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That's been the "theory" for a long time - say, the threshing machine will mean that farmers will be unemployed, the powered sawmill will put all the sawyers ou

That's been the "theory" for a long time - say, the threshing machine will mean that farmers will be unemployed, the powered sawmill will put all the sawyers out of work, the spreadsheet program will put all the accountants out of work. The trouble with that theory is that people invent and move into new services and jobs. Sure, the old work was automated, but that just means that people can redeploy their labour into an work that simply wasn't being done before. Why doesn't this mean that resource-owners will control everything? Because "resources" are transformed by technology in the same way. Things that were previously not thought of as resources, become so. Secondly, one still imagines competition. There is no "he who owns the resources", there's many, and as long as they have to compete for the custom of the other 95% of the economy, they can't control, or coordinate to control, much of anything.

logfromblammo 10y ago
Newer jobs have always replaced older jobs, and the shift in job titles disguises this. When we say "farmer" now, we mean someone who uses electronics-enhanced tractors to plant and harvest at high yields on 1000 acres. But it used to mean someone who produced food from 5 acres with only human-operated tools. Later, it was someone who used ox-powered tools to produce on 20 acres. As the tech advanced, the job responsibilities changed. Accountants are no longer responsible for adding the numbers correctly in handwritten ledgers. They use computer spreadsheets. But they are still accountants. The market can either use less of them for the same work, or require that they do more work for the same number of laborers. The problem that is arising now, which did not arise in the industrial revolution, is that more employers are choosing the former option, simply because they cannot imagine more work for the same number of people to do that could not also be automated away. If the only way for cab drivers to compete with self-driving hire-on-demand cars is to become tour guides as well, it only takes a few more years to add a synthesized voice recanting trivia to passengers about nearby points of interest to the cab-driver-replacing software. As long as anyone has the intent to replace expensive human labor with cheap machine labor, no offer of additional added value is sufficient to save everyone's jobs. If no job is safe, how do you know which field to move into when your old one goes obsolete?
- wybiral 10y ago
  I'm sticking with software development. If the robots ever get better at writing their own software than us then we'll have other problems to worry about besides work :) Plus there's a chance that it will open up a market for artisanal hand-written software (when people long for the little bugs and imperfections that make if feel authentic).
  - AndrewKemendo 10y ago
    If the robots ever get better at writing their own software than us then we'll have other problems to worry about besides work :) I wouldn't sleep on that. It's coming.
    - logfromblammo 10y ago
      To be fair, writing code better than the median software quality is not a tremendously high bar to pass. There is some truly awful code out there, and plenty of mediocre CRUD apps to add bulk around the middle. It is far more worrisome if software can write better software than the best software-writing humans. After that point, there is no job any human could do that would be competitive with AI. At that time, meat-humanity will just have to retire from the workforce, move in with its AI grandchildren, surrender its drivers' licenses, and eat discounted ramen.
      - AndrewKemendo 10y ago
        It is far more worrisome if software can write better software than the best software-writing humans. After that point, there is no job any human could do that would be competitive with AI. I don't agree with this. From an industry perspective It should be worrisome even if it's not better than the best because as you know, it's not required to be the best to take over an industry. From an AGI perspective, you are generally correct that there will be no job that a human does better than an AGI, however between the point at which it kills programming jobs and when it dominates everything there will still be bespoke jobs. Even though Nike dominates, there are still cobblers.

logfromblammo 10y ago

Newer jobs have always replaced older jobs, and the shift in job titles disguises this. When we say "farmer" now, we mean someone who uses electronics-enhanced tractors to plant and harvest at high yields on 1000 acres. But it used to mean someone who produced food from 5 acres with only human-operated tools. Later, it was someone who used ox-powered tools to produce on 20 acres. As the tech advanced, the job responsibilities changed. Accountants are no longer responsible for adding the numbers correctly in handwritten ledgers. They use computer spreadsheets. But they are still accountants. The market can either use less of them for the same work, or require that they do more work for the same number of laborers. The problem that is arising now, which did not arise in the industrial revolution, is that more employers are choosing the former option, simply because they cannot imagine more work for the same number of people to do that could not also be automated away. If the only way for cab drivers to compete with self-driving hire-on-demand cars is to become tour guides as well, it only takes a few more years to add a synthesized voice recanting trivia to passengers about nearby points of interest to the cab-driver-replacing software. As long as anyone has the intent to replace expensive human labor with cheap machine labor, no offer of additional added value is sufficient to save everyone's jobs. If no job is safe, how do you know which field to move into when your old one goes obsolete?

wybiral 10y ago
I'm sticking with software development. If the robots ever get better at writing their own software than us then we'll have other problems to worry about besides work :) Plus there's a chance that it will open up a market for artisanal hand-written software (when people long for the little bugs and imperfections that make if feel authentic).
- AndrewKemendo 10y ago
  If the robots ever get better at writing their own software than us then we'll have other problems to worry about besides work :) I wouldn't sleep on that. It's coming.
  - logfromblammo 10y ago
    To be fair, writing code better than the median software quality is not a tremendously high bar to pass. There is some truly awful code out there, and plenty of mediocre CRUD apps to add bulk around the middle. It is far more worrisome if software can write better software than the best software-writing humans. After that point, there is no job any human could do that would be competitive with AI. At that time, meat-humanity will just have to retire from the workforce, move in with its AI grandchildren, surrender its drivers' licenses, and eat discounted ramen.
    - AndrewKemendo 10y ago
      It is far more worrisome if software can write better software than the best software-writing humans. After that point, there is no job any human could do that would be competitive with AI. I don't agree with this. From an industry perspective It should be worrisome even if it's not better than the best because as you know, it's not required to be the best to take over an industry. From an AGI perspective, you are generally correct that there will be no job that a human does better than an AGI, however between the point at which it kills programming jobs and when it dominates everything there will still be bespoke jobs. Even though Nike dominates, there are still cobblers.