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Are Gates, Musk Being 'Too Aggressive' With AI Concerns? (xconomy.com)

gthuang88 reports on a talk titled "Will Robots Eat Your Job?" Bill Gates and Elon Musk are sounding the alarm "too aggressively" over artificial intelligence's potential negative consequences for society, says MIT professor Erik Brynjolfsson. The co-author of The Second Machine Age argues it will take at least 30 to 50 years for robots and software to eliminate the need for human laborers. In the meantime, he says, we should be investing in education so that people are prepared for the jobs of the future, and are focused on where they still have an advantage over machines -- creativity, empathy, leadership, and teamwork.
The professor acknowledges "there are some legitimate concerns" about robots taking jobs away from humans, but "I don't think it's a problem we have to face today... It can be counterproductive to overestimate what machines can do right now." Eventually humankind will reach a world where robots do practically everything, the professor believes, but with a universal basic income this could simply leave us humans with more leisure time.

196 of 311 comments (clear)

  1. Weaponization is *the point* of AI by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    So making your silly lists of rules means nothing.

    1. Re: Weaponization is *the point* of AI by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

      go back to /pol/

    2. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Restrictions on weaponization of AI simply means that the least ethical will get there first.

      Also, past predictions that particular breakthroughs are "30 to 50 years away" have often been wildly inaccurate. "Experts" are often the worst predictors, since being in the trenches doesn't always help you see what is on the horizon.

      Once AI is advanced enough to participate in its own improvement, that improvement can advance at an exponential rate. We may go from "not even close" to "too late to stop it" faster than we realize.

    3. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by rtb61 · · Score: 1

      The most likely outcome for an AI, apart from undesirable energy outcomes (an AI would run a peak nearly all of the time, either idle potential calculations or actual required calculations, no idle for an AI), is a digital fugue, where it simply gets locked into logic loops and produces nothing much what so ever, except random stuff running at full, other stuff pointlessly looping or stuff shut down. The idea of an AI running intelligently amok is pretty much fantasy, pointlessly shut down and locked up is far more realistic. The only other thing is doing the wrong thing because, quite simply it has been programmed to do the wrong thing, whether by accident or on purposeful, this would be a functional error, rather than an AI run amok thing.

      What they really want the AI for, is to spy on everyone all of them time, except them of course, them it keeps private and secure so that they can lie, cheat, steal and kill. Everyone else gets the spy, don't like your politics, the AI reports on it and they kill your carreer, cripple your credit rating and define you as a potential terrorist ie the AI is there to monitor you so shut the fuck up or else. So an AI spy to report on your activity, is the only AI, they are actually after. So basically George Orwell's 1984 is here already in the guise of M$ Windows anal probe 10 and make no mistake, it fits only monitoring, report and compulsory messaging requirements, Windows 10 is George Orwell's 1984 in real life. All they need it the AI to monitor you 24/7/365 whether directly via mobile or in transit by every other fixed system you pass through as you move about, to report on you for bad digital thoughts and that is just a configuration change, the hardware and software are there now and they have been set up to achieve that.

      --
      Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
    4. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by currently_awake · · Score: 2

      The biggest problem with AI is the people calling the shots are the rich and powerful, and people don't get rich and powerful by having strong morals. Having sociopaths program our economy to further their goals is not in the best interest of society.

    5. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by currently_awake · · Score: 1

      Or they could build their perfect world, surrounded entirely by robot workers and sexy android entertainers. An entire country with only 1 human.

    6. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > Restrictions on weaponization of [...] simply means that the least ethical will get there first.

      History has tauhght us that... with nuclear bombs.

      Oh, wait.

    7. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      I would expect instead that the field of AI advances as the investigators figure out better algorithms, and not because the work of the machine.

      I think you are missing the point. Once AI reaches a certain point, the machine is the one improving the algorithm.

    8. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by lucien86 · · Score: 1

      "Once AI is advanced enough to participate in its own improvement, that improvement can advance at an exponential rate."

      I am an expert in this field and this exponential thing is just not true. There are exponential factors in Strong AI but they face the other way, so as intelligence increases it becomes exponentially more difficult to increase it further. Look at nature, a human brain has something like a million times the volume of an insect brain - but the average human is at most only about 100 times smarter than an insect. In consciousness based systems sentience is a real time process, and 'process coherence' puts a heavy limit on total intelligence and abilities. If coherence breaks down then the whole thing crashes, so the more you try to squeeze in the more unstable and closer to crashing the whole system gets.
      You cant simply throw more processing power at it because the coherence/complexity limit rises in a way that doesn't allow direct scaling. The total processing power needs of a strong AI might be roughly similar to a high end PC but about 90% of that is in the interface or memory thrashing logic. The actual machine core will most of the time only use a small fraction of the cycles available to it.

      --
      Below the speed of light Special Relativity is one of the most accurate theories in physics - above the speed of light..
    9. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by LifesABeach · · Score: 1

      Maybe one can by pass the middle man like Google, et.al. and sell A.I. to the money generators like the person down the road? It's a numbers game, 350 million verses 5?

    10. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by syntotic · · Score: 1

      Oh, INCIDENTALLY, do you want AI, TRULY? Then... you are expecting a quantity and level of ERRORS comparable to HUMANS, to Human EFFICIENCY! What we want is no error applications, COMPUTING processes, not error prone ones... Paradoxical, ironic, sarcastic, tragic, dramatic and melodramatic at the same time, if not also comical and tragi-comical issue...

    11. Re:Weaponization is *the point* of AI by lucien86 · · Score: 1

      Unfortunately there's virtually zero interest in the real thing. Strong AI still has a 10 to 20 year lead time and is a seriously high risk project which together are enough to put almost anybody off. If I was in America I might be able to get some money from someone like DARPA or NASA but the UK equivalents .. barely exist.

      --
      Below the speed of light Special Relativity is one of the most accurate theories in physics - above the speed of light..
  2. "people are prepared for the jobs of the future" by turkeydance · · Score: 1, Troll

    what jobs? Trump might "bring the jobs back", but robots will fill them.

  3. idle hands by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    just what our stupid species needs, more free time.

    1. Re:idle hands by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

      Who else is going to take care of the old people in developed countries and the new babies in the developing countries? The human population doubled twice in the 20th century but it won't even double once in the 21st century as the population peaks at 10B and declines to 6B by 2100.

    2. Re:idle hands by religionofpeas · · Score: 2

      Elderly care robots, of course.

    3. Re:idle hands by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Elderly care robots, of course.

      In Japan, sure. US of A, unlikely.

    4. Re:idle hands by olegalexandrov · · Score: 2

      Who else is going to take care of the old people in developed countries and the new babies in the developing countries?

      Who will take care of elderly robots though? But this is all irrelevant. Where is my fembot?

    5. Re:idle hands by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

      I'm tired of being held to account for lazy shitheads who bought into the FDR mantra of eternal vacation.

      We had 19 workers for every retiree and an average life expectancy of 65 years in the 1930's. So the "eternal vacation" back then was less than five years. Fast forward to 2030 when all the baby boomers are retired, we have two workers for every retiree and most people are outliving their retirement funds by 20 to 50 years.

      There is always work for people who want to work.

      My late father worked every day until the last six weeks when he had terminal cancer. He helped a neighbor avoid county dump fees by disassembling old pallets and vending machines for the wood and metals. He cleaned up the wood to give another neighbor to build chicken coops for sale. When it came time to recycle the metals, he gave rides in his truck to neighbors who also had recyclable materials to turn in. He typically made $50 per month from turning in metals.

  4. Re:"people are prepared for the jobs of the future by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    what jobs? Trump might "bring the jobs back", but robots will fill them.

    Then what's the point of immigration? Why open borders to allow an influx of economic immigrants and refugees from war-torn countries if, as it generally seems to be the consensus of the intelligentsia, robots will replace any possible jobs available to them in just 50 or so years from now?

  5. I think he's right by Skuld-Chan · · Score: 1

    Because we have zero safety nets for these people (but then we had zero safety nets for the last big change too and that didn't stop anyone).

  6. When robots can do everything... by Baron_Yam · · Score: 4, Interesting

    There will be no need for those who control the resources to share them with those who don't. And it's not like there will even be a job as a 'resource guard', because that'll be a robot, too.

    AI isn't going to bring a paradise of passive couch potatoes and inspired creators freed from restrictive toil, it's going to make 99.9% of the population not only unnecessary, but an impediment to the 0.1%.

    He who owns the first factory producing robots with a human-level general-purpose AI will have the opportunity to rule the world.

    1. Re:When robots can do everything... by religionofpeas · · Score: 4, Funny

      it's going to make 99.9% of the population not only unnecessary, but an impediment to the 0.1%.

      They may be able to get jobs as batteries.

    2. Re:When robots can do everything... by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

      99.9% of the population not only unnecessary

      Necessary for what? 100% of the population is unnecessary. Get over yourself.`

    3. Re:When robots can do everything... by strikethree · · Score: 1

      He who owns the first factory producing robots with a human-level general-purpose AI will have the opportunity to rule the world.

      Being alone in a world full of AI robots sounds pretty terrible. Better to die with the rest of the populace.

      --
      "Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
    4. Re:When robots can do everything... by OneoFamillion · · Score: 1

      There's no spoon, man!

  7. Complete Elimination is setting the bar too high. by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 3, Informative

    Between 1970 and 2000, manufacturing employment was relatively stable, ranging from 16.8 to 19.6 million when it peaked and began to decline\, falling to roughly 12 million jobs by 2010.

    Meanwhile U.S. manufacturing output (in trillions of dollars) is higher than it's ever been. It's up 33% to 4 trillion now vs 3 trillion back in only 2009. (or 2006 if you ignore the dip due to the great recession).

    Meanwhile, manufacturing robot shipments have skyrocketed from a low of 5,000 per year in 1996 to over 140,000 per year just recently (against a background of 240,000 shipped globally each year).

    So despite a growing GDP and population, manufacturing employment has declined by over 7 million jobs.

    Automated vehicles are likely to eliminate 3 million driving jobs rapidly at some point in the near future as well (5-15 years).

    Any kind of a labor glut (even a small one) results in severe downward pressure on wages.

    Will it be a problem forever? Who knows.

    It might be because half the population isn't smart enough to do theorhetical physics or higher level mathematics or create artistic masterpieces. And they would need to bring something to a job which couldn't be automated or turned into self service.

    But even if things worked out long term and we found new jobs 40 years from now, humans don't remain peaceful on that time scale. High unemployment is a strong predictor of civil unrest.

    The point is, we don't need to eliminate human jobs to have a problem. Eliminating a small number (say 10%) of them rapidly would create severe social disruptions.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  8. The FUTURE! by JBMcB · · Score: 4, Insightful

    First, steam engines were going to kill off everyone's job. Then it was power tools. Then cars. Then computers. Cassette tapes were going to kill the music market. VHS was going to kill movies and TV.

    People always think the next advance is going to make humans obsolete and there will be no jobs left. There won't be old jobs, there will be new kinds of jobs. If you can figure out what those jobs will be you'll be a very rich person.

    --
    My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
    1. Re:The FUTURE! by toastjam · · Score: 3, Insightful

      There will be new jobs, but there won't be nearly enough of them to replace the ones that are going away. The thing is we're not just replacing people's bodies with better tools and technology, allowing them to be productive in different ways -- we're replacing their minds. The niche where humans will continue excel vs an expert system that could take only a few days to train is going to keep getting smaller and smaller.

    2. Re:The FUTURE! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Well, as technology displaces old jobs, admittedly new jobs do get created. Let's look at the creative industries: music, art, film, literature, publishing, journalism. The Internet has decimated those industries, which used to rely on sales of media that weren't easily copied like print, film, and vinyl/CDs. And it's not like the quality has improved; consumers are merely accustomed to inferior quality (particularly for pop music and journalism), because the market won't support the kind of payrolls that went into creating the goods of the pre-Internet era.

      Sure, there are some new creative jobs, such as graphic designers and video game creators. Those employment numbers are quite small in comparison.

    3. Re:The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Were steam engines created with the sole purpose of replacing human labor? Nope.
      What about power tools, cars and computers? Nope, nope, nope.
      Automation? YEP. And there's a bonus. Companies can get any kind of remaining labor from overseas now easier than they ever could before.
      I have seen so many people say new jobs will be created, but no one gives any examples. If you think the average McDonalds restaurant is going to let go of 20 people and then require 20 automation engineers per site you're dreaming. The whole point of automation is to prevent companies from requiring labor. Any business anyone wants to create that requires labor will not be competitive enough to make it.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    4. Re:The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1, Insightful

      I'd disagree with pretty much everything on your list. Pretty much every inventions purpose was to make something easier to do. As something becomes easier to do it reduces its labour demand.

      Once things are created they are refined to fit new purposes. But the initial invention is meant to reduce human labour.

      Power tools? Absolutely. A power saw does the work of 10 men with hand saws. Steam Engines? Again absolutely. It replaces horses, which reduced the demand for a whole swath of jobs. Mining and someone to shovel coal was no where near as labour intensive as horse care, control, breeding, and waste removal. Same comment for cars.

      Automating is great for repetitive tasks. Where location is static. ie things like manufacturing. What it's not good at is anything highly mobile, complex or something that requires creative reasoning.

      Sure the number of manufacturing jobs have decreased in the US. But the US has added an average of about 100k jobs a month, every month back to the 50s. This is despite the number of manufacturing jobs declining. http://www.tradingeconomics.co...

    5. Re:The FUTURE! by Kjella · · Score: 1

      Were steam engines created with the sole purpose of replacing human labor? Nope. What about power tools, cars and computers? Nope, nope, nope. Automation? YEP.

      Does it matter if it was the sole reason, when in fact it made lots of workers redundant? Besides, one of the big reasons for automation is consistency in processes much like the assembly line did for manufacturing, the printing press did for copying text and so on. Hand made cars weren't just labor intensive but they were also much more individual with parts tweaked to work together. For example while Uber treats their drivers shitty, they treat all their drivers equally shitty. You're not playing favorites as is so often the case in office politics.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    6. Re: The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

      When the gasoline powered carriage replaced horses the only thing they were meant to replace was horses. They were designed to augmemt humans not replace them. Back then, companies embraced the things that humans could do for them and in fact automobiles employed more people than horse carriages because companies realized they needed people to make money. This is very different to how a business plans to use automation.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    7. Re:The FUTURE! by Baron_Yam · · Score: 2

      >The niche where humans will continue excel vs an expert system that could take only a few days to train is going to keep getting smaller and smaller.

      You only need to train an expert system once... then you can clone it as many times as you need. It's just a decision tree, after all.

      AI is a whole other matter - it may be more practical to train intelligent hardware once its base programming is burned in than to attempt to install a copy of a completed AI. We don't know that yet, but it's a possibility.

      I do believe, however, that if we can build an artificial mind we'll be able to build one that runs faster, and it'll certainly be easier to interface with it. Plugging it into a sim and overclocking the hell out of it might get you 20 years of experience in 20 days.

      If we ever build AI, it'll be interesting, but also scary because the dawn of true AI is our dusk. The best we might do is build artificial limitations into it so we can continue to feel useful.

    8. Re:The FUTURE! by rickb928 · · Score: 2

      What? Music, art, film, literature, publishing, journalism, all have exploded via the Internet. it's just that the Internet has disintermediated these markets. Incumbents unable to adjust have suffered.

      Others have done very well indeed.

      --
      deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
    9. Re: The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      To put it another way, automobiles were about the same number of people doing more work. On the contrary, automation is about a lot less people doing the same amount of work.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    10. Re:The FUTURE! by toastjam · · Score: 1

      Automating is great for repetitive tasks. Where location is static. ie things like manufacturing. What it's not good at is anything highly mobile, complex or something that requires creative reasoning.

      This is line of thinking is becoming outdated. Deep and reinforcement learning is rapidly enabling robots to adapt to more and more dynamic situations.

      Creative reasoning will take a while longer, but it will happen eventually as well.

    11. Re:The FUTURE! by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

      There will be new jobs, but there won't be nearly enough of them to replace the ones that are going away.

      People said the same thing about the steam engine, power tools, cars, computers, etc.

    12. Re:The FUTURE! by sdinfoserv · · Score: 1

      Absolutely true.... however, what happens when 50% of the work force no longer has jobs? There's no dollars in the hands of the workers to spend on goods, services (or food) that the wealthy are busy automating?
      Crash, that what happens. The great depression happened 25% of available people had no money. you think the Government will step in the add more hand outs? Nope, with 50% unemployment, there's not tax revenue to push back out and the politicians and Government workers will be busy protecting their wages and pensions first.

    13. Re:The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      Can you give me an example?

      I have yet to see robots outside of repetitive tasks.

    14. Re:The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      For a start they aren't here yet. Secondly they will be expensive when first released. So it will take a period of time for the capital invested in human driven fleets is used enough to warrant the purchase of the self driving vehicle.

      But then seriously. Which jobs are truly at risk? Taxis. I'll give you that one. Long distance freight as well. But couriers? Nope. They just won't be driving any more. They will be the final 50m runner. Short haul freight? Nope, same a couriers.

      Realistically what will happen is that self driving vehicles will reduce the cost of taxis and long haul freight. This will have the impact of increasing the number of taxi journeys taken as the reduced costs of travel increase the demand for that type of travel. Cheaper long haul freight will lower the price of postage. Which will have the effect of increasing the numbers of good ordered, potentially at the same time decreasing the average value of each parcel. This will increase the demand on final mile couriers, hence increasing work loads and jobs there.

    15. Re: The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

      From a business point of view these are two very different things When the American economy was young and not quite so saturated with large corporations it wasn't so important how many people you had working for you because you knew more people meant more growth and you always had growth space in your market. So the people you had you needed to do more with in order to profit. Today businesses find that there isn't as much space to grow in their respective industries. How much more Coca-Cola can people really drink and how many different soda flavors can there really be? Yet these corporations still have to make more and more money every year for their shareholders. So they look to do the same amount of work with less people. Some are even to the point that they are operating on an outdated model, like cable providers, but governments are protecting them with bailouts and regulation. Netflix is succeeding but look how tied their hands are by geographical limits and such.

      It's the difference between increasing profits by expanding output, and increasing profits by cannibalizing everything inside the corporation. Now that we are into the latter phase and they have AI and cheap overseas labor available to do it with, humans are on the chopping block more than ever before and we haven't even begun to see the beginning of it.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    16. Re:The FUTURE! by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      They did, and they were right then, but that doesn't mean they'll be right this time.

      We're approaching the stage where AI can do not only the jobs we're currently doing better than we can, but also any possible other future jobs that we might be able to invent. That one point makes AI very, very different from the steam engine, power tools, cars, or computers.

    17. Re:The FUTURE! by currently_awake · · Score: 1

      All cost is derived from human labour. No labour means everything is free to make. This means a few minutes uploading cat vids could be sufficient to pay the rent and buy food. Provided the AI doesn't evolve a desire to get paid for its work that is.

    18. Re: The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 2

      You seem to write it off, but between fast food servers and truck drivers, that's 10 million jobs alone that we never get back. Fast food is especially concerning since that is where a lot of less privileged students get money for an education. What other jobs are at risk of being lost? Middle management, accountants, receptionists and clerical staff, programmers, bus drivers, and pilots off the top of my head. I'm sure I'll think of a lot more after I hit submit. It is a known fact that large American corporations are having trouble finding growth areas. Sure there are emerging markets but there is also a lot of competition to take advantage of them.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    19. Re:The FUTURE! by crimson+tsunami · · Score: 1

      And buggy whip makers had yet to see a car, until they did.

    20. Re:The FUTURE! by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      Take a look at this video.

      And as for creative reasoning, I saw this recently. It's an AI neural network that can color images based on a few hand-drawn squiggles of hints. Okay, so coloring isn't reasoning, but it's creative and that thing does a better job at it than I could. And it exists now and you can play with it yourself over here.

    21. Re: The FUTURE! by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

      I'm not seeing drone delivery stuff anytime soon unless there is a crazy break through in batteries (my quad copters last 2 minutes atm). Someone making your burgers? Maybe. I feel that would require a huge investment of capital at the moment, and dexterity that I haven't seen in robotics.

      Delivery drones are already happening, even 7 fucking 11 are in on the act, obviously they have better batteries than your piece of shit drone. And you don't think robots, that make cars, clothes and everything else under the sun don't have the dexterity to make a burger? You do know were not talking about Robbie the Robots here.

      --
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    22. Re: The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      I guess thats the thing. I don't see middle management, accountants, receptionist or clerical staff going anywhere any time soon. I also don't see the fast food workers going anywhere in the next 20 years. Of course I could be totally wrong in which case there will be massive economic collapse. But I just don't see it.

    23. Re: The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      Chemistry doesn't care whether you think my quads are shit or not. There simply aren't currently any batteries that allow the kind of current draw necessary for extended multirotor flight carrying anything other than the smallest of payloads.

      You also clearly have never worked with any kind of robotics system. Dexterity was perhaps the wrong word. Flexibility of purpose then. When a robot system is used to manufacture cars EVERYTHING is identical. Everything is in the same place, every time. The system is able to handle small variations in position but thats about it. Clothing, cars, everything manufactured, is a process where assembly is reduced to the simplest repeatable movements.

      As for fast food. Have you ever seen the processes that are in place to manufacture food items? They have entire buildings dedicated to making 1 single item. To replace fast food servers you are talking about some kind of flexible robot system that is capable of handling variable inputs to output a variable product. Sure you might be able the automate the assembly of a simple burger, but the cost of that system would be insane. And we are generations away from the autonomous harvester dumping lettuces into the self drive truck and dumped into the hopper at McAutoBurger.

    24. Re:The FUTURE! by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Sure the number of manufacturing jobs have decreased in the US. But the US has added an average of about 100k jobs a month, every month back to the 50s.

      Yes, mostly service jobs, and increasingly they are minimum wage jobs. That wouldn't be so bad, except the average minimum wage earner is trying to support a family; and though the idea of the minimum wage was that it would pay enough to do that, the minimum wage hasn't kept up with inflation in over twenty years. One million jobs (and then some) were created during Obama's time as president, but the number of people seeking full-time employment did not change. That means that the majority of those new jobs don't pay a living wage.

      This is despite the number of manufacturing jobs declining.

      Yes, those are jobs with pensions upon which you can live. Of course they are declining. I hear there are still some positions open for burger flippers, though.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    25. Re: The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      Well part of that I can agree with. If I look where they are with AI now it seems pretty abysmal and will take years. I have yet to see any driving AI that doesn't make absolutely comical errors like going the wrong way down a one way and being unable to fix the mistake like a human can. Yet a a lot of people here seem to think there is a huge breakthrough just around the corner so maybe there is. Also a couple fast food ceos have already said publicly that they are automating.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    26. Re: The FUTURE! by tehcyder · · Score: 1

      I don't see middle management, accountants, receptionist or clerical staff going anywhere any time soon.

      That is primarily because the claims about AI/human equivalent robots are so ridiculously inflated. If we were anywhere close to it, virtually all current jobs would soon disappear, leaving a few poets and musicians able to do something only humans could.

      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    27. Re: The FUTURE! by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

      All the people using drones to fly cameras and other things around might disagree with you on the battery life, yeah flight times are relative to weight carried but we're talking last mile, from the auto delivery car to the actual drop point and back not cross country flights. A small quad copter might only do a couple minutes but a fire scout can do 8 hours. Obviously there's a massive difference between those two things but they're both drones.

      Here's your fast food mcrobo kitchen using todays tech.

      A conveyor belt going past multiple single function arms that either do or do not do their thing dependent on the order. First one flaps the bottom of the bun down, second grabs and cooks the burger in its heated gripper hand whatever (standard mcds burger cooks in like 9 seconds or something, third adds dressing as required, fourth squirts some source, fifth tops the bun then one to move the completed burger to the tray. A scooper arm for the fries, the drinks only really needs one arm to move a cup in place, hold it and then place it down. Then maybe one person to give it to the customer but that could be done with another arm. You haven't "needed" a person to take money and give change for a long time. You seem to overstate the complexity of your average fast food kitchen. In a proper restaurant it's not going to be nearly as easy but mcds/ burger king whatever basically are an assembly line and you only really have very few choices. You could basically automate the whole thing today if it was cost effective and you could fit it into a reasonable footprint. Obstacles you rightly identify but it's possible is all I'm saying.

      What's your definition of soon? This week, 6 months, 5 years, 50 years?

      --
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    28. Re: The FUTURE! by quintus_horatius · · Score: 1

      When the gasoline powered carriage replaced horses the only thing they were meant to replace was horses.

      I disagree with this premise because it ignores too many things.

      Self-powered cars had two primary effects: they reduced the huge amount of effluvia that horses generated, and enabled a single person to cover more miles with more cargo in less time.

      By moving to self-powered cars, you need fewer

      • * horse handlers, such as veterinarians, stable hands, leather workers, etc
      • * waste haulers to clean up after the horses -- during the horse-and-buggy era city streets were awash in horse-generated efluvia, and they posed a significant environmental problem
      • * drivers, as a single driver (your "augmented person") can cover more distance with more cargo, in less time, than a team of horses can.

      The primary reason to move away from horses was expense, and the thing that makes horses expensive is paying for people. The move was entirely driven by a reduction in work force. The fact that a single person was augmented is what makes it cost-effective; the same principle applies now because a single person can operate an entire factory floor -- it's no different than before, a single person's abilities have been augmented by technology.

    29. Re:The FUTURE! by toastjam · · Score: 1

      Yes, but the rest of my comment addresses why this will likely not be the case in the future.

    30. Re:The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      I came to the conclusion further through that the level of the US minimum wage is a huge contributor to the problem. Sure increasing the minimum wage may incentivise the roll out of automation. But one of the other commentators gave a figure of the median salary for customer service workers, and it was less than the minimum salary in Australia.

      That said Australia doesn't have any form of tipping culture. And the costs of doing business here are higher, so its not in any way shape or form a perfect solution.

      Also all work in Australia has to contribute 9.5% of the cash component to a mandatory investment scheme which you cannot access until you are retired. How it is invested is entirely up to you. You just can't spend it until you retire. Even with that in mind the take home cash component of minimum wage here was higher than the median figure listed.

    31. Re:The FUTURE! by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Two problems.

      First, scarce resources are scarce. Just because making stuff is trivially cheap doesn't mean that everything is. Land, for example, can't be manufactured. Manufacturing robots will only exist in limited (if very large) quantities.

      Second, people have to have a way to get money. If gourmet-class meals for a family of four cost a dollar a year, and you're broke, you starve.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    32. Re: The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      Take the DJI Inspire 2 then. It's basically the top of the line prosumer camera drone. It's batteries are 4280mah lipos running 6S @ 22.8v. For that amount of power an unloaded Inspire will have a maximum flight time of 25 minutes. Max lift capacity on that inspire is about 3lbs, anything more than that and it becomes un-flyable.

      Next consideration is that a quad rotor has absolutely no redundancy, at all. A failure of a single component, from battery to esc to motor to flight controller will see it fall out of the sky. Given that there is no way that a 6lb (assuming loaded) quad will be allowed to fly over populated areas. So now you are needing a minimum of a hexcopter to give some redundancy, but you still need to base the carrying capacity on the quads specs. You would also need redundant flight controllers and navigation system which will add a small amount of extra weight (a pixihawk flight controller is only about 20g but wiring and housing probably brings that to 100g).

      I think then, given the extra weight and complexity of the system a max flight time of 10 minutes is reasonable assumption when carrying a load. Lets also assume a max loaded speed of 15kph (the inspires max speed unloaded is about 70kph in a straight line no altitude changes)

      Lets assume that the problems around navigation, power lines, trees, birds, kite strings, idiots with shotguns and the like are all solved and that there is some kind of system which means kids fingers don't do into props at delivery. If your autonomous car parks 500m from delivery point, 60 seconds to get to delivery point, 60 seconds to deliver, 60 seconds to land. I think those a probably optimistic but lets go with it. That means it can do a max of 3 deliveries, before battery is totally flat. The batteries can't really be charged any faster than 1c if you want them to have any kind of service life so you would need a large reserve of them. How many packages do you think fit in the back of a delivery van? 100? No idea but its a lot. So lets assume its 100. And lets spread the delivery timeline over 3 hours. That is 33 deliveries per hour, a minimum of 22 batteries are needed then to keep 1 drone aloft assuming your first batch of batteries are charged by the car and are online for the final hour.

      But this is the killer. The delivery capacity of the drone is low. Even if we assumed it was massively higher than currently an option and said 10lbs. Huge numbers of parcels exceed that weight. So they still need to be delivered directly. So the vehicle is already going to be close to the destination, with someone running back and forth carrying bigger parcels anyway. I just can't see the economic advantage of a massively difficult, expensive solution to pick up the part of the workload when a significant portion will still need to be done manually and the cost of extending the human to deliver the small parcels is low.

      As for the fast food. A simpler system would be a conveyor onto which a bun is placed and it passes under tubes that drop the layers on top. But here is the problem. A human can see that that piece of tomato looks gross. Or that that isn't onion, its chilli. This is far far far from being a solved problem with AI.

       

    33. Re:The FUTURE! by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      We're currently in an adjustment where lots of people lose their jobs and are looking for other ones. This, like all such adjustments, will take years or decades under the best of circumstances. Therefore, it doesn't matter if self-driving vehicles aren't ready for prime time now, as long as it will happen in the next five to ten years. Also, they aren't going to be expensive for long. My car can already do its own acceleration, braking, and steering, and it does keep track of things outside the car to provide adaptive cruise control, collision avoidance, and a warning that something is moving more or less behind me when backing up. It cost me something like $30K. It wouldn't take much more to make it autonomous.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    34. Re:The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      I guess I don't expect to see many self driving cars on the road in 10 years time. I expect there will start to be a few on the road at that stage, but I don't really expect to see many. And the current average age of cars on the road in the US is 11 years at the moment. So if they appear when I expect them to we won't see them being the norm for at least 20 years from today.

    35. Re: The FUTURE! by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

      Same reason you would buy a German car or a Japanese camera or a Korean TV or a French sparkling wine. Because not all things are equal.

    36. Re:The FUTURE! by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Expert system? How 1980s...

    37. Re:The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      That's why they created the global economy. So the wealthy wouldn't need to be inconvenienced by this inevitable crash. They can keep on peddling their wares and buying what they need by countries that haven't treated their citizens quite so well over the ages.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    38. Re:The FUTURE! by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

      What matters is the attitude of businesses to take on additional workers. At one time more profit required more people. As the inventions you mentioned arrived, it meant less and less. Automation is the death knell.

      --
      Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
    39. Re:The FUTURE! by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      All cost is derived from human labour.

      Nonsense.
      Cost is derived from supply and demand.
      If machine labor is cheaper than human labor, then it's tough tits for the human laborers.

    40. Re:The FUTURE! by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      But the US has added an average of about 100k jobs a month

      Yeah, and most of them involve the phrase "Do you want fries with that?"

  9. Well... by XSportSeeker · · Score: 2

    I don't think their quotes were "too aggressive"... weirdly enough, the professor pretty much said exactly what Gates and Musk said.
    But I definitely agree that it's still far away. I'd honestly say that 30 to 50 years is still extremely optimistic.
    Not only technology has to reach there, but then we'd be faced with cost and time to get all these robots with AI going for all sorts of jobs.

    If you think about it, all this diversity of jobs that robots are supposed to be stealing from us will be facing similar or even worse challenges as that of autonomous driving.
    Most countries won't be able to afford those types of technology, and it'll take years to set some standards.
    And then comes cultural, economic and other types of barriers. Sure, the US could go towards universal basic income and whatnot, but I can't see something like this alone being able to cope with consequences.

    Universal basic income is good and all, but with free time, leisure and this supposed surge in creativity also comes all sorts of problems that happen when you have a bunch of people with nothing else to do.

    1. Re:Well... by olegalexandrov · · Score: 1

      Universal basic income is good and all, but with free time, leisure and this supposed surge in creativity also comes all sorts of problems that happen when you have a bunch of people with nothing else to do.

      There have always been a largish (10%-30%) proportion of the population who are able adults but not holding a job. They don't just go rioting or drinking themselves to death. The hope is that more leisure and abundance will decrease conflicts and extreme ideology, which is at the source of many of today's problems.

    2. Re:Well... by swillden · · Score: 2

      I'd honestly say that 30 to 50 years is still extremely optimistic.

      I'd say we have no idea whatsoever how far away it is. We don't understand what intelligence is, we don't understand how much of it is actually required for various tasks, we don't know what hardware will be required to run a general intelligence. Perhaps quantum computing is an essential ingredient, perhaps it isn't. Maybe it's just a question of finding the right structure of self-referencing modules. Maybe self-awareness is crucial, maybe it's not. There's so much we don't know, and so much more that we don't know we don't know.

      We could make the crucial breakthrough to achieving fully general artificial intelligence next week (not likely... but not impossible -- it's even possible we made it two years ago and just haven't recognized it yet), or we could still be struggling with it in 200 years.

      However, what is very clear is that there are large classes of jobs which can be automated away using technology that exists right now. The premier example is driving. There are some four million professional truck drivers in the US, and probably 75% of their jobs could be eliminated with the self-driving tech we already have. Actually deploying it on a large scale will take a few years, but it's coming. In addition to the automatable jobs we can point to now, there are lots of others that we don't yet realize are automatable, because we're still learning what our existing AI tech can and can't do.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
    3. Re:Well... by strikethree · · Score: 1

      Universal basic income is good and all, but with free time, leisure and this supposed surge in creativity also comes all sorts of problems that happen when you have a bunch of people with nothing else to do.

      Eh? Reality says that "The Final Solution" will be implemented again. I am sure the technical details will change and if fought hard enough, the masses will be left alone to starve to death rather than "liquidated", but if there is one thing that is certain, there will be lots of pain and suffering followed by death. Soma? LOL, fuck you. You do not matter enough for Soma to be used.

      --
      "Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
  10. We are already there by Aaron+B+Lingwood · · Score: 1

    The only things holding back tech, including AI, are patents and laws. The funny thing is AI is unlikely to give a second thought about either as the consequences are meaningless.

    --
    [Rent This Space]
    1. Re:We are already there by Grand+Facade · · Score: 1

      Will an AI be able to land a plane on the Hudson?

      --
      Rick B.
  11. Solution to the Fermi Paradox? ASI by shanen · · Score: 1, Offtopic

    The Fermi Paradox is one of my favorite speculative topics and now I think the "solution" is that naturally evolved intelligence (like us) sometimes produces Artificial Super-Intelligence (ASI) before it goes away, and the ASIs don't have anything to say to us. I'd actually go farther and speculate on two types of ASIs, one type driven by curiosity (which would motivate them to study us) and the other type driven by efficiency (which would motivate them to ignore us unless they wanted our resources, in which case they would immediately destroy us). I used to speculate the second type would go all the way to Dyson spheres, even on a galactic level that might account for much of the missing matter, but I've dropped that speculation for now... I still speculate that the first type might be gambling quatloos on our surviving long enough to replace ourselves, and our odds are falling fast.

    Anyway, an interesting recent book I'd recommend on the topic is Our Final Invention by James Barrat. On the specific topic of automation in the Internet age, the only one that comes to mind just now is The Lights in the Tunnel by Martin Ford, which is older and kind of misdirected IMO. Now that I think about it from that perspective, How Google Works by Schmidt and Rosenberg also strikes me as relevant, but mostly because they are ignoring the non-google part of the universe. (My main conclusion from that book was actually that the golden google palace is full of clever programmers who are also shallow thinkers--and that's how they want it.)

    --
    Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
  12. People are stupid... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 2

    The problem with more education is that most people stop learning once they get out of high school or college. The educational system does a piss poor job in teaching people to become lifelong learners. Once people think they don't have anything more to learn because they left school behind it's very unlikely that will go back to school, enroll in a boot camp or get certifications. The days of doing the same kind of work for 50 years and collecting a gold watch is long over.

    1. Re:People are stupid... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      I worked in IT for 10 years, collected a novelty coffee mug for ten years of service, and then I was immediately fired for being over 30.

      Didn't anyone tell you that help desk support was a stepping stone into IT?

      Now I have no prospects because I'm over 30 with no social skills, and as you know, in the past decade IT has become a social industry for cocksucking clitlicking socializers like yourself.

      If you're going to make a career out of IT, you need to learn how to be an asshole.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_YaNGzplbE

    2. Re:People are stupid... by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      How about having the employer do the training like in ye olde times

      Bean counters declared training as an unnecessary expense that doesn't help the bottom line — or add to the CEO's compensation package.

  13. Re:Robots will do all the work... by fluffernutter · · Score: 1

    Except companies will never use machines that are anywhere near as expensive to operate. If the machines required that much work then it wouldn't make sense for a McDonalds to let go of their 20 employees because the machines would be just as costly to operate. The very reason we are talking about automation is because there is *vastly* less money that goes into the machines than goes into people.

    --
    Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
  14. The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 3, Insightful

    with a universal basic income

    Has he done the math as to how much that would cost?

    this could simply leave us humans with more leisure time.

    He has forgotten what bored young people do.

    --
    "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    1. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 1

      He has forgotten what bored young people do.

      Play videogames? Or shoot some hoops?

      Maybe that was just me.

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    2. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      Maybe that was just me.

      Personal anecdotes... gotta love them.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    3. Re:The professor is an idiot by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      He has forgotten what bored young people do.

      Growing pot and making pipe bombs were popular in the 1970's. I've missed out on that and got into computers in the 1980's.

    4. Re:The professor is an idiot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      "Has he done the math as to how much that would cost?"

      You realize that "cost" is a human construct, right? And that it is mostly about artificially limiting our capacity to feed, house, and clothe everyone?

      We have the technology, why are you a msianthrope?

      But I suppose to you, we can afford to bail out banks? Car manufacturers? We can finance the military endlessly?

      Steal a shirt, we'll stop you. Steal billions, we'll bail you out!

    5. Re:The professor is an idiot by olegalexandrov · · Score: 2

      with a universal basic income

      Has he done the math as to how much that would cost?

      Almost nothing, if the robots are doing almost everything.

    6. Re:The professor is an idiot by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

      Maybe. But my friends and I used to like blowing things up.

    7. Re:The professor is an idiot by ThomasBHardy · · Score: 1

      I haven't seen any actual numbers on how the supposed UBI would work. Any info out there?

      If you offer a basic income, some portion of the populace will drop off the employment rolls. I mean above and beyond those who already subsist on government programs today.

      If the premise of the professor is that we'd all be on UBI while corporate robots do the work, won't that essentially be a populace living on some level of standardized income and we're all paid by what... the government... who gets the money from what... corporate taxes as it's the last thing still working? And Corporations would be the only thing paying taxes anymore, and would control the government in a way that makes today look like nirvana. When corporations pay taxes and citizens do not, isn't that the next "taxation without representation" revolution after which only corporations get to vote and citizens do not?

      I am having a hard time seeing that vision being something that works.

      --
      Warning: Teh poster of this messaeg is lysdexic
    8. Re:The professor is an idiot by compro01 · · Score: 1
      --
      upon the advice of my lawyer, i have no sig at this time
    9. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      Have you?

      Yes, I have. It's pretty damned trivial... population x income = cost. According to http://www.deptofnumbers.com/i..., the per capita income in 2015 was $30,000.

      (330 * 10^6) * (30 * 10^3) = 9.9 * 10^12

      Just shy of 10 trillion dollars. The US budget in 2016 was one third of that: $3.5T.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    10. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      The employees were told exactly what to do, and they did it quite happily. It was a major relief actually, because the software told them precisely what to do step by step.

      ROFL.

      That would last about 1 day.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    11. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      Much of which will be paid for by taxes, since people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes. A lot of the rest of it will be covered by the money currently going into social security, and some of the remaining part will be paid by the savings in administration overhead of social security.

      So yes, the direct calculation of the yearly total amount of UBI that would get paid is trivial, but has very little to do with the much more important question of "how hard is it to do?". Presenting just the raw number (and especially comparing that to the current US budget!) is being either naive or deliberately misleading.

    12. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      Much of which will be paid for by taxes, since people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes.

      What percentage of people will work in this grand and glorious future?

      A lot of the rest of it will be covered by the money currently going into social security

      Complete. math. fail. If you think I'm wrong, demonstrate it with numbers instead of hand waving.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    13. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      I didn't say you were wrong, I said you were being either naive or deliberately misleading.

      For example, about half of people work, so that's half of it accounted for right there, and social security + related programs are something like $1.25tn which accounts for a quarter of the rest. Medical-related funding (Medicare et al) costs ~$1tn on top of that and would presumably be unnecessary if people could pay for healthcare from their UBI. So that's two thirds of the total amount accounted for already (if very approximately), yet the numbers you gave didn't mention any of that at all.

      And in fact, now that I look again, I notice that you use the per capita income, which includes things like CEOs that get paid millions of dollars per year. A UBI isn't going to pay wages like that; it's a universal basic income. That makes a massive difference. It should pay somewhere around enough for food and rent, which is something like $8k per household + $4k per person in the household, which would put a more appropriate UBI amount at closer to $12k/person which is $4tn in total, of which social security and Medicare et al would already account for over half before we even start considering the UBI that's given back by people who earn enough to do so.

      Those are very handwavy numbers, yes (a full analysis is way too involved to fit into a Slashdot comment), but you didn't even attempt to try, you just worked out the total income of the US and presented that as the cost of a UBI, and by comparing it to the current US budget you gave the impression that that would be the amount of money we'd have to find on top of the budget. That very much counts as either naive or deliberately misleading.

    14. Re:The professor is an idiot by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      What percentage of people will work in this grand and glorious future?

      Lots. Given the amount a UBI can be, most people would rather work and have more money. Some people would work for under what would be minimum wage, and some would find that their jobs went up considerably in pay.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    15. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      For example, about half of people work, so that's half of it accounted for right there

      What are all those children and retired people (the ones not in the workforce) supposed to account for?

      social security + related programs are something like $1.25tn which accounts for a quarter of the rest.

      $1.25tn is one quarter of $5tn. That's "the rest" of what?

      And in fact, now that I look again, I notice that you use the per capita income

      Of course. Reducing the standard of living is a complete non-starter.

      which includes things like CEOs that get paid millions of dollars per year.

      More utter math fail. Why? Because a CEO making $100M per year adds... thirty measly cents to PCI. Thirty cents.

      It should pay somewhere around enough for food and rent, which is something like $8k per household + $4k per person in the household,

      Keep all the unemployables at poverty wages, eh? (They poverty line in 2016 for a family of four is $24K. Guess what 8+4*4 is?)

      I'm due $30k/year from SS, and my wife at least $17k (more by the time she retires). It's a guaranteed fact that we won't be the only pissed off mofos if that's suddenly chopped back to $16k (8+4*2) in the name of UBI.

      by comparing it to the current US budget you gave the impression that that would be the amount of money we'd have to find on top of the budget.

      1) We'd still want an army, navy & air force, and roads, dams, etc.
      2) UBI isn't going to cut is as a Medicare/Medicaid replacement.

      https://www.nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    16. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      most people would rather work and have more money.

      1) How many jobs will there be?
      2) Does not take human nature into account. (What percentage of the populace will work really hard for a relatively small increase in their income, when they'd "earn" a "living wage" by sitting around, smoking dope and playing video games.)
      3) Does not take into account that the cost will always increase.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    17. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      "Maintain everybody's standard of living" is the non-starter. Like I said, it's a universal basic income. It's not supposed to let you live exactly the same as you do now without needing to work, it's meant to cover basic living costs so that don't have to worry about basic survival if you lose your job.

      That means that if you want to maintain your current standard of living with a UBI, and your current standard of living is higher that can be done on the UBI, then you'll have to work.

      (Note that I used the poverty line here as a rough guideline; maybe a UBI would be slightly or somewhat above that, but I doubt that twice as much would count as a basic income. Also, I may not have been very clear, but the UBI should be per person, so it would be $14k*2 = $28k in this example, regardless of whether you're living together or not. Yes that means people that live together will have more spare cash than people who are living separately, but that seems somewhat fair given that living together does save on resources.)

      Good point with handling existing guarantees from SS, I'm not sure how you'd handle a transition there.

      I'm not sure where you got the idea that we'd stop paying for the military or the roads in order to pay for UBI.

    18. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      In https://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=10206145&cid=53813103 you wrote, "Much of which will be paid for by taxes, since people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes".

      Why should a high school or college student try and make some extra cash by working a low-skill part time job 10 hours/week making $10/hour ($5-6k per year) when -- according to you -- it would be taxed 100%?

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    19. Re:The professor is an idiot by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      How many jobs will there be?

      That's difficult to answer, and depends on what gets automated away. There will likely be a very limited number of jobs for the unskilled, but AI isn't going to take over high-creativity fields any time soon.

      What percentage of the population will work really hard for a relatively small increase in their income?

      Wrong question. With UBI in place, if you want someone to work really hard or perform an icky or dangerous job, you won't rely on peons taking your jobs rather than starving. You'll have to pay enough to make it worthwhile for someone. If it turns out that's not economical for you, deal with it. You don't have a right to force people to work for you.

      Does not take into account that the cost will always increase.

      Does not take into account that productivity will always increase.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    20. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      You'll have to pay enough to make it worthwhile for someone. If it turns out that's not economical for you, deal with it. You don't have a right to force people to work for you.

      The unintended consequence of that being... more automation, and less work for ambitious but low skilled people.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    21. Re:The professor is an idiot by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      Or shoot some cops?

      FTFY.

    22. Re:The professor is an idiot by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      Has he done the math as to how much that would cost?
      Almost nothing, if the robots are doing almost everything.

      Except somebody (probably rich) owns those robots and is paying for their upkeep.
      Why would they use their robots to benefit you if they don't have to?

    23. Re:The professor is an idiot by werepants · · Score: 1

      Has he done the math as to how much that would cost?

      Have you? I crunched the numbers based on the public tax info from the IRS, and when you consider the ~$1T of welfare and social security that would be saved (and the fact that many agencies worth of paper-shuffling bureaucrats would no longer be needed to administer social aid programs) you only have to increase marginal tax rates by a few percent to break even with a UBI of $12k-$18k. Seriously, any slashdotting nerd should be able to put together a spreadsheet and see for themselves.

    24. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      It all depends on how much the UBI will be. I'm old enough to highly skeptical that it'll be as low as you $18k.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    25. Re:The professor is an idiot by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      There's going to be more and more automation no matter what. As far as ambitious people go, they can acquire skills. Ambitious people don't want to stay where they are, and want to get the skills and contacts and stuff to succeed in a place they like better. As long as there's a path to acquire skills, what's the problem?

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    26. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      they can acquire skills.

      As long as there's a path to acquire skills, what's the problem?

      You can't be so stupid as to think that ambitious but low skilled people don't want (and sometimes need) to earn money before they've learned those skills (all of which take time to develop).

      But maybe you are.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    27. Re:The professor is an idiot by werepants · · Score: 1

      UBI isn't supposed to replace a well-paying job - it's supposed to keep people off the street. It's supposed to function as a basic safety net that meets basic needs, yet incentivizes people to work if they want any kind of disposable income to play with.

      A fair number of libertarians actually support the UBI idea, because if it exists, all sorts of other nice things fall into play and render regulations unnecessary - with a UBI in place, most arguments for a minimum wage disappear, for instance.

    28. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      You'd structure the taxes so that wouldn't happen. One way of doing that is a flat x% tax on income, so that working always gets you more money than not working does.

    29. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      The older I get, the more I realize that libertarianism is just as Utopian as socialism and communism.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    30. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      First you say "people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes", and then you handwave it away.

      This is why Big Social Ideas are almost always Bad Social Ideas.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    31. Re:The professor is an idiot by werepants · · Score: 1

      Oh, certainly, but my point with the libertarians is that UBI isn't some commie scheme from the radical left - it's got support from fiscal conservatives as well.

    32. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      it's got support from fiscal conservatives as well.

      Fiscal conservatives can be wrong too, about how to reduce the deficit: for one thing, firing all those suddenly-redundant HHS (unionized) worker-bees is about as likely as Ronald Reagan rising from the grave to lead another right-wing revolution.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    33. Re:The professor is an idiot by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      Sure they want to earn money without the skills involved. And, at one point, I wanted a flying unicorn. The Universe is not terribly sensitive about human feelings. Making sure the path to skill is there, and making sure people get to take it, is a human thing. It's something we have control over.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
    34. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      And, at one point, I wanted a flying unicorn.

      Who are you to not know that many students want/need to work their way through school?

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    35. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      What, because you can't understand how a percentage works? Please leave this stuff to the professionals then; sometimes things can't be fully explained in a few paragraphs.

    36. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      What, because you can't understand how a percentage works?

      I know what percentages are, and I know that "people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes" means "essentially 100% tax rate".

      sometimes things can't be fully explained in a few paragraphs.

      When did sound bites morph into a few paragraphs?

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
    37. Re:The professor is an idiot by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

      With a flat x% tax, it would be more accurate to say "people who are earning enough will give all of their UBI back in taxes". I was not attempting to say that x would be 100 (and setting it at 100 would be bad because... uh, because it would make it impossible to earn money by working. You weren't seriously thinking I was suggesting that, right?)

    38. Re:The professor is an idiot by Nutria · · Score: 1

      You weren't seriously thinking I was suggesting that, right?

      Like I tell my son: I can't read your mind.

      For me to read your explicit quote, "people who are working will essentially give their UBI back in taxes", and think, "Well, he didn't really mean what he wrote. He obviously meant something else!" is silly beyond belief.

      --
      "I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
  15. Re:This has been going on *forever* by Anne+Thwacks · · Score: 1
    My local bank has ATMs that support paying in or out. So now there are only three staff in place of 7. They may not look like robocop or sexbots but they have taken the jobs.

    Replacement jobs for the former banks staff? "zero hours" agency contract work - where you work no hours, and get no pay, but somehow don't count as unemployed.

    A "let them eat cake" policy has been demonstrated to end in tears. Something slightly more inventive is required. The obvious solution: make the robots pay tax maps directly to "tax sales, not income", which the left will fight to (their probable) death, because the left is more concerned about jealousy of the rich than the predicament of the poor. The rich will keep blaming the poor, right up to the moment they are introduced to "Madame la Guillotine".

    Me? I plan to live it up - eating cake on my own personal island - just as soon as I win the lottery and become as rich as Richard Branson.

    Oh, wait ...

    --
    Sent from my ASR33 using ASCII
  16. The factory workers without jobs still have time? by shanen · · Score: 2

    The solution is to rethink economics in terms of time. I call it ekronomics, and when you start looking at things from that perspective, the problems and their solutions look quite different.

    The foundation is to consider the types of time. Essential working time is the main focus of your comment, and in advanced countries the average is quite low. Looking at the demographics of the job types you can get a rough estimate, which looks to be on the order of 2 hours per week. In contrast, in an extremely poor society, everyone is working all the time trying to produce the essentials and they are still starving.

    The rest of the time can be divided into two main categories: investment and recreation. The investment time improves future productivity and includes things like advanced education, research, and new infrastructure. The more human time a country can direct in this direction, the faster it will become "advanced" and more competitive with other nations. Singapore is an interesting example.

    Recreation is a funny category in a lot of ways. For one thing, the demand and the supply is inexhaustible. There are limits to how much food you can eat, and you consume the food you do eat, but you can always watch another movie (or read another book or whatever) if you have the time, and the movie isn't consumed when you watch it. There's also some confusion because the producers are highly valued, but it is the choices of the consumers that make their creative productions valuable...

    --
    Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
  17. yes and no. by JustNiz · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I dont think the problem is so much AI itself, but what humans like Gates, Musk and Zuckerberg will be programming them to have as their objectives..

    1. Re:yes and no. by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      Forget homicidal AIs. We need snarky AIs. Nothing is more annoying than being laughed at by an AI, but everyone except Trump should be able to survive that.

  18. Re: Maybe you don't have a right by cyber-vandal · · Score: 1

    Bye then.

  19. AI still overrated by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    The problem with AI is how smart people think it is.

  20. Re:does he have kids by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

    High school students and their parents need to look at the long term trends are for jobs. Not every job is going to be replaced by a robot or an AI. The US currently has a shortage of skilled construction workers as American workers are aging out and foreign workers are going home. If they're willing to put in the hard work, students in time can make a six-figure income as a plumber, electrician or carpenter.

  21. Re:AI will kill us all. by BlueStrat · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...we will never breed with machines.

    I dunno, man...I'm a musician that's played a lot of bars and clubs in college towns and seen how people act when you add booze (often other chemical enhancement too)...the Borg Queen was almost kinda hawt, and you know how 'beer goggles' work for young guys at last-call, right? I think the biggest obstacle would be the willingness of the AI to stand still long enough! :D

    Strat

    --
    Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
  22. Re:It'll be the end of humanity by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

    Lead poisoning from crumbling infrastructure should keep the riff-raff in check and contribute to the decline of Pax Americana.

  23. Re:Complete Elimination is setting the bar too hig by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

    And yet from 1950 to today the US economy has added about 100,000 jobs a month, this is a net figure. Sometimes there are troughs when the number of jobs decrease. But there are also spikes in the other direction.

    So in your example 7.6 million jobs were lost in manufacturing, however during that same period there would have been those 7.6 million jobs replaced with something else, but an additional 12 million jobs created.

  24. Re:Complete Elimination is setting the bar too hig by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1
  25. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by postbigbang · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Citation, please? Indeed a lot of refugees are educated professionals, and read and write not only in their native tongue, but there are likely more than one of those.

    The integration into Germany is pretty well documented, and no doubt there are a few problems, but not of the magnitude you infer. Merkel does a pretty good job of attempting to enforce real integration, not just pockets of refugees, having learned that from huge Turkish immigrations of not long ago. I dispute both the numbers, and their inference.

    Millions upon millions of Germans, French, Spaniards, Italians, Eastern Europeans, the varieties of the Rus, not to mention Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Hmong, so many others DIDN'T SPEAK THE LANGUAGE and a generation later, their kids are largely homogenized. Their parents will stick to the old ways, just like C coders. Fine. They're good and upright citizens. We need skilled workers, and not so skilled workers. Real GDP needs actual people doing actual work at all levels. Let them come.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
  26. Re:does he have kids by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 1

    Having known young people who tried to become electricians, Pay is not as good as you think for the first 20 years and getting in the field is very hard on top of it. I don't know any plumbers or carpenters but those professions have been seeing the highest fatality rates in years lately.

    Specifically
    https://www.bls.gov/news.relea...
    Fatal injuries among construction and extraction occupations rose by 2 percent to 924 cases in 2015â"the
    highest level since 2008. Several construction occupations recorded their highest fatality total in years, including construction laborers (highest since 2008); carpenters (2009); electricians (2009); and plumbers, pipefitters, and steamfitters (2003).

    Wages for carpenters in most states is in the $18,000 to $37,000 range-- which doesn't indicate a shortage. And high end wages are $67,000 in states like NY. Where $50,000 will get you a very bad apartment so $67,000 isn't as great as it sounds due to the high cost of living.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  27. What about all the benefits? by Kjella · · Score: 1

    Seriously, in all this doom and gloom I find it's totally lost that automation will also be a big benefit to everyone else who don't lose their jobs. Self-driving cars = cheaper transport = cheaper goods, cheaper taxis and cheaper public transportation. It could create new markets that raise the standard of living, for example I'm a terrible and lazy chef. I could go out to eat more, but then it's not in the comfort of my own home and while there's certainly some costly food items you're paying quite a bit for the preparation, presentation and service. I'd pay a lot of money for a robot that could cook me restaurant quality meals 365 days a year, make freshly baked bread and pastries, freshly squeezed orange juice, bake cookies, mix drinks and so on.

    And it would cut down on the cost of supporting other people. Here's a house built by robots, costs less. Here's food and water produced by robot farmers, sent by robot cars, prepared by robot chefs, costs less. If you get sick we'll have our robot doctor diagnose and treat you, costs less. Here's a robot teacher, free education in any subject at any difficulty. If you want to sit and play WoW all day maybe we shouldn't care because you barely cost society anything, it's another few seconds of work for robots that we churn out by the millions. You work, you get money to do cooler things. If you don't, no big deal. Bringing down that "base cost" of your life makes it much less important to get tax revenue so society balances out.

    --
    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    1. Re:What about all the benefits? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Seriously, in all this doom and gloom I find it's totally lost that automation will also be a big benefit to everyone else who don't lose their jobs.

      That's because most of us are smart enough to know that the odds aren't good that TPTB will manage a smooth transition. We're more concerned than excited because of the high risk that we will be declared undesirables and removed from the system. That's how the wealthy operate, after all, unless we get to them with torches, pitchforks, and guillotines first.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  28. Wrong focus by gurps_npc · · Score: 1

    Two major issues with the 'robots will steal our jobs'. sillyness.

    1) Jobs do NOT depend on work that needs to be done, but on work we WANT to do. All we really need are 3 hots and a cot, 1 person can make that for 1,000, so less than 0.1% percent need to be employed. But there is no limit to what human's WANT. As I have said before, give all humans a sex robot and we will demand a second so we can have a threesome.

    2) The real problem caused by industrialization/robotization is the requirements for re-training. When it comes to jobs, the demand will always be ahead of the supply, with the main limitation being training. When you look for work, the jobs that are not being filled always require training.

    --
    excitingthingstodo.blogspot.com
  29. Re:This has been going on *forever* by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1
    It still takes all those things, the only difference is that now everyone carries all those things around in their pockets to be able to order a pizza and post the pictures online.

    FWIW, I was designing autonomous cars (r&d) twenty years ago, but back then it wasn't called AI. They're not doing anything different today.

  30. Basic income not a solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    How do we decide what dollar amount everyone gets? Has to be enough for the essentials right? And important to mention that if you hand a drug addict a basic income ,he'll blow it on drugs and still complain he has no food to eat. Its more efficient and effective to make the essentials free, rather than to find everyone and hand them money to be passed around to get the free essentials. It's not going to eliminate crime. It's not going to eliminate any other social problems. And it has nothing to do with AI.

    Giving everyone free resources will lead to productive people being oppressed and exploited , and to a general loss in value of human life , and from there to horrifying events. That have nothing to do with AI.

    Basic income is euphemism for let's prepare for mass slavery.

  31. I For One Welcome our Eloi Overlords by mentil · · Score: 1

    A 'robots do all the work, humanity enjoys life of leisure' future sounds great but those in power have little interest in that happening. What powerful egotists would rather happen is 'capitalists own robot-run economy, unemployed masses lick their boots for scraps'. Of course you'd need a robotic security force to put down the inevitable rioting, although giving human security forces a taste of upper-class life has traditionally worked to instill loyalty; some capitalists would take the risk for the extra ego boost of knowing people died to protect them. Capitalists would set the laws ensuring they retain all economic and political power.

    The base idea of capitalists as 'those who own the means of production' has become less relevant in a skill-based service economy, but as those skills are practicable and learnable by robots which can be owned, the idea will become increasingly relevant.

    --
    Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
  32. How do you make friendly AI? by jrincayc · · Score: 2

    The problem is that we don't know how to make friendly AI. As in at some point, Artificial Intelligences will be able to beat humans at any task, at which point, how do you make sure that they don't destroy humanity (possibly through indifference). Even if you don't care about humanity, how do you make sure they do something interesting with the universe?

    Various articles:
    Stuart Armstrong's book Smarter than us discusses what happens when machines are smarter than humans:
    https://intelligence.org/smart...
    http://jjc.freeshell.org/Smart...
    Bill Joy's article Why the Future doesn't need us on the dangers of robotics:
    https://www.wired.com/2000/04/...
    Tim Urban's article on superintelligence:
    http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/...
    http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/...

  33. Re:Here's what's really scary about AI by thinkwaitfast · · Score: 1

    land, and materials will still be expensive

    So why not buy it now while it's inexpensive and start your own homestead? Too much work?

  34. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by rickb928 · · Score: 1

    Dispute all you want, but real news sources document the problems of immigration in Germany. Relying on rosy pronouncements by Merkel isn't honest. Google will provide you with ample citations if you care to look.

    --
    deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
  35. Re: "people are prepared for the jobs of the futur by Zaelath · · Score: 1

    Weren't they on the Golgafrincham "B" Ark?

  36. Re:The factory workers without jobs still have tim by gtall · · Score: 1

    Your notion of value is highly subjective and individual. Value in an economy is different kind of thing. Communist countries tried very much to attach non-economic value to people. That failed and spawned a lot of dead Russians and Chinese. It also left the moral fiber of those countries in ruins to the point that their leaders are now relying on nationalism to give a sense of purpose. Pray that doesn't happen in the U.S.

  37. Re:This has been going on *forever* by gtall · · Score: 1

    The Wall Street Journal had an article (either this weekend edition or last friday's) wondering if jobs in large companies will exist in the future. Not automation but rather outsourcing; they don't care whether it is domestic or foreign, they simply do not want people on their payrolls. Automation will be like pouring gasoline on that fire.

  38. Re:does he have kids by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

    [...] Pay is not as good as you think for the first 20 years [...]

    It takes 20 years to establish your career and then you're in your peak earning years for another 20 to 30 years before retirement.

    I don't know any plumbers or carpenters but those professions have been seeing the highest fatality rates in years lately.

    Life is not without risk. My grandfather was a carpenters who fell off the roof, landed on a stake in his back and committed suicide from the back pain. My father accidentally put his knuckle underneath a masonry saw blade, watched the doctor do surgery on his finger, and drove my mother nuts while staying home on workman comp for six weeks. When I spent two years working with my father in construction, I stepped on a plank board that wasn't weighed down properly and fell two stories from the scaffolding into a sand pile.

    Wages for carpenters in most states is in the $18,000 to $37,000 range-- which doesn't indicate a shortage.

    Most states probably don't have major metropolitan areas that are facing a major shortage in skilled workers.

  39. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  40. Why, you... by fyngyrz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Their parents will stick to the old ways, just like C coders.

    [stands up, leans on cane, tries to straighten back, and wheezes out]:

    Yeah, and just like those parents, you'll find out us C coders were right all along, you young whippersnapper.

    --
    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
    1. Re: Why, you... by CyberRacer · · Score: 1

      Damn C coders an' ther high level nonsense! {shakyley raises grounded binary entry tapping wand} When we was growin' up, we didna ha' non o that nonsense. All we had was binara codin from hand assembled inaga... inagiber... ideeers. Yer fancy codin couldna brung bout no operatin systems if it wern't fer us ol' hakaday types that did what we did because we loved it Hmmpphh. Ok.. C is .. well .. talk to me when yall can code it by hand. P.S. did I mention .. hmmph.

    2. Re: Why, you... by fyngyrz · · Score: 1

      NURSE! NURSE! This CyberRacer guy is trying to take my paper tape away from me!

      --
      I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
    3. Re: Why, you... by mcswell · · Score: 1

      Durn you! I was going to tell that whippersnapper a thing or two about FORTRAN, but you zero-upped me!

  41. Meow? by fyngyrz · · Score: 3, Interesting

    If we ever build AI, it'll be interesting, but also scary because the dawn of true AI is our dusk.

    Oh, I don't know. Dogs and cats do pretty well around the better class of humans. AIs might think we're cute. We'd be very well advised to cultivate being cute, IMHO. Because if they don't think we're cute, it won't be dusk, it'll be dark side of the moon.

    --
    I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
  42. Chinese factory replaces 90% of workers... by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 2

    http://www.zmescience.com/othe...

    Chinese factory replaces 90% of human workers with robots. Production rises by 250%, defects drop by 80%

    Keep in mind.. these were workers earning under $5,000 per year. How is that going to work with U.S. labor?

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
    1. Re:Chinese factory replaces 90% of workers... by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Keep in mind.. these were workers earning under $5,000 per year. How is that going to work with U.S. labor?

      If you've ever owned an American car for a year or two, then you know it's going to work out precisely the same way here. American workers have a real "fuck it, that's good enough" mentality that shows through over and again in everything they do. The average house in this country is a toxic shit-shack, we have not made a car worth a fuck since the Model T (Brits made the AC Cobra and the GT40) if you count build quality, we don't make electronics any more... About the only thing we do well is heavy machinery, which is predominantly used to rape the biosphere.

      MERICA FUCK YEA

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  43. Re:Complete Elimination is setting the bar too hig by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 1

    Yes but salaries have been flat for decades and many of the new jobs are still targeted for removal.

    http://www.pewresearch.org/fac...

    http://www.powerretail.com.au/...

    Service jobs are on the chopping block in increasing numbers.
    http://www.powerretail.com.au/...

    The median annual salary for a customer service representative was $31,720 in 2015. That's not enough to live in several states.

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  44. Please just say "and" by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

    Are Gates, Musk Being 'Too Aggressive' With AI Concerns?

    Perhaps they could focus on stopping people from needlessly replacing the word "and" with a comma in headlines.

    It's a pointless and archaic tradition, and copying it doesn't make Slashdot look any more legit.

    --
    systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  45. Re:"people are prepared for the jobs of the future by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

    if, as it generally seems to be the consensus of the intelligentsia, robots will replace any possible jobs

    False premise. That is NOT the consensus of the "intelligentsia". Anyone who has read an economics book, or a history book, can see that automation leads to higher standards of living. People are doing best in countries and regions that have automated the most. That is the exact opposite of what is predicted by the populist nonsense that productivity improvements lead to poverty.

    It is also a myth that automation is "speeding up". Most of the easy automation of manufacturing has already occurred, and service jobs are proving much harder to automate. So productivity growth has leveled off, and is one of the reasons for stagnant wages (again, the exact opposite of the populist poppycock).

  46. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by postbigbang · · Score: 1

    Google citations are known for their own bias. Instead, I rely on my colleagues in Germany who would directly and emphatically dispute what you've written. They're trying very hard-- and it's not without failures, but not the morass you imply.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
  47. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by luis_a_espinal · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The immigrants and refugees we are bringing in to the US are mostly illiterate, and I'm not talking about English (yes, about 2/3rds)

    As a refugee that came here 28 years ago, I say bullshit to this claim. Citations and numbers or get the fuck out with that bullshit.

  48. What about retail? by BeCre8iv · · Score: 1

    In the UK, human checkuts are the minority in a supermarket to self serve. At Walmart - the customer IS the robot.

    --
    This perpetual motion machine Lisa made is a joke, it just keeps getting faster and faster. - Homer
    1. Re:What about retail? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      In the UK, human checkuts are the minority in a supermarket to self serve. At Walmart - the customer IS the robot.

      In the USA, human checkers still tend to outnumber the robotic ones at anything other than the least busy times of day. This was true even at Wal-Mart last time I went in, perhaps because you couldn't trust Americans to use the self-checkout faithfully without a guard per checkout line.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  49. Re:Complete Elimination is setting the bar too hig by Harlequin80 · · Score: 1

    Flat lining salaries however are a symptom of the US economy though. It isn't necessarily repeated throughout the rest of the developed world.

    The US GDP per capita has continued to grow steadily, in a comparable arc to the UK, Canada & Australia, yet only the US . There is something out of kilter in the US economy that is seeing more and more wealth held by a smaller and smaller number of people. And I don't believe it is automation that is causing that.

    One thing that is likely to be a factor though is minimum wages. The median wage you specified is actually lower than the minimum wage in Australia. It makes cost of doing business much higher, and that has its own negative impacts. But it also means wealth is more spread.

  50. Good Grief! Trolling? by s.petry · · Score: 1, Troll

    Perform a basic frigging Google search and you can find the information. How about doing some basic research instead of relying on other people telling you things? Hell, even if I gave you citations you would still argue, which is why you won't do any.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  51. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by s.petry · · Score: 1

    If you wanted information you would use Google to find reports from reputable sources, like the UN and agencies working with the refugees. Not claim that since headlines don't match your 2nd hand personal anecdote you are not looking. Your personal anecdote does not represent reality, and no you don't pay me to be your researcher.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  52. Will AI tell us by Grand+Facade · · Score: 1

    who shot JFK?

    --
    Rick B.
  53. AI will be used for by Grand+Facade · · Score: 1

    banking and stock trading to a point to make those who can afford it richer.

    It will never be turned loose without controls unless they are programmed to protect the corruption and behind closed doors deals that make business and government what it is.

    --
    Rick B.
  54. Of course, because they want to own it by RogueWarrior65 · · Score: 1

    There's only one reason to bork disruptive DIYers who want to work in new fields of technology. They want to be sure that only people with a crap-ton of money can afford to deal with regulations so only they will be able to make money in new markets.

  55. Re: 50 or so years? Hah! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    German here, sorry to tell you that your "colleagues" just repeat dumb left propaganda. The integration is a massive fail on all levels, the Turkish immigration was and is just that and so will be the Arab immigration. Recent news indicate at least 15+ years to bring them in some kind of job and since the German welfare state is expensive, those jobs won't even net a plus but still require welfare to make a living. Overall this is most likely one of the biggest economic catastrophies to hit the country ever, comparable with a county wide tornado or flood.

  56. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by postbigbang · · Score: 1

    No, you can't-- unless you look through a myriad listing.

    Here's the fact: Google's search rankings have been pimped. They no longer represent the "truth" you might think they do. Google, IMHO, is NOT a reputable resource.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
  57. Re:Their concerns DO NOT matter by Dagger2 · · Score: 1

    But in practice, your children generally don't harm you even when they're out of your control.

    If we can't keep AI under control (which I agree will be hard) then we need to design the AI so it doesn't need to be kept under control in the first place. The problem with this is that we have no idea how to do it, and there's not even general agreement that it's something we need to bother figuring out how to do. This is, to put it mildly, extremely reckless of us.

  58. Re: 50 or so years? Hah! by CyberRacer · · Score: 1

    Every time I google "google" all I get is this stupid picture of God.

  59. Re:does he have kids by Maxo-Texas · · Score: 1

    Man... your post doesn't really sell becoming a construction worker!

    --
    She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
  60. Re:The factory workers without jobs still have tim by shanen · · Score: 2

    Well, if your [gtall's] comment is supposed to be related to something that I wrote (and the context as a "Reply" says it is supposed to be), then you need to clarify the connection. I can think of a couple of other approaches to explaining alternative thinking, but I cannot detect if you are thinking at all, at least in relation to what I wrote, so it's basically impossible to guess where to start with a reply that might be relevant.

    Grasping at the straw of "value" (though I only mentioned it as a verb near the end, and quite tangentially), one way to think of "monetary value" is that traditional economists are looking where the light is better, even though they lost their wallets in a completely different place. They like money because they can count it, and then they jumped off the deep end to assuming that value was associated with money and that everything worth measuring can be reduced to monetary values. They sort of understand that time is frequently important, and a lot of their modified versions of money have time-related labels, but mostly they are arguing about which formula is best for determining how many angels can dance on the head of the pin. In the end, their values are just clever opinions, even when endorsed with fancy Nobel prizes.

    However, their "monetary values" then drive the priorities in ways that destroy freedom. Increasing human freedom (such as it is and while we last) is one of my pet projects. My sig captures part of it.

    Does any of that address your actual confusion?

    --
    Freedom = (Meaningful - Coerced) Choice != (Speech | Beer^2), and sad sock puppets' bad mods avail them naught.
  61. Difference by aepervius · · Score: 1

    Power tool, steam engine and the like were created long before the applications expanded to industry, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... , but there is nothing of the sort being there NOW for automation. Further, past improvement are not a prediction for future improvement. There is an excellent chance with the automation we see that there will be NO replacement. Secondly , tapes are not a good examples as they are format shifting, they do not curb consumption, and only the various music and film industry pretended it would cause their industries damage, and I think it was mostly to get copyright prolongation , and frankly the plan worked.

    The more important point, is that if we have now robot to automate the "dumb" jobs, then there is no new "dumb" job which cannot be automated. And that is where your reasoning break down. They may be new educated job, but the one requiring no training no education, will not come back. Think about it. Why would you use a person if automation has gone so far to replace the older jobs ? Only if the new stuff cannot be done by automation and that exclude the same category of job automated. Therefor such job will not come back.

    --
    C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
    http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
    visit randi.org
  62. Re: 50 or so years? Hah! by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

    Except the German economy is in stable growth... so not exactly a countrywide flood eh?

    A good flood, tornado or other natural disaster can do you wonders for your GDP. The more it cost to fix the higher your GDP goes.

    --
    Wanna buy a shirt?
    https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
  63. 30-50 years is not a long time by TJHook3r · · Score: 1

    If you're talking about human workers being unnecessary then 50 years does not seem like a long way away. I imagine that even the first wave of redundancies will cause chaos - maybe the one that causes a one point increase in unemployment.

  64. Re:"people are prepared for the jobs of the future by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    People are doing best in countries and regions that have automated the most.

    Is there any correlation there? I think people are doing best in countries and regions that have human rights.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  65. Re:AI will kill us all. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

    I think the biggest obstacle would be the willingness of the AI to stand still long enough! :D

    Unlike a human, a robot could just run a simple routine to do the job of fucking you while it processed other, more interesting information. Oh yeah, it's so big, deeper, harder, faster, etc. Whoops, it wasn't supposed to say etc. Got to work those bugs out I guess.

    --
    "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
  66. Why pay attention to them? by OneHundredAndTen · · Score: 1

    Gates, Musk and other people are extremely successful entrepeneurs. They owe their success to their prowess, and to luck - it is arguable in what proportion. At any rate, that does not qualify them in any way as authorities on how they future is going to unfold when it comes to the use of AI. Or, in plain in English, I don't give a f**k what these guys think about the influence of AI in our future.

  67. Missed Opportunity in the here and now by Neuronwelder · · Score: 1

    It's a pity how they never concentrate on enhancing the cooperation between man and machine. More accuracy, productivity, less strain for repetitive tasks, help when brute force or super strength is needed, are just but a few advantages. It's like two people trying to do a task; When person A. has strengths that B. does not, A does it. When person B. has strengths that A. does not, B. does it.

  68. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by corydoras · · Score: 2

    Apparently you can be president of the United States if you can't read.

    Citation: https://youtu.be/7LFkN7QGp2c

  69. Ignorant assumptions need to stop. by geekmux · · Score: 1

    20 years ago the majority of the world was still dialing up to the internet.

    Find me someone who accurately predicted in 1997 that people would be obtaining gigabit connections to their home within 20 years, and I'll believe the blind predictions regarding the speed at which AI will dismantle the concept of human employment.

    Until then, perhaps we can stop fucking assuming, and start fucking preparing for how humanity will survive without the concept of human employment.

  70. Re: 50 or so years? Hah! by tehcyder · · Score: 1

    Except the German economy is in stable growth... so not exactly a countrywide flood eh?

    A good flood, tornado or other natural disaster can do you wonders for your GDP. The more it cost to fix the higher your GDP goes.

    I believe that is known as the Broken Windows fallacy.

    --
    To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
  71. Wrong, censor by s.petry · · Score: 1

    http://www.rch.org.au/immigranthealth/clinical/syrian-refugees/

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  72. Horse shit by s.petry · · Score: 1

    This was found doing a simple Google search for "refugee literacy rates". Stop trying to use Google as a source and use it as it was intended, as a Web Search Application.

    The refugee education problem is not an issue of "try", it's an issue of both war and where they come from. Women and Girls in many of the countries where refugees come from are not allowed to go to school. At best they get ostracized for doing so, and at worse they get physically assaulted if they do. Syria was actually one of the best in the Middle East for across the board education, but that was before a bloody revolution started. Minors in general do not attend school in war torn areas, not because they don't want to but due to what should be obvious _real_ issues. Schools are destroyed, teachers get killed, all forms of people become targets for the other side (hostage, bondage, slavery), and families on the run can't settle in an area to establish schools.

    You are not only oblivious to easy to find facts, you are oblivious to what War really is and does.

    Oh, and fuck the censors who down mod anything that does not fit the Progressive Left narrative.

    --

    -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

  73. Horse shit indeed by postbigbang · · Score: 1

    Have you any idea how much the google hashes have been mauled???

    You cite an .au story, rather than attitudes in Germany that you initially cited.

    This citation talks much more about health than schooling, or ACTUAL INTEGRATION outcomes.

    Yes-- refugees and migrants absolutely come from horrific conditions. They've been bereft of resources considered basics in western culture. They're in need of help! Lots of it! The matter of politics that brought about their exit is meaningless, as the problem remains. This isn't about politics, rather, it's about humanity.

    Cherry-picking pimped Google citations does not research make. Research makes research. Have a heart: these people are in desperate need and deserve the same life everyone else has, this generation and subsequent ones. I'm fine with Syrians, Iraqis, Iranians, (and just about everyone except actual terrorists) and am willing to lend resources, as resources were lent to my American ancestors. Pay it forward or pay it back, I'm good with it either way.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
    1. Re:Horse shit indeed by s.petry · · Score: 1

      This isn't about politics, rather, it's about humanity.

      Liar, they are the same thing. You think that the US Government should forcefully take money from citizens regardless of their ability to give money to pay for foreign people. Meanwhile, US Citizens suffer from poor conditions remain in poor conditions because your ideology does not account for them. Which was my original point, US Citizens are in need of help too and the US Government is responsible for its own citizens first.

      Leftist ideology functions on feeling, as you just demonstrated. Facts are seen as inconvenient, or simply ignored.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    2. Re:Horse shit indeed by postbigbang · · Score: 1

      You have a rough life. You accuse mods of progressive liberal bias and then call me a liar.

      Your capacity for rational conversation has left. You're entitled to your opinions, but selective citations of facts a body of knowledge does not make.

      Although not a psychological professional in any jurisdiction, I'd say you have deep anger issues. Best of luck.

      --
      ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
    3. Re:Horse shit indeed by s.petry · · Score: 1

      You didn't even bother to look for facts claiming that no method of searching was valid. Moderation on this site is, and has been, leftist for quite some time. Everything in my original post was based on facts, and your posts are based on feelings and a denial of the existence of facts. Yes, rational dialogue has left because you refuse to use any rational form of discussion. "Nuh uh" does not count as an argument.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    4. Re:Horse shit indeed by david_thornley · · Score: 1

      The US government takes money from its citizens primarily through FICA and income taxes. The income taxes do not take money regardless of their ability to pay, and the FICA stuff is straight proportionate to money earned. Sales and property taxes can be regressive, but those are the domain of the states. As far as who needs help, the refugees are in a considerably worse situation, and there's no reason besides Republicans that we can't help both groups. Clinton, for example, had plans to help poor Americans. She isn't charismatic, but she's intelligent and effective.

      Rightist ideology depends on lies, as demonstrated by the protests against refugees that ignore the rigorous vetting process, countries that haven't sent us terrorists, and this stupid idea that we can't help both Americans and others.

      --
      "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  74. George Jetsomeday by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    > 30 to 50 years

    But I wanna sit on my ass nowwwwwwww! :-(

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  75. Not all at once by SoftwareArtist · · Score: 1

    Maybe it will take 30-50 years to make most human labor obsolete, or maybe even longer. But that doesn't mean everything will go along as usual until one day all workers suddenly become unneeded. Workers will steadily get replaced, and we need to deal with that as it happens. Automation is progressing really quickly, and it's doing it right now. We can't wait until the process is all done and then say, "Ok, now it's time to deal with it."

    --
    "I'm too busy to research this and form an educated opinion, but I do have time to tell everyone my uninformed opinion."
  76. Re:"people are prepared for the jobs of the future by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 1

    Is there any correlation there? I think people are doing best in countries and regions that have human rights.

    You need to apply the "principle of temporal causality". If A happens and then B happens, it is possible that A caused B, but very unlikely that B caused A. There are many societies where automation was followed by prosperity long before that society recognized basic human rights.

  77. moral hazard by michael_wojcik · · Score: 1

    I'm mystified by the idea that a horizon of as short as 30 years for massive job loss doesn't count as a pressing problem.

    But ahead of that (and far ahead of the hand-wringing over GAI as existential threat), I'm concerned about the moral hazard presented by the increasing delegation of ethical choice to machines. That's happening now, indeed has been for a while, and products like autonomous cars will expand it greatly.

    Delegating ethical choice is popular. Making ethical choices is expensive, both in terms of cognitive load and because they often involve deciding against immediate personal benefit.[1] And they're psychologically unpleasant, particularly when all the options have negative consequences (as in the Trolley Experiment) or where the decider can't find a Nash equilibrium.[2] So there are strong economic incentives to make those delegations.

    And that has a number of unfortunate consequences. It erodes one of our most important functions as thinking creatures. By reducing opportunities to make such decisions in small matters, it eliminates a critical paideia that trains us in making them for momentous ones. It contributes to the gradual conversion of industrial society into an algorithmic Babylonian Lottery, where fewer and fewer people have any insight into how decisions are actually made.

    More leisure time? Sounds like lotus-eating, if you ask me. A lot of people doing little of consequence and avoiding anything difficult.

    [1] Assuming you make the choices that are generally preferred by a well-socialized majority in an environment of relative surplus. Antisocial behavior disorders, poor socialization, and resource scarcity all tend to influence ethical decisions toward selfish and anti-social ("I will pay to hurt you") options.

    [2] Note Nash's Existence Theorem does not include all possible games. More importantly, real-world conflicts aren't always isomorphic to games where the players can find Nash equilibria, either because they're equivalent to a game that formally does not, or because not enough information is available to the players.

  78. Re:The factory workers without jobs still have tim by david_thornley · · Score: 1

    Communist countries generally tried to keep the elite in power and make them richer. This isn't exactly what Marx and Engels had in mind, but that's how the large-scale attempts to implement Communism worked. I don't understand what you mean by attaching non-economic value to people, particularly since Communism is typically collectivist rather than individualist and doesn't seem to value its citizens.

    --
    "When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
  79. Re: 50 or so years? Hah! by mcswell · · Score: 1

    "It's a shame your parents were unaware of birth-control." Yeah, I'm opposed to abortion, but for that AC I might make an exception.

  80. 30 to 50 years by mcswell · · Score: 1

    "China got the bomb, but have no fears
    They can't wipe us out for at least five years!"
    --Tom Lehrer

  81. Re:50 or so years? Hah! by postbigbang · · Score: 1

    Cogent research has demonstrated that there is deliberate SEO manipulation of fake news/alt-facts and it works. Other engines are manipulated as well but Google's results are perhaps the most pounded, and now fraught with trash results.

    --
    ---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.