4 ms·

Lots of people were put out of work when the loom was invented. We've gone through this before many times in human history

treehau5_ 10y ago
Putting aside what s ridiculous, downright asinine comparison that was in comparison with our economy now -- what an extremely cold, unempathetic comment. People, lots of people, with families are going to lose their livelihood. Many are advanced in age, and have only known one thing their whole life. We have a responsibility to our fellow neighbor. A 50 year old truck driver is not going to pick up a coding boot camp and get hired as a tech worker, maybe a small handful but it's unrealistic.
- dotancohen 10y ago
  > Putting aside what s ridiculous, downright asinine > comparison that was in comparison with our economy now > what an extremely cold, unempathetic comment. You should read about the introduction of machines in 18th century England if you think that comparison is ridiculous, asinine or unsympathetic. Start with the Flying Shuttle and the Spinning Jenny. Hint: there was no social security or unemployment benefits then.
  - wastedhours 10y ago
    As has been mentioned elsewhere - there were other un/low skilled industries that people could move sideways into once they'd been displaced. Automation affected vertical industries in previous "revolutions", whereas now automation is impacting a vast swathe of un/low skilled industries simultaneously.
  - madaxe_again 10y ago
    And do you know how many starved, and how incredibly abysmal the conditions were for workers? Quality of living for the majority of people took a nosedive with the industrial revolution, and the pay-off took generations. Yes, they had gas street lighting and coal fires, but they no longer had the freedom they'd enjoyed since the end of feudalism, and once more found themselves serfs - just this time ten to a room in disease ridden urban slums rather than in their peasants cottage in whatever village they'd been sucked up from. Yeah, we're still here, but to assert that everything was positive is equally ridiculous. It took over a century for labour rights to start appearing, and for the system of governance to adapt to economic reality. Do you really want the same again?
- jellicle 10y ago
  You're getting downvoted because the readers of HN do not get old or have neighbors.
  - losteverything 10y ago
    Yes. HN gives access to minds and lives unseen. Sometimes a downvote is really an upvote because it confirms the distance at hand
  - madaxe_again 10y ago
    HN is a libertarian technocratic bubble. If technology isn't the solution, or if technology might present a social problem, they don't want to know.
spdy 10y ago
Not this time we dont move people sideways and we do not create more jobs because robots are here to stay and only get better. Look at what Boston Dynamics is able to do right now. A few years down the road and we will have fully automated chains from planting to delivery all done by robots with minimal maintenance from humans. Self driving cars will be the first indicator if we will move to utopia or dystopia.
- ChrisBland 10y ago
  Have you seen what assembly lines looked like in the past? With humans at each station? Now how do they look? While I haven't been alive for hundreds of years, I would imagine that each time a new innovation comes in to play, humanity panics and says this will put everyone out of work, then we find new things to occupy our time and move on to the next outrage.
  - spdy 10y ago
    I dont argue over the point that people will find something to do but our concept of work and income changes with this. A truck/cashier etc. wont be able to take a course and be a nurse next week. UBI is one alley we can take. We have to accept the fact that we wont have enough jobs for our growing population and part of what i am working on everyday is to do more with less by optimization and we cut into every area with technology from bottom to top. Human employment is expensive. And never forget Google Minds win in GO was our Manhattan Project.
madaxe_again 10y ago
Not quite this, however. As you say, there have been multiple points in history where technological innovation obliterated the livelihood of whole categories of people, from dock workers to sailors to drivers. Now, automated driving isn't in the "changes everything" category, no more than Diesel engines and containerisation changed everything. Yes, there are still areas which are feeling the impact from this change 50 years ago, but for the most part people moved on into other industries - the service industry in particular. The thing is, the service industry is being eaten by automation. That does change everything, as without radical change there is not a further category of job for un or semi-skilled labour. Within the current framework, UBI seems like a sane solution, although finding a way for people to be productive in a way that technology cannot and never can do better would be preferable. The thing is, I'm not certain there is any such thing even in the medium term - even creative and analytic skills are being assumed by AI. Not everybody can be a developer. Even developers will likely be substantially obsolete at some point - we are already at the point where silicon designs silicon with human intervention. This is no small part of what's troubling the world right now - we have swathes of underemployment like we haven't seen before, and it shows in malcontentedness in the political process. The other solution of course is to have a hell of a lot fewer humans, but that's unpalatable in terms of implementation. It's interesting watching the economy contort in on itself in ever decreasing circles of mutation - it's something like Malthusian collapse, as we consume the available pool of productive purposes, leaving a hollowed out civilisation behind.
- Eridrus 10y ago
  What's your source for the service industry being eaten by automation? Nothing really comes.to.mind for me as showing serious promise to destroy it.
  - komodo 10y ago
    online shopping is a big one, self-serve kiosks, AI tier-one help desk, personal assistant technology built into every phone, fast food industry is actively developing automated replacements for line cooks, robo-investing, online learning courses, nearly the entirety of the transportation jobs.

treehau5_ 10y ago

Putting aside what s ridiculous, downright asinine comparison that was in comparison with our economy now -- what an extremely cold, unempathetic comment. People, lots of people, with families are going to lose their livelihood. Many are advanced in age, and have only known one thing their whole life. We have a responsibility to our fellow neighbor. A 50 year old truck driver is not going to pick up a coding boot camp and get hired as a tech worker, maybe a small handful but it's unrealistic.

dotancohen 10y ago
> Putting aside what s ridiculous, downright asinine > comparison that was in comparison with our economy now > what an extremely cold, unempathetic comment. You should read about the introduction of machines in 18th century England if you think that comparison is ridiculous, asinine or unsympathetic. Start with the Flying Shuttle and the Spinning Jenny. Hint: there was no social security or unemployment benefits then.
- wastedhours 10y ago
  As has been mentioned elsewhere - there were other un/low skilled industries that people could move sideways into once they'd been displaced. Automation affected vertical industries in previous "revolutions", whereas now automation is impacting a vast swathe of un/low skilled industries simultaneously.
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  And do you know how many starved, and how incredibly abysmal the conditions were for workers? Quality of living for the majority of people took a nosedive with the industrial revolution, and the pay-off took generations. Yes, they had gas street lighting and coal fires, but they no longer had the freedom they'd enjoyed since the end of feudalism, and once more found themselves serfs - just this time ten to a room in disease ridden urban slums rather than in their peasants cottage in whatever village they'd been sucked up from. Yeah, we're still here, but to assert that everything was positive is equally ridiculous. It took over a century for labour rights to start appearing, and for the system of governance to adapt to economic reality. Do you really want the same again?
jellicle 10y ago
You're getting downvoted because the readers of HN do not get old or have neighbors.
- losteverything 10y ago
  Yes. HN gives access to minds and lives unseen. Sometimes a downvote is really an upvote because it confirms the distance at hand
- madaxe_again 10y ago
  HN is a libertarian technocratic bubble. If technology isn't the solution, or if technology might present a social problem, they don't want to know.

spdy 10y ago

Not this time we dont move people sideways and we do not create more jobs because robots are here to stay and only get better. Look at what Boston Dynamics is able to do right now. A few years down the road and we will have fully automated chains from planting to delivery all done by robots with minimal maintenance from humans. Self driving cars will be the first indicator if we will move to utopia or dystopia.

ChrisBland 10y ago
Have you seen what assembly lines looked like in the past? With humans at each station? Now how do they look? While I haven't been alive for hundreds of years, I would imagine that each time a new innovation comes in to play, humanity panics and says this will put everyone out of work, then we find new things to occupy our time and move on to the next outrage.
- spdy 10y ago
  I dont argue over the point that people will find something to do but our concept of work and income changes with this. A truck/cashier etc. wont be able to take a course and be a nurse next week. UBI is one alley we can take. We have to accept the fact that we wont have enough jobs for our growing population and part of what i am working on everyday is to do more with less by optimization and we cut into every area with technology from bottom to top. Human employment is expensive. And never forget Google Minds win in GO was our Manhattan Project.

madaxe_again 10y ago

Not quite this, however. As you say, there have been multiple points in history where technological innovation obliterated the livelihood of whole categories of people, from dock workers to sailors to drivers. Now, automated driving isn't in the "changes everything" category, no more than Diesel engines and containerisation changed everything. Yes, there are still areas which are feeling the impact from this change 50 years ago, but for the most part people moved on into other industries - the service industry in particular. The thing is, the service industry is being eaten by automation. That does change everything, as without radical change there is not a further category of job for un or semi-skilled labour. Within the current framework, UBI seems like a sane solution, although finding a way for people to be productive in a way that technology cannot and never can do better would be preferable. The thing is, I'm not certain there is any such thing even in the medium term - even creative and analytic skills are being assumed by AI. Not everybody can be a developer. Even developers will likely be substantially obsolete at some point - we are already at the point where silicon designs silicon with human intervention. This is no small part of what's troubling the world right now - we have swathes of underemployment like we haven't seen before, and it shows in malcontentedness in the political process. The other solution of course is to have a hell of a lot fewer humans, but that's unpalatable in terms of implementation. It's interesting watching the economy contort in on itself in ever decreasing circles of mutation - it's something like Malthusian collapse, as we consume the available pool of productive purposes, leaving a hollowed out civilisation behind.

Eridrus 10y ago
What's your source for the service industry being eaten by automation? Nothing really comes.to.mind for me as showing serious promise to destroy it.
- komodo 10y ago
  online shopping is a big one, self-serve kiosks, AI tier-one help desk, personal assistant technology built into every phone, fast food industry is actively developing automated replacements for line cooks, robo-investing, online learning courses, nearly the entirety of the transportation jobs.