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> In the case of capital investment, hard robotics is a photo op. > Anyone who performs a process that follows a definable set of business rules is going to be

> In the case of capital investment, hard robotics is a photo op. > Anyone who performs a process that follows a definable set of business rules is going to be automated away in the next 10 years. Completely agree, and this is what I fear we are not in the least bit prepared for as a society. The second quote I pulled from your comment applies equally to any worker irrespective of shirt color. There are many blue-collar jobs that would be exceedingly difficult and/or cost-prohibitive to automate; the same is true of a subset of white-collar jobs. But in the gushy center is a host of jobs that, with today's technology (and it's only going to get better) can be completely replaced by an algorithm. When we start seeing former yuppies from Yale picketing and marching with former machinists and truck drivers and so on, buckle up.

ethbro 10y ago
I will say that in the long run, it will increase labor productivity and be a good thing. Where formerly there were 100 people manually performing {Back Office Process X}, now there are 5, aided by automation. But... it's going to be a helluva time between here and there. The erosion of manufacturing jobs and subsequent demographic and geographic sinkholes caused by our society's inability to shift those dislocated into new productive work seems to indicate we (capitalism) don't have much of a plan other than "Hope the market / individual rationality fixes things eventually." Unfortunately, I think it's the timescale that's going to get us. Holding the human lifetime, initial education, and reeducation (aka time to acquire marketable skills) approximately constant while continually increasing the rate of change of those skills' relative values doesn't give rational actors enough time to course correct. Which, to summarize it coarsely, leads to people getting @$^!ed through no fault of their own, other than an inability to predict the future. "I went into management because I felt it was a human-centric role that would always be needed." (5 years later) "BREAKTHROUGH: New business description language allows for AI-driven allocation of labor and task resources!"
- mncharity 10y ago
  > Holding [...] initial education, and reeducation [...] approximately constant I wonder if that's one way the transition might happen faster than expected. Education improvement may someday accelerate. Startlingly so. It's widely recognized that education is working poorly at present. And that it could be working much better. But just how pervasively poorly is often underappreciated. As in some MIT graduates, given a battery, a long wire, and a bulb, have been unable to make light. And just how much better seems reachable, is hard to appreciate without watching the cutting edge of diverse fields. It's easier to see a line of bottlenecks stretching ahead, than to realize how many of them we may already know how to unlock. It's not that many students could resemble incoming Harvard undergraduates. That's a ghastly low target. It's that by the time students hit high-school bio, it's at least vaguely plausible that they can have a better understanding of biology than many current first-year Harvard Med School students. Which is admittedly another very low bar. Will it happen? Who knows. Pearson is collecting patents. And I've not seen many informed and rational actors in national public policy dialog lately. But building on an assumption that the status quo characterizes the envelope of possible progress in education, seems unnecessarily pessimistic?

ethbro 10y ago

I will say that in the long run, it will increase labor productivity and be a good thing. Where formerly there were 100 people manually performing {Back Office Process X}, now there are 5, aided by automation. But... it's going to be a helluva time between here and there. The erosion of manufacturing jobs and subsequent demographic and geographic sinkholes caused by our society's inability to shift those dislocated into new productive work seems to indicate we (capitalism) don't have much of a plan other than "Hope the market / individual rationality fixes things eventually." Unfortunately, I think it's the timescale that's going to get us. Holding the human lifetime, initial education, and reeducation (aka time to acquire marketable skills) approximately constant while continually increasing the rate of change of those skills' relative values doesn't give rational actors enough time to course correct. Which, to summarize it coarsely, leads to people getting @$^!ed through no fault of their own, other than an inability to predict the future. "I went into management because I felt it was a human-centric role that would always be needed." (5 years later) "BREAKTHROUGH: New business description language allows for AI-driven allocation of labor and task resources!"

mncharity 10y ago
> Holding [...] initial education, and reeducation [...] approximately constant I wonder if that's one way the transition might happen faster than expected. Education improvement may someday accelerate. Startlingly so. It's widely recognized that education is working poorly at present. And that it could be working much better. But just how pervasively poorly is often underappreciated. As in some MIT graduates, given a battery, a long wire, and a bulb, have been unable to make light. And just how much better seems reachable, is hard to appreciate without watching the cutting edge of diverse fields. It's easier to see a line of bottlenecks stretching ahead, than to realize how many of them we may already know how to unlock. It's not that many students could resemble incoming Harvard undergraduates. That's a ghastly low target. It's that by the time students hit high-school bio, it's at least vaguely plausible that they can have a better understanding of biology than many current first-year Harvard Med School students. Which is admittedly another very low bar. Will it happen? Who knows. Pearson is collecting patents. And I've not seen many informed and rational actors in national public policy dialog lately. But building on an assumption that the status quo characterizes the envelope of possible progress in education, seems unnecessarily pessimistic?