Robot Uprising - Or, what to do when AI Does All The Jobs

[woodsghost]

Cram your damn generalizations up your ass.

Something else to consider: In my experience there are always jobs to be had. Those jobs are not always fun and don't always pay well. But honestly, my wife and I have made a good life for ourselves with very low wage jobs and a very limited number of hours per week. It has required very simple living and careful budgeting.

Many of my current coworkers are examples of lives carved out of minimum wage jobs. I live with the stories and the struggles. I also see that it is possible to live and not just survive, but to thrive a little. It is honest work, and we work hard at it.

I've secured different employment and that starts soon. Having a baby on the way pushed me to move in a different direction. It still does not pay much, but enough that my wife will be able to stay home with our baby, and we will continue with simple living and careful budgets. Down the road I can move up and make a good wage, but what we will be making will cover the bills and be sufficient.

Minimum wage living is not easy, but it is not impossible either. This colors my views and what I have said. Again, there is a difference between "a job" and "a good job." For me, having a job and living simply has been enough to get along and make some headway. That has been the case for a good number of my older coworkers too.

These are just my experiences.

Also, if I wanted to take a very different direction for my life I could get trained and get several extremely well paying jobs. I could become an electrician, a (large) refrigeration unit repair guy, a forklift repair guy, start laying tile, or start a lawn care business. My wife wants me doing something with my current schooling, and that career path is now opening up, so I'm heading that way instead. It took me a while (and a baby) to figure out what I wanted to do with my life.

[Stercutus]

The jobs that will be safest the longest are the most challenging and skilled. Which only a very small percentage of the population is suited for. You can't take a guy who was pumping gas one week and train him to be a corporate law attorney or a brain surgeon in a few weeks,months, maybe never. If you could, there wouldn't be enough surgeries to keep most of the brain surgeons employed.

You are right, there are different jobs now than there were in the middle ages, but people and their ability to handle tasks of varying degrees of complexity largely haven't changed in any fundamental way.

That is a good example. When I was a kid there were full service gas stations everywhere. Robots did not take the job of pumping gas away, efficiency and cultural mores did. Practically no one wants to pay 30 cents extra a gallon for gasoline to have someone pump it for them. The idea of the dainty housewife not being able pump her own gas was dying 40 years ago. I have not seen a full service gas station in 25 years. They may be out there but they are in the tiny minority.

Humans are radically different than they were 2000 or even 100 years ago. Physically we are much taller and larger, less lean and muscular and our brains are larger. With a complex and more nutritious diet and a decline in disease most people are able to perform at higher cognitive levels than ever before. Whether they do so or not (or want to do so) is a separate issue.

True, these are not changes that happen over night for the most part. The guy that was pumping gas 40 years ago is now collecting shopping carts at the Walmart parking lot. Short of a mass die off happening that I have not heard about he seems to have adjusted just fine.

[teotwaki]

Very complex cart retrieval training video

[flybynight]

The guy that was pumping gas 40 years ago is now collecting shopping carts at the Walmart parking lot

Forty years ago ,the guy pumping the gas was probably also the guy who repaired your car too. When was the last time you got gas at a station that also does repairs?
With self driving cars a reality, I see this technology overtaking our highway systems rapidly both for the novelty factor at first and then because of the safety factor. How long til police forces begin to dramatically decrease due the lack of revenue from moving/parking violations? And what will this mean to our safety from criminals when fewer LEO are responsible for much larger numbers of the population?

[teotwaki]

With self driving cars a reality, I see this technology overtaking our highway systems rapidly both for the novelty factor at first and then because of the safety factor. How long til police forces begin to dramatically decrease due the lack of revenue from moving/parking violations? And what will this mean to our safety from criminals when fewer LEO are responsible for much larger numbers of the population?

Lawmakers won't allow the state's revenues to go down so they usually come up with ways to boost the money stream. Oregon's road usage tax was their response to fuel efficient vehicles.

http://www.oregon.gov/odot/hwy/rufpp/pages/ruftf.aspx

I do agree that there would be less need for LEOs due to a drop in collisions, speeding, unsafe lane changes, etc.

It may not come to pass that the number of LEO's would automatically decrease due to self-driving cars.

[Stercutus]

The guy that was pumping gas 40 years ago is now collecting shopping carts at the Walmart parking lot

Forty years ago ,the guy pumping the gas was probably also the guy who repaired your car too. When was the last time you got gas at a station that also does repairs?

A gas station/ repair shop is a very inefficient business model, which is why it disappeared. A convenience store or fast food place will do world's more business at a gas station then an auto shop. People need food, beverage and beer much more often than they need their car worked on.

A mechanic will make much more money working on cars then pumping gas. Cars need much less maintenance today vs. 40 years ago. Practically every owner's manual before 1980 stated to check your oil every time you get gas. You had to check it or else it could run out then you would need a new engine. The manual may still say it but how often do you see people checking oil every time they get gas? I might check mine once a month. Because most modern cars don't leak or burn oil a year or two after leaving the factory.

But mostly from what I recall the mechanic was always too busy to pump gas.

With self driving cars a reality, I see this technology overtaking our highway systems rapidly both for the novelty factor at first and then because of the safety factor. How long til police forces begin to dramatically decrease due the lack of revenue from moving/parking violations? And what will this mean to our safety from criminals when fewer LEO are responsible for much larger numbers of the population?

They will get shot in the tool box more.

However, if you need less police due to computer preventing traffic violations that is a good thing in my mind. Public safety should improve with a corresponding drop in traffic fatalities.

[MPMalloy]

They will get shot in the tool box more.

all I am sayyyyyyyyying......is give non-nuclear generation of EMP a chance...

[NamelessStain]

They will get shot in the tool box more.

all I am sayyyyyyyyying......is give non-nuclear generation of EMP a chance...

Hardened military applications of technology laugh at your EMP.

[flybynight]

They will get shot in the tool box more.

all I am sayyyyyyyyying......is give non-nuclear generation of EMP a chance...

Hardened military applications of technology laugh at your EMP.

<-------------- In the dark

[teotwaki]

all I am sayyyyyyyyying......is give non-nuclear generation of EMP a chance...

"Boeing's "CHAMP," short for Counter-electronics High-powered Microwave Advanced Missile Project. It's essentially the old nuclear electromagnetic pulse weapon that we used to worry so much about -- but without the nuclear part. CHAMP carries a small generator that emits microwaves to fry electronics with pinpoint accuracy. It targets not nations or cities but individual buildings, blacking out their electronics rather than blowing up physical targets (or people).

What makes CHAMP even more interesting is that, unlike a nuclear electromagnetic pulse weapon, which fires once, blacking out entire nation-states, CHAMP can fire multiple times, pinpointing and blacking out only essential targets. This would permit, for example, taking down radar defenses in a hostile state while saving the electrical grid that supports the civilian population. In a 2012 test flight in Utah, a single CHAMP was reported to have blacked out seven separate targets in succession, in one single mission."

https://www.sbir.gov/sbirsearch/detail/1207771
http://www.afcea.org/content/?q=Article ... ure-fights
https://www.fool.com/investing/general/ ... eapon.aspx

[MPMalloy]

all I am sayyyyyyyyying......is give non-nuclear generation of EMP a chance...

"Boeing's "CHAMP," short for Counter-electronics High-powered Microwave Advanced Missile Project. It's essentially the old nuclear electromagnetic pulse weapon that we used to worry so much about -- but without the nuclear part. CHAMP carries a small generator that emits microwaves to fry electronics with pinpoint accuracy. It targets not nations or cities but individual buildings, blacking out their electronics rather than blowing up physical targets (or people).

What makes CHAMP even more interesting is that, unlike a nuclear electromagnetic pulse weapon, which fires once, blacking out entire nation-states, CHAMP can fire multiple times, pinpointing and blacking out only essential targets. This would permit, for example, taking down radar defenses in a hostile state while saving the electrical grid that supports the civilian population. In a 2012 test flight in Utah, a single CHAMP was reported to have blacked out seven separate targets in succession, in one single mission."

https://www.sbir.gov/sbirsearch/detail/1207771
http://www.afcea.org/content/?q=Article ... ure-fights
https://www.fool.com/investing/general/ ... eapon.aspx

I must have these...

[Neville]

True, most people in the middle ages didn't possess the ability to read for example, but that wasn't because they weren't capable of reading, it was because they hadn't been taught how... the same way most folks these days don't know how to milk a cow, skin and tan leather, or cobble shoes for example (very common skill sets back then). The capability they had at birth is roughly the same as people today, at birth, possess. Yes we have had years to acclimate to the pace and complexity of modern life... but those people, given the same opportunities we have had, would have adapted as well. Our advantage over them in this regard is because of our upbringing and education, not because of genetics or evolution.

[Stercutus]

True, most people in the middle ages didn't possess the ability to read for example, but that wasn't because they weren't capable of reading, it was because they hadn't been taught how... the same way most folks these days don't know how to milk a cow, skin and tan leather, or cobble shoes for example (very common skill sets back then). The capability they had at birth is roughly the same as people today, at birth, possess. Yes we have had years to acclimate to the pace and complexity of modern life... but those people, given the same opportunities we have had, would have adapted as well. Our advantage over them in this regard is because of our upbringing and education, not because of genetics or evolution.

Evolution does not apply much here. Diet, disease mitigation, sanitary conditions, clean food and water source availability have all resulted in major physiological changes of achieving of greater mental potential in humans. We have had a corresponding drop on the physical side though.

[flybynight]

We have had a corresponding drop on the physical side though.

Which is going to put us at a severe disadvantage fighting this guy


or even this guy

[MPMalloy]

We have had a corresponding drop on the physical side though.

Which is going to put us at a severe disadvantage fighting this guy


or even this guy

[flybynight]

Ick say aboutsay fightingsay robot overlordah aroundsay Stercutusay. He's turned say

Found on another thread

The kid is driven to be an engineer and other than music, church, tail and scholarly competitions his life revolves around building robots. He is genius smart too, so I figure in ten years we will all be working to service his robot army.

[MPMalloy]

Ick say aboutsay fightingsay robot overlordah aroundsay Stercutusay. He's turned say

Found on another thread

The kid is driven to be an engineer and other than music, church, tail and scholarly competitions his life revolves around building robots. He is genius smart too, so I figure in ten years we will all be working to service his robot army.

I have no idea of what you just said, but yeah...I agree with you.

[Stercutus]

Look, I said you would have "jobs" I never said what you would be doing. Slave armies don't just lead themselves you know, somebody has to be overlord.

[raptor]

Look, I said you would have "jobs" I never said what you would be doing. Slave armies don't just lead themselves you know, somebody has to be overlord.

Would like some lube with your power charge Mr. Robot Overlord sir?

[MPMalloy]

Look, I said you would have "jobs" I never said what you would be doing. Slave armies don't just lead themselves you know, somebody has to be overlord.

Would like some lube with your power charge Mr. Robot Overlord sir?

Your lucky your a moderator raptor...

[Stercutus]

Look, I said you would have "jobs" I never said what you would be doing. Slave armies don't just lead themselves you know, somebody has to be overlord.

Would like some lube with your power charge Mr. Robot Overlord sir?

Your lucky your a moderator raptor...

Moderators will be useful in the new robotic world order to give the illusion of fairness.

[flybynight]

[MPMalloy]

I hope that it doesn't come to that.

[MPMalloy]

The link is for a video from CNBC: http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?play=1&v ... eningbrief

Jack Ma: Humans will win over machines
In an exclusive CNBC interview, Alibaba's Jack Ma differentiates between artificial intelligence and wisdom.

I can't play the video because I use ad-blockers.