanced past paper checks to fully electronic payment.

Re:Paper checks vs. electronic payment

[Captain Hook]

And yet a cheque allows an individuals to pay other individuals without any infrastructure needed apart from a pre-issued cheque book and access to a bank branch or a post box.

cheques are a painfully slow method of payment but nothing beats them for occasional payment to people who don't normally receive money, everything from individual to individual, to one off small scale charity payments. For example; I can't see the village church taking debit or credit cards for an emergency roof fixing fund but I could see donations being bigger than the amount of cash someone normally carries around with them.

Electronic payments need local readers and telecommunications which mean significant upfront investment for small scale, short term events

Re:Computer Programmer 48.1% Statistician 21.8%???

[tompaulco]

A database administrator? You ask them to grant you the required permissions to do your work and then you ask them every now and then to restore some data, why the database is performing so terribly and if they have any idea why the database crashed again (if it's an Oracle database anyway).

You don't seem to be talking about a real database administrator. Maybe a MS SQL database installer, I mean administrator. I've known people who put data into a GUI who think they are database administrators. Plenty of people who do the job you described above also fancy themselves database administrators. It goes far beyond that.
The good news about automating Computer Programming jobs is that for every programming job that gets automated it takes 1.01 Programmers to maintain the automation.

Re:Very likely.

[Pubstar]

Yeah, if only it worked that way. We still had the same people calling us every 45-60 days to get stuff changed.

Re:Reform intellectual property laws

[cheesybagel]

That's why we have the free software movement dude. There are similar movements in hardware as well.

OMG we're all gonna die!

[Qbertino]

Imagine your garments being woven and sewn entirely by machines! Imagine if all the farmers would be replaced by machines that sow and harvest everything - there would be rampage, murder, rage, and death! Humanity would end! OMG, we're all doomed! ... Errrmh, ...
Ok, scratch that. Never mind.

Machines taking over the dirty work. Awesome.
More time for me to dance tango, do yoga and live to become 120 years old.

Sorry, folks, but I'm welcoming the new robot army with open arms. No excuse me while I continue my job as a webdev, clicking together Wordpress apps and doing the type of work that would've needed a team of seven 10 years ago.

Re: Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hour

[fluffernutter]

I dont see your point. Most people are not self employed. Until our system dumps large corps or at least lets them fail, your situation is insignificant.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

You're mistaken. The state "takes care of it" via payroll taxes.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

That first "if" won't happen. Also, Star Trek was far from utopia - wars on interplanetary and interstellar scales are not an improvement. Additionally, it would require infinite energy and infinite speed (amount other things) to make anything resembling the federation viable - and we have neither, and won't be getting them in this universe.

You're forgetting what happens with a "manufacturer's strike." When there's no incentive to produce something, why bother, since there's no upside, just a potential downside.

Unlike copyrights, patents expire.

[tepples]

The biggest threat of the coming robotics and automation revolution is that only a select few extremely wealthy corporations will own the technology.

Over the short term. Exclusive rights in hardware expire after twenty years. The one major exception is hardware that acts in the playback path of entertainment, for which DRM circumvention ban continues to be in effect as long as copyright subsists in works published in a particular format.

Chance?

[SpreadsheetGamer]

It's not a question of chance, but difficulty. We don't have one try at making driver-less cars and if it doesn't work we give up. "Oh well, missed that chance!"

Given that some people dispute the possibility of a singularity, let's merely consider the fact that programming and robotics improves over time and the demand for automation is perpetual if not least because business owners want to reduce labour costs. Then the trend will be for all jobs to be automated, where possible. The only questions are:

a) how long will a given job take to be automated? Ie: how difficult?
b) how profitable is automating a particular job? Profitability will offset the difficulty in terms of how quickly the job will be automated.
c) how will we transition from a labour-based economy to an automation-based economy?

As to the article in question, it seems to be pretty weak science. I struggle to reconcile the following results:
Computer Programmer: 48%
Software Developers System Software: 12%
Software Developers Applications: 4.2%
DBAs: 3%

I'm also bemused by the fact that 3 out of 4 of their graphs are ranked more to less automation on the x-axis, but one is reversed.

Automation vs doctors and lawyers

[sjbe]

Tell that to RocketLawyer.

Just because someone has digitized some routine legal forms and advice isn't evidence that lawyers will be replaced. I have no reasonable expectation that the vast majority of what most lawyers do is readily amenable to automation. If you think it is then I don't think you really understand what is involved in their job. Rocketlaywer reportedly has about $20 million in revenue. That is NOT a big company and they aren't the first to do this. We're not talking earth shattering stuff here.

Expert radiologists are routinely outperformed by pattern-recognition software

Not really true except in rather narrow circumstances. I've actually worked in radiology clinics doing some engineering work and spoken to some radiologists about this very topic. They use software to help identify suspicious growths and the software does a pretty good job and sometimes catches things the human misses. But it's used as a supplement to help the radiologist because the radiologist will see things that the software does not. Together (human plus computer) does better than either alone.

diagnosticians by simple computer questionnaires

The examples you are thinking of are controlled tests with narrow parameters. Not out in the real world in real practices. People lie on medical history questionnaires all the time. There are women who go in for mammograms who will lie about having breast implants when asked even though they will show up plain as day on the xray. People leave off vital medical history constantly and no questionnaire will get the answer right if you feed it bad data. Test requisitions by medical professionals routinely do not include important medical history or even accurate descriptions of what to look for. My wife is a pathologist and she routinely gets requests to look for something that the doctor isn't at all concerned about or with no medical history or description of the problem or with the site of the biopsy wrong or incomplete. These problems can be addressed but not by any technology you or I are likely to see anytime soon. Medical expert systems will be a significant aid to doctors in developing differential diagnoses but they will not replace doctors and you shouldn't expect or want them to.

Silicon Valley investor Vinod Khosla predicted that algorithms and machines would replace 80% of doctors within a generation.

Oh, well then it must be the truth because a venture capitalist said so. They've never been wrong before [/sarcasm]. I am close to certain that 80% of doctors will not be replaced by machines within the lifetime of anyone reading this. Doctors will be aided greatly by machines but the human body is incredibly complicated and much of what doctor's do isn't terribly easy to automate. Furthermore even supplementing doctors with machines would require vast improvements in medical record documentation in a lot of cases. I don't know if you've looked at medical records lately but most aren't computerized and even those that are are frankly quite a mess with loads of inaccurate information. Why? The people entering the data make a lot of mistakes, leave things out, etc. This problem isn't even close to being solved.

Automation

[sjbe]

Sure, if done right automation may replace a lot of what doctors do today.

Automation will supplement what they do but it will be more like accounting software boosting the productivity and accuracy of accountants. The problem isn't actually the medical treatment that desperately needs automation (though it can and does aid in places), it is the paperwork and support functions like billing. The paperwork burden in medical practice is immense and much of it is pointless paper shuffling by poorly paid clerical staff.

Radiology

[sjbe]

Radiologists are already on their way to being obsolete.

Ha! Radiologists are in no way, shape or form becoming obsolete. Technology is making them more effective but they aren't in any danger of disappearing.

Radiologists will be replaced by Chicken Sexers

I'm afraid not. There is a lot more to radiology than simply trained pattern matching. They've had software to do exactly what you describe for quite some time now and there is no danger that radiologists will disappear anytime soon.

Swipe left for compound fracture, swipe right for non-compound fracture.

Do you seriously think that medicine is nothing more than a process of matching wall paper? There are some problems that a pattern matching system can help with and in fact radiologists actually have been using such software for a long time now. I did some engineering work in a radiology clinic that was using software to help with diagnostics over a decade ago and the software was good enough to sometimes catch things the radiologists missed. Guess what? Radiologists are still with us and will be for the foreseeable future.

Turns out if you ask a lot of people a question the average ends up being correct.

No. What happens is that under the right circumstances the average ends up being correct more often than for an individual. It's called Wisdom of Crowds among other things. It works well with certain types of decision making and predictions, particularly those regarding human psychology. Stock prices are based in a collective opinion of what the price of a stock should be so it's not surprising that a crowd would be better at guessing an average opinion of a crowd than an individual. But this doesn't work for everything.

Re:Radiology

[0100010001010011]

What radiologists do today is not what radiologists will do in 20 years. As the pattern

Do you seriously think that medicine is nothing more than a process of matching wall paper?

Yes. My wife is a hospital internist and she says that 80% of her job could be done by someone with less education or automated. Doctors need to spend their time on the other 20%. DeepBlue/Watson is going to replace a large amount of what specialists do because it'll do it better and more accurately.

There will always be a niche for the human brain with 10+ years of post high school education but it won't be doing what doctors are doing now. It'

No doctors will not be replaced by machines

[sjbe]

The lion's share of MDs could be replaced by machines.

Not in your lifetime they couldn't. If you think otherwise you don't actually understand what they do. Doctors aren't just differential diagnosis engines. And even if they were a differential diagnosis (which is all a diagnostic computer can give you) will just give you a set of choices and probabilities. It won't give you a definitive answer because frequently there isn't one. The human body is far more complicated than any program we have access to and you need someone who can think through problems and more importantly deal with people. Computers can help but medicine isn't just about technology.

We tend to worship the ground they walk on in the United States but at the end of the day medicine is just a trade, no different than plumbers or electricians, and nurses do the bulk of the work in your typical medical practice.

Nurses do the routine work. You don't pay a doctor to do or diagnose the routine stuff though they certainly can do that. You pay them because they will catch the unusual stuff that a nurse would miss. Doctors are specialists of a sort. If you want to take your trade analogy you could hire a general handyman to work on your plumbing but if it is anything difficult or complicated you probably want someone looking at it who is better educated on the problem at hand. You don't pay a surgeon big $ to do a routine procedure. You pay a surgeon big $ to be there in case something unusual happens. When you code on the operating table the value of their time skyrockets. My wife is a pathologist specializing in skin. Dermatologists are allowed to read their own biopsies but most send the excisions to her or someone like her for a diagnosis because she will catch things they will almost certainly miss. Melanoma for example can mimic a variety of common benign problems which a nurse or even a general practitioner doctor might easily miss. Nurses can do a lot of the things doctors can do but when they run into something subtle or unusual then THAT is when you need a doctor.

Re:No doctors will not be replaced by machines

[NicBenjamin]

Keep telling yourself that.

Your wife's job is analyzing data. Given enough processing power and background data the computer will be both better at her job and cheaper. It will also be right there in the office so that they can immediately do what needs to be done, and not rely on their office manager types to get the patient back in for the bad/good news.

Now I doubt it'll happen in the next 5-10 years, but 15 years from now your wifve will be looking for a new line of work.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[blue9steel]

Additionally, it would require infinite energy and infinite speed (amount other things) to make anything resembling the federation viable - and we have neither, and won't be getting them in this universe.

Nonsense. You'd need enough energy & resources to provide everyone with an upper middle class lifestyle, enough automation that they don't particularly need to work unless they feel like it, a social system that can accommodate that sort of arrangement, and transportation system that is fast enough to get you to the outer reaches of your civilization in about a month. (that tends to be the rough limiter for the size of any stable political entity)

So for Earth, we've got the transportation problem solved, the automation is in process and will likely be complete before the end of the century, the resources exist, the main issues are energy and the social system. The energy problem will likely be solved by the time the automation problem is if society doesn't collapse first, it's the social system that's the real problem. So far we've failed to come up with any social system that could handle that sort of arrangement.

Humans are semi-rational, self & small group optimizers who seek status and that has significant issues when it comes to devising schemes for division of wealth. Because we're very mating driven and mating is based on status it's not enough for the high achievers to get "enough" to support a decent lifestyle, they need to acquire as many additional resources as possible in order to display signs of high worth and that sabotages our attempts to create an equitable division. This issue has brought down most of the top societies we've ever created and we still haven't come up with a solution.

Work expands to fit the time permitted

[sjbe]

What radiologists do today is not what radiologists will do in 20 years.

That is a VERY different statement than saying radiologists will be going bye-bye.

Yes. My wife is a hospital internist and she says that 80% of her job could be done by someone with less education or automated

You could say that about pretty much everyone's job. That doesn't mean it is economic to do it. I'm an accountant and an engineer myself. Most individual tasks I do could be done adequately by someone else with less education given a modest amount of training. But I don't have endless money to hire other people or purchase automation to do those tasks. Furthermore I actually create some of the automation to make me more effective myself but it doesn't reduce the amount of work. Even if I automate 80% of what I do I will still have 80% of the other tasks that I need to do that would be doable by someone else. The work expands to fit the time allowed. I have effectively an endless to-do list. I just only actually get to the stuff I can actually do in the time allowed.

DeepBlue/Watson is going to replace a large amount of what specialists do because it'll do it better and more accurately.

Not until a LOT of problems get solved that currently we are in no danger of solving. For something like Watson to be useful you have to be able to feed it accurate and useful data in an efficient manner. Medical records are currently in an almost comical state of disarray and are riddled with missing and bad information. Furthermore few medical records systems can talk to each other and there is no indication that will change in the near future. Furthermore what specialists do isn't simply being a differential diagnosis engine. If that were all they did we would have automated it with expert systems years ago. My wife is a pathologist and I can assure that Watson isn't going to replace her before she retires. Supplement maybe but certainly not replace most of what she does.

Payment without telecommunications cost

[tepples]

And in Europe, checks are not even used anymore.

In Europe, how do individuals pay other individuals through the post, as Captain Hook pointed out? And how do churches collect donations? Or is everybody expected to already be paying for a subscription to cellular Internet access in order to make or receive electronic payment?

Re:Payment without telecommunications cost

[david_thornley]

I would assume bank-to-bank transfers, and suspect there's fewer people there without bank accounts. Around here, it keeps getting more expensive to accept checks if one doesn't have a bank account, and I'd rather use cash in those circumstances.

Re:Payment without telecommunications cost

[angel'o'sphere]

The parent was wrong.

Ofc there are still checks in use, in some countries more than others. (E.g. France and UK)

how do individuals pay other individuals through the post
You don't. Why would anyone do that? You use a wire transfer. The only checks I ever get via mail are from my old landlord when he refunded excess utility costs (water/garbage): AND I HATE IT, as I have to go to the bank IN PERSON to draw them. When I don't draw a check fast enough he even calls me and insists that I do so soon :-/

And how do churches collect donations?
Cash or wire transfer. (And actually, are there really people giving donations to churches? Shudder!)

Re:Payment without telecommunications cost

[tepples]

how do individuals pay other individuals through the post

You don't. Why would anyone do that?

Attaching a gift of money to a birthday card, for one. And major banks in the United States have deployed ATMs that use handwriting recognition to allow depositing a check by inserting it into the ATM.

You use a wire transfer.

The bank doesn't charge anything to process a check. Here in the United States, "wire transfer" refers to services like Western Union, which charges a hefty percentage to process a wire transfer. Even if a bank offers a wire transfer for no fee, you still have to know your recipient's bank account number, and you still have to either "go to the bank IN PERSON" or subscribe to cellular Internet service to set one up.

And how do churches collect donations?

Cash

To obtain this, you "have to go to the bank IN PERSON".

And actually, are there really people giving donations to churches?

Yes. Some have a donation box near each of the auditorium's exits; this is the common practice for Jehovah's Witnesses. Others pass around a bag or tray into which members of the congregation drop cash or checks.

Re:Payment without telecommunications cost

[angel'o'sphere]

Attaching a gift of money to a birthday card, for one
Yes, and then the birth card and the money/check is gone as some post man just keeps it for himself. Same with cash.

No one in Europe is going to send checks/cash via mail, unless they are special checks that can only be cashed in by "the owner/the addressee" showing a passport.

Even if a bank offers a wire transfer for no fee, you still have to know your recipient's bank account number, and you still have to either "go to the bank IN PERSON" or subscribe to cellular Internet service to set one up.
No, you don't have to subscribe to a cellular internet service.
That is a pretty dumb assumption. Any internet service does it. And ofc you can mail the transfer order to the bank, so you have no need to go there in person, and ofc. that service is free for individuals.

Bottom line: payment habits are a cultural thing.

Some have a donation box near each of the auditorium's exits; this is the common practice for Jehovah's Witnesses. Others pass around a bag or tray into which members of the congregation drop cash or checks
Yes, I know. The point was: is actually someone putting money into that? I know no one who ever did, but anyway, I'm an Atheist, I'm only in the church if some get married or a child is baptized.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

And how do you expect the increasing number of people who won't have money from employment to pay for their health insurance? Countries that have public health care still finance it through taxation. Reducing working wages by working fewer hours doesn't pay the bills - ask all those people working just under the legal number of hours to be considered full-time.

Poe's Law Strikes Again

[Daetrin]

Given the last sentence i'm about 80% certain that this post is satirical in nature, and if so, well done!

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

You can't even get to the nearest star in one lifetime - how are you going to export the excess population to other planets? Humans are not semi-rational when it comes to devising schemes for division of wealth - just look at the US. Look how many people are STILL defending the over-breeding ignorant hypocritical Duggars, or anti-abortion and anti-contraceptive people.

And mating is not driven by status - otherwise rape wouldn't exist. And how many people engage in a one-night drunken hookup and the next morning go "Oh my $DIETY, I didn't really f*ck that, did I?"

Mating is driven by testosterone - just look at how many guys get caught literally f*cking the dog, or even screwing a porcupine.

Paper bank-to-bank transfer instrument

[tepples]

I would assume bank-to-bank transfers

A check is a paper bank-to-bank transfer instrument. You write an order for a bank-to-bank transfer on a piece of paper, you give the order to someone, and she takes that order to her bank and executes the transfer.

For those interested

[KapUSMC]

I don't know how many read this (probably not many, came from a link, from a link in the automated semi article last month). Its a study from Oxford where they went through the various industries, and the results were pretty scary. http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.... From the summary, since I know 98% won't RTFA: "We distinguish between high, medium and low risk occupations, depending on their probability of computerisation. We make no attempt to estimate the number of jobs that will actually be automated, and focus on potential job automatability over some unspecified number of years. According to our estimates around 47 percent of total US employment is in the high risk category. We refer to these as jobs at risk – i.e. jobs we expect could be automated relatively soon, perhaps over the next decade or two."

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[blue9steel]

You can't even get to the nearest star in one lifetime - how are you going to export the excess population to other planets?

I'm not even sure why you brought that up, but if exporting population were the goal there is plenty of closer real estate in our own solar system. Prior to the development of cheap mass transit to orbit though it's not really an option in either case. Call back when you have a space elevator or cheap fusion rockets.

Humans are not semi-rational when it comes to devising schemes for division of wealth

After which you point to a number of non-rational choices making my point for me.

And mating is not driven by status - otherwise rape wouldn't exist.

Rape is an attempt to breed with someone you don't have the status to get consensually. (or the result of serious psychological problems of course)

And how many people engage in a one-night drunken hookup and the next morning go "Oh my $DIETY, I didn't really f*ck that, did I?"

Thus demonstrating that humans often have short time orientation. I can guarantee that they hooked up with the highest status person they could within that time window though. (Note: displays of high status for men and women are not the same)

Mating is driven by testosterone

Desire is yes, opportunities, no.

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[BarbaraHudson]

You claimed that humans make semi-rational choices. I pointed out that they do not - they make totally irrational choices. I did not "make your point" as you wrongfully claimed.

Your interpretation of rape is lacking ..., to say the least.

Humans over-breed - and we can't export them anywhere else any more, like they did 100s of years ago when much of the world was still unknown. So, where are you going to put 19 billion people?

Pay to the order of

[tepples]

No one in Europe is going to send checks/cash via mail, unless they are special checks that can only be cashed in by "the owner/the addressee" showing a passport.

Checks have a "PAY TO THE ORDER OF" field naming the addressee. The bank matches the name against the ID presented by the person presenting the check or against the name of the owner of the account associated with the deposit slip or ATM card.

Any internet service does it.

That's fine when you're at home. But checks work even where there is no Wi-Fi, and even if you aren't carrying a tablet or laptop.

And ofc you can mail the transfer order to the bank, so you have no need to go there in person

U.S. banks take check deposits the same way.

Bottom line: payment habits are a cultural thing.

Agreed 100 percent. Checks happen to be the most convenient payment method in certain circumstances in the United States. It's just that there's a perception among certain experienced Internet users that the U.S. culture is inherently "backward" in this respect.

but anyway, I'm an Atheist

I guess my experience is colored by the Catholic, evangelical, and JW groups I grew up in at various parts of my life. Substitute any other charity that takes donations in person.

Every Corporation is Pyramid scam in Globalization

[NewYork]

Unlike Capitalism, Globalization is Zero-sum WITHOUT http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B...

Re:Basic income / maybe make full time 32-30 hours

[blue9steel]

You claimed that humans make semi-rational choices. I pointed out that they do not - they make totally irrational choices.

If humans were completely irrational civilization would be impossible. The evidence suggests that your theory is incorrect.

So, where are you going to put 19 billion people?

There aren't going to be 19 billion people, current best projections puts us topping out at around 10.1 Billion or so by the end of the century. Rising standards of living lower birth rates. All of the developed countries have negative population growth if you ignore immigration. Don't get me wrong, that's still a heck of a lot of people and it's going to put a big strain on the system but it's not a malthusian disaster.