4 ms·

It is not without irony that AI is going to replace the radiologist before the cleaning lady. First field of expertise requires specialized knowledge (which AI

It is not without irony that AI is going to replace the radiologist before the cleaning lady. First field of expertise requires specialized knowledge (which AI is great at) latter requires general intelligence (which requires Artificial general intelligence and is much harder)

govg 9y ago
Well, Roombas do exist...
- rbanffy 9y ago
  They don't clean walls. Or toilets.
  - myth_drannon 9y ago
    Or corners and stairs
    - coldcode 9y ago
      Or floors full of toys.
      - qbrass 9y ago
        Or dog poo.
  - skywhopper 9y ago
    Or corners, or windows, or sinks, or counters, or stoves, or bathtubs. Nor do they take out the trash, or even dump their own waste into the trash. Nor can they do the laundry or the dishes or dust, or fold towels, or go up and down stairs...
  - dsfyu404ed 9y ago
    That's just a hardware problem. With Roomba quality software a blower, an electric pressure washer, a few soap reservoirs, valves and maybe a squeegee can do the majority (by time) of a janitor's job in a bathroom more thoroughly. Being able to press "go" and have it find the floor drain, wash-down everything in the room below a set height and then herd all the water to the floor drain with the squeegee and blower and make a noise when it's done or needs to be refilled. You're not replacing the janitor just narrowing the scope of their job. Putting up the toilet seats and letting a robot foam and pressure wash them down with some chemical you can't sell in California (so you know it must be good) is a big improvement over cleaning toilets manually, especially for anyone with back problems.
- ThomPete 9y ago
  They are a far cry from what you need to do actual cleaning in any professional sense.
taneq 9y ago
I bet an AI would be much more likely than a janitor to know about Moravec's paradox.
- ThomPete 9y ago
  Know about it? I’ll take that bet. Plenty of smart janitors out there.
  - taneq 9y ago
    Do you know many? I don't mean the janitors at Google who are probably qualified software devs who are also Google fanboys and are using it as a foot in the door. I mean genuine blue-collar never-worked-in-anything-but-manual-labour cleaners. I know a few. They're really good people, but the ones I know aren't book-smart in the same way that we are lucky enough to be, who get to sit around reading everything we can find on the internet.
    - ThomPete 9y ago
      Yes i know many, cleaning people too. You do know that being a bluecollar worker doesent make you dumb or ignorant and cant be booksmart right? Furthermore how many ais do you know that know about movarec let alone the paradox. How many normal academics do you know who know movarec?
cvsh 9y ago
My mom is a radiologist nearing retirement and from the time we were old enough to seriously consider career paths she would tell us "Do not become a radiologist". As she tells it, the reason is outsourcing. Radiology is probably the single easiest medical field to outsource, and more and more of her office's work has been contracted out to doctors in India over time. She doesn't consider AI as much of a threat... but I don't think she fully understands the leaps and bounds by which software is getting better at detecting patterns in images. As a software developer, I know that my field is still in its infancy. I wonder what it's like to look back on your profession, knowing your generation is the last of its kind.
- ThomPete 9y ago
  Yeah your moms intuition is correct but yeah perhaps she don't get just how far ML/DL is (most people aren't really) Image/pattern recognition is already being used intensively and the only thing that keeps it from being used more is legislation and humans. Having more than a thousand moles and having had two melanomas I am still hoping for the arrival of a system that can do complete scan of me and automatically figure out the areas of concern. Currently I am at Sloan Memorial and using Molesafe as a more manual way to do the same. My dermatologist on of the best with regards to melanomas in the world using colonoscopy to see if there are any melanomic cells, there is even a 3model of me in blue spedos. But I really would feel much better when they start taking the shots regularly and have the computer look for the odd ones out.
  - cvsh 9y ago
    I just really can't imagine, given the progression we see in AI image recognition on a daily basis these days, that medical fields like dermatology or radiology that revolve around scrutinizing things visually will continue to exist in anything but a dramatically shrunk supervisory form 20-30 years from now.
    - ThomPete 9y ago
      Neither can my dermatologists :)

govg 9y ago

Well, Roombas do exist...

rbanffy 9y ago
They don't clean walls. Or toilets.
- myth_drannon 9y ago
  Or corners and stairs
  - coldcode 9y ago
    Or floors full of toys.
    - qbrass 9y ago
      Or dog poo.
- skywhopper 9y ago
  Or corners, or windows, or sinks, or counters, or stoves, or bathtubs. Nor do they take out the trash, or even dump their own waste into the trash. Nor can they do the laundry or the dishes or dust, or fold towels, or go up and down stairs...
- dsfyu404ed 9y ago
  That's just a hardware problem. With Roomba quality software a blower, an electric pressure washer, a few soap reservoirs, valves and maybe a squeegee can do the majority (by time) of a janitor's job in a bathroom more thoroughly. Being able to press "go" and have it find the floor drain, wash-down everything in the room below a set height and then herd all the water to the floor drain with the squeegee and blower and make a noise when it's done or needs to be refilled. You're not replacing the janitor just narrowing the scope of their job. Putting up the toilet seats and letting a robot foam and pressure wash them down with some chemical you can't sell in California (so you know it must be good) is a big improvement over cleaning toilets manually, especially for anyone with back problems.
ThomPete 9y ago
They are a far cry from what you need to do actual cleaning in any professional sense.

taneq 9y ago

I bet an AI would be much more likely than a janitor to know about Moravec's paradox.

ThomPete 9y ago
Know about it? I’ll take that bet. Plenty of smart janitors out there.
- taneq 9y ago
  Do you know many? I don't mean the janitors at Google who are probably qualified software devs who are also Google fanboys and are using it as a foot in the door. I mean genuine blue-collar never-worked-in-anything-but-manual-labour cleaners. I know a few. They're really good people, but the ones I know aren't book-smart in the same way that we are lucky enough to be, who get to sit around reading everything we can find on the internet.
  - ThomPete 9y ago
    Yes i know many, cleaning people too. You do know that being a bluecollar worker doesent make you dumb or ignorant and cant be booksmart right? Furthermore how many ais do you know that know about movarec let alone the paradox. How many normal academics do you know who know movarec?

cvsh 9y ago

My mom is a radiologist nearing retirement and from the time we were old enough to seriously consider career paths she would tell us "Do not become a radiologist". As she tells it, the reason is outsourcing. Radiology is probably the single easiest medical field to outsource, and more and more of her office's work has been contracted out to doctors in India over time. She doesn't consider AI as much of a threat... but I don't think she fully understands the leaps and bounds by which software is getting better at detecting patterns in images. As a software developer, I know that my field is still in its infancy. I wonder what it's like to look back on your profession, knowing your generation is the last of its kind.

ThomPete 9y ago
Yeah your moms intuition is correct but yeah perhaps she don't get just how far ML/DL is (most people aren't really) Image/pattern recognition is already being used intensively and the only thing that keeps it from being used more is legislation and humans. Having more than a thousand moles and having had two melanomas I am still hoping for the arrival of a system that can do complete scan of me and automatically figure out the areas of concern. Currently I am at Sloan Memorial and using Molesafe as a more manual way to do the same. My dermatologist on of the best with regards to melanomas in the world using colonoscopy to see if there are any melanomic cells, there is even a 3model of me in blue spedos. But I really would feel much better when they start taking the shots regularly and have the computer look for the odd ones out.
- cvsh 9y ago
  I just really can't imagine, given the progression we see in AI image recognition on a daily basis these days, that medical fields like dermatology or radiology that revolve around scrutinizing things visually will continue to exist in anything but a dramatically shrunk supervisory form 20-30 years from now.
  - ThomPete 9y ago
    Neither can my dermatologists :)