20 ms·

While this iteration of the product seems like it is not ready for prime time, a couple more years of improvements and you could have a machine able to reliably

• chooseaname 7y ago
  > We really should be having an urgent conversation on how to handle this and what the responsibility of those that own the means of production will be (if any) when this occurs. The problem with that is the people who would be in a position to make change don't feel the constriction of the immediacy of it and those who do are rarely invited to the table to talk.
  • anchpop 7y ago
    Some people in the democratic debates are bringing it up, at least
  • pixl97 7y ago
    Just go for the one job that's not apt to be automated soon... guillotine assembler.
    • richk449 7y ago
      Hmmm. Make money selling blades? No, I got a better idea - give away the guillotine, make money selling the blades. Or perhaps a subscription model for the blades? Probably the best option is decapitation as a service.
  • anigbrowl 7y ago
    Just change the ownership rules, the old concept of private property is clearly nonsensical for the same reason that the game of Monopoly was meant to be a warning, not a tutorial.
    • anigbrowl 7y ago
      I don't mind people downvoting but you're not gonna tell me that people with the 18th century had timeless wisdom that allowed them to extrapolate to today's economy in the 21st century and appreciate all the problems of resource allocation, externalities, and financial markets. If your principles are implicitly predicated on infinite land and labor availability then its possible your understanding of economics is kinda primitive.
      • maccam94 7y ago
        Technically we do have infinite land and labor, there's just a step function in cost.
        • anigbrowl 7y ago
          Sure, perhaps we will solve by shrinking ourselves down like the ants did to effectively expand our territory while reducing our footprint. It's clear that our current large size is economically inefficient.
          • maccam94 7y ago
            I was referring to expanding out into space.
      • fragmede 7y ago
        Our ancestors in the 18th century didn't have a time machine, but neither were they stupid. Our view of economics is going to look similarly primitive in 300-400 years. The notion that jobs, and thus work, was going to disappear has been a theme since the Industrial Revolution began, in the late 18th century. A treatise from that time period on how to avoid a depression is certainly suspect, but the crash in 2008 wasn't so long ago, so it's not our understanding of market forces is 100% either. (To be fair, our understanding did allow us to recover from it, in an imperfect way.) We still don't have a better answer as to what the displaced will do for work than we did in the 18th century, other than "oh, we'll create new jobs". Not comforting, especially to anyone that simply can't afford to go to a coding bootcamp, or those that have gone and dropped out. They, too, deserve not to starve or die in the gutter. Thus, there is wisdom from the 1800's that is relevant, even today.
  • mrhappyunhappy 7y ago
    Yang is advocating on their behalf, even if they don’t know what’s coming.
• abfan1127 7y ago
  you do know we've been replacing humans with machines since the Industrial revolution, right? These people that were replaced didn't just go off and die. They found other more advanced work, allowing our civilization to produce more wealth allowing all of us to be richer. The same will continue.
  • mdpye 7y ago
    Well... the generation after them do, anyway. The actual people who were actually made redundant in each wave don't generally fare that well.
  • QualityReboot 7y ago
    Right, that's historically been true for humans because we are pattern recognition workhorses. We have some other examples worth considering though, like literal workhorses. Once the engine came around, horses became inefficient and were relegated to shows and races. With AI able to do superhuman pattern recognition, it's only a matter of time before humans also become a luxury, as they're no longer needed for traditional work.
    • HenryKissinger 7y ago
      > traditional work In a lot of data science focused places, like mine, people are more or less researchers. There is no repetitive work, and everyone must show creativity and autonomy. You can't automate that.
      • potta_coffee 7y ago
        And not everyone is capable of such work. What about average people who don't really have the facility to become data scientists?
        • HenryKissinger 7y ago
          Given the fact that the economy is at full employment and that there are more job openings than people looking for a job, I'm not too worried at the moment.
• alexis_fr 7y ago
  How is the AI revolution different from the industrial revolution(s)? A farmer in 1700 would have seen the 1880 machine and said « We’ll all lose our jobs »... and he’d be right. Also « and money will be centralized in the hands of the factory owner ». He’d be right too. « We’ll never be able to make everyone learn ti read and work in a desk job ». Right again. We just raised everyone’s education, and also raised everyone’s IQ in levels that would seem impossible to a 1700 farmer. We’ve also have the underside: poverty for those who can’t get office jobs and socialism to try level the field. Similarly it seems to us like we’ll all lose our jobs to AI, wealth will be concentrated by 99% more and we’ll never be clever enough to make each of us an AI scientist. That’s what it seems today. You can call to regulate but it’s hard to know in which direction. After all, we had to spend 2 centuries of wars and famines till we figured a merely stable system, and even today, we wouldn’t stand upright if we didn’t rely on Chinese workers being poor. So all the regulation in the world didn’t suppress any problem, we just put it out of sight. I see no difference between the scale of the AI revolution and the scale of the industrial revolution.
  • tryitnow 7y ago
    I assume the counter-argument is that this time change is happening faster since it's driven by intangibles like code. It took a long time for the effects of the first industrial revolution to spread out because transportation was slower, the world's communication infrastructure was not as developed, etc. But honestly, I could see both sides of the argument here.
  • petra 7y ago
    >> You can call to regulate but it’s hard to know in which direction. Sure, there are risks in everything. So we'll take no responsibility and just wait to see what the worst that can happens ? You know, historians believe that the two world wars are deeply connected to the industrial revolution?
  • mdorazio 7y ago
    The difference is three fold: 1) Speed. The industrial revolution took place relatively slowly, over the course of 60-80 years (2-3 entire generations). Once a tipping point in automation is reached, it will very likely happen extremely quickly in our connected, easy-capital, globally competitive economy. 2) Reach. The industrial revolution primarily impacted manufacturing and to some extent farming. Today's automation is attacking almost every single major industry on the planet at the same time. Farming, manufacturing, finance, construction, food service, you name it. If your warehouse picker job gets automated away it's unlikely you'll be able to go get a job at Burger King because those jobs will be automating at about the same time. 3) New economies. The Industrial Revolution led to the industrial economy, which enabled the service/information economy. It's unclear what new economy is waiting beyond automation for the workers who lose out. Entertainment economy? Personal servant economy? What's left if most of the manual labor jobs and a good chunk of white collar jobs all go away within a generation?
• CriticalCathed 7y ago
  I mean we already have way better automation for pizza making and at huge scale and efficiency -- that's what frozen pizzas are with few exceptions. And some of these are great; safeway brand rising crust pizza is pretty damn good and can be had for as little as $3 a pie. The machine in the video kind of sucks. Slow, one pizza at a time, poor control of amount and placement of toppings, poor consistency, lots of waste with toppings flying off everywhere. I don't think machines are going to be putting pizza places out of business. The margins are already quite high, and paying one guy to sling pies at a restaurant and get high quality product isn't a huge expense. Maybe a place like little Caesars would use this tech but local pizza joints? nah
  • chillacy 7y ago
    The article mentions that the killer feature is that this machine can fit in a restaurant and presumably make better tasting fresh pizzas.
• petra 7y ago
  The thing is: robot videos are viral. That doesn't mean white collar jobs, even those that are high-skilled aren't at big risk. You just need to look at the rate AI is advancing, the amounts of startups and money aiming at white collar jobs, and what's waiting in research.
  • wasdfff 7y ago
    Be hired for your brain and not your hands. AI will never be able to think creatively.
    • X6S1x6Okd1st 7y ago
      Why do you believe that?
    • mdorazio 7y ago
      On the other hand, thinking creatively is often discouraged at the majority of bigco white collar jobs and executives would gladly replace an expensive person with cheaper software doing the same task if they could do so without tripping on labor laws.
      • MagnumPIG 7y ago
        Managers themselves often don't realize how much money automation could save them. Perhaps their role could be automated away ;)
        • porknubbins 7y ago
          With the amount of mind numbing easily automated work I’ve done in my career I wonder if they don’t realize or there is some kind of tacit social contract not to cause mass unemployment. Because companies could replace like 50% of office workers if they were willing to redesign their processes.
          • WrtCdEvrydy 7y ago
• badrabbit 7y ago
  Four year degrees need a re-evaluation. A lot of alternative entry level jobs that are hard to automate exist but they have a reasonable degree requirement. A two year job specific degree and a restructuring of higher education is needed.
  • ribosometronome 7y ago
    Why only re-evaluate non-high school degrees? Career oriented education could start significantly early. There's no real reason why 16-18 year olds couldn't already be appropriately skilled to work in many fields save individual maturity. My big priority would be ensuring continuing access to education. Schooling that pushes certain students toward skilled blue collar work seems potentially a little classist if folk aren't given the appropriate opportunities to achieve something else, if they want it, throughout life.
  • chillacy 7y ago
    This is a pretty good point, a lot of the trades are hard for machines to automate: plumbing, HVAC repair, solar installation, etc.
  • anticensor 7y ago
    Vocational schools giving associate degrees do exist.
    • badrabbit 7y ago
      I meant for normal 4 year degrees. For example CS!
      • anticensor 7y ago
        I agree. Associate's degrees on Informatics (including intermediate level computer science and introductory MIS) might be useful but do not exist. Associate-level Programmer's degree and Computer Technician's degree do, though.
• toephu2 7y ago
  That is called progress. Ever hear of the Industrial Revolution? There will always be jobs. AI won't be able to do everything, we are far off from that world. Think about it, it's the year 2019 and we can't even invent a robot to separate plastic bags from normal trash.
  • johnday 7y ago
    > There will always be jobs. Yes, but there will be fewer jobs. That's a problem. The industrial revolution removed a large number of jobs (basic manufacturing skills) and created a load more (advanced manufacturing skills / logistics / etc.). There is no expectation or even hope of a new class of jobs coming out of the high-power automation that we are liable to see in the next couple of decades.
    • muzz 7y ago
      Fewer jobs in that area. Jobs will be created elsewhere because human wants are endless.
      • chillacy 7y ago
        Last wave of automation took out millions of manufacturing workers. Instead of retraining to become software engineers they largely went on disability and then as a cohort started dying of drug overdoses and suicides at higher than normal rates. Most of the new jobs created in the past 10 years are temporary / gig jobs without benefits, nothing like the manufacturing jobs lost. So, great opportunities for some, but many will suffer.
        • burntoutfire 7y ago
          Just as a side note, but I wouldn't in any way idealize the manufacturing jobs that were lost. A lot of them were so horrible that the new hires quit in the first day (often just not coming back from a break). I'd probably prefer to be an Uber driver than to work in a car factory.
  • 7y ago
• bobloblaw45 7y ago
  >While this iteration of the product seems like it is not ready for prime time Yeah just looking at it I couldn't stop myself from imagining how nasty it's bound to get after getting put to work full time. Too many nooks and crannies and it would need to be easy to tear down and put together again for cleaning.
• perl4ever 7y ago
  "a couple more years of improvements and you could have a machine able to reliably do the work of 2- 3 employees" I see frozen uncooked pizza in stores. I feel like it existed 20-30 years ago too although I'm not sure exactly. Surely these are not hand made. Whenever I read about impending automation, I wonder which millennium I'm in.
  • caf 7y ago
    I feel like there's a lot fewer SKUs involved in store frozen pizza than varieties available from a takeaway pizza store, and the volumes are also a lot higher. So the trick might not be "cheaply and reliably automate making a fifty thousand a day of the same pizza" , but in the detail of "cheaply and reliably automate making a pizza, composed of any combination of the basic ingredients, but only amortised over a hundred an hour for a few hours each day".
    • nefitty 7y ago
      That's an interesting point. Does that mean you think a chain like Little Caesars, that offers about 4 types of "Hot N Ready" pizzas could basically automate away most of its workforce? If frozen pizza is possible, it seems really weird that no one has pursued this vigorously already.
      • ukyrgf 7y ago
        I've only been to Little Caesars a few times recently, but in none of those experiences did I see more than a single young (hourly) employee running the entire operation.
      • thaumasiotes 7y ago
        > Does that mean you think a chain like Little Caesars, that offers about 4 types of "Hot N Ready" pizzas could basically automate away most of its workforce? If frozen pizza is possible, it seems really weird that no one has pursued this vigorously already. Little Caesar's entire business model is "the lowest quality pizza at the lowest possible price". I assume they already have automated away most of their workforce; given a minimum wage, that's a key part of low prices.
• DickingAround 7y ago
  First, I get there's a lot of people supposedly looking for work but I've spent a solid 20 years now in a "we are constrained on labor" environment across a few industries. I think this is a problem more of what work people are able or willing to do rather than the existence of jobs themselves. Second, the concept of "means of production" is now not just about the factory the workers work in but the factory that makes things on it's own. We have to accept that if someone else owns something, if they have property rights over it, it just isn't mine no matter how much I want it. If I own a breadmaker machine and it makes me bread anytime I want, I still don't owe anyone my bread no matter how much they want or need it. They can ask. They can't take. A person might ask "why can't they take? what goes wrong when they have a right to your bread?" The answer is that without strong property rights, we fight over who gets to own eachother's stuff instead of making new stuff for ourselves. Making new stuff instead of trying to take someone else's stuff is how we have more stuff. And before anyone says we don't need any more stuff; If you don't need any more stuff, don't take anyone else's. I disagree; I want more stuff. I want a space ship. But I'm not going to try and take bread from another or a space ship from another. I'll have to find a way to buy or build my bread or space ship.
  • zanny 7y ago
    Except the strawman of abject simple property rights falls apart when you acknowledge that taxes, especially sales / capital gains / etc, are the absolute and certain forfeiture of your property - your money - to the government, to almost exclusively be given to others. Societies are erected on a foundation of the seizure of private asset for public benefit. If you own the breadmaker machine, what is the difference between the seizure of bread and a 100% tax on your revenues of said bread?
• clarkmoody 7y ago
  The best thing we can do is to allow the labor market to be more dynamic. This means reducing barriers to entry, including licensing, employer-mandated benefits, minimum wage, etc. Placing minimum employee costs upon an employer or minimum qualifications upon an employee both have the same effect: reducing the ability of entry-level employees to get work. Either the jobs don't exist due to minimum costs, or the labor that qualifies demands too high a wage. A highly-restricted labor market doesn't make any sense in an ever-changing global economy.
• avip 7y ago
  I was with you up until picking crops. Have you ever actually picked a crop? It's an extremely complex problem. For the bulky crops (s.a corn) we've had machines for decades. For fruits... we're decades away from automation.
  • patrickk 7y ago
    Fruit picking robots are being worked on, strawberries if I remember correctly. Search for strawberry picking robot. It’s possible thanks to advances in computer vision.
• axilmar 7y ago
  Here in Greece Souvlaki is the most common form of fast food. Its creation can be completely automated very easily. Lots of Greek people work in the fast food industry in Greece; they are in for a big surprise in the near future.
• GarrisonPrime 7y ago
  That you even thought it relevant to mention "those that own the mens of production" makes it clear what you think their responsibility will be.
• dalbasal 7y ago
  "entry level jobs like fast food / picking crops / warehouses" These things are very hard to predict. We have a long history of such "automations" and the outcomes have been often unpredictable. Effectively, "automation" is interchangeable with any labour saving tech. Production lines, tractors, etc. Agriculture basically did shed jobs due to the green revolution and mechanisation. Fewer farmers grew the food and people moved to towns. You could argue that towns pulled agricultural workers in rather than automation pushing, but machines replaced people regardless. Industrial manufacturing, OTOH, increased output and added jobs to the sector for hundreds of years despite labour saving "automation" progressing constantly. It's only recently that manufacturing employment plateaued. Global trade and other shifts have caused some severe job shedding locally, but even that is only in the last 30-40 years. The long term trend was more automation and more jobs. Computers landed on every desk very fast. Typists, mailrooms, secretaries and other such "entry" jobs became mostly obsolete. Still, the "white collar" and administration sectors experienced massive employment growth since the 80s. Think of colleges, with their ever rising admins/academics ratio even as "administration automation" technologies became available. When it comes to something like automating restaurants it's so dependant on "consumer preferences" and food culture that I wouldn't hazard any guesses. Prepared food isn't a commodity and restaurants aren't driven by efficiency. There's no hard, purely rational reason why one burger is worth €3 and another is worth €20. McDonald's us extremely efficient, in terms of labour cost per bite, but most newer competitors compete by being less "efficient" and more "artisinal."
  • speby 7y ago
    Couldn't agree more. It is highly unpredictable. We tend to get antsy about the entry level jobs and quickly jumping to some conclusion where if you're currently doing the toppings at Domino's pizza by hand and Domino's replaces you with this machine, that you suddenly will have nothing to do but go home and lay on the couch all day while being unemployed. There are many things someone in such a situation may decide to do next and that "next" thing for that person is what could be unpredictable. And if tens of thousands of these people were replaced over a several year period, each of them making individual decisions about what to do next, it is hard to say where they all end up. We simply don't know.