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More and more we are seeing "the computer says no" in our lives. We've replaced human activity and decision making with computerized versions, which are nothing

by bmitc 5y ago

More and more we are seeing "the computer says no" in our lives. We've replaced human activity and decision making with computerized versions, which are nothing more than the automation of stored human knowledge and routines.

sofixa 5y ago
A much more efficient automation. For instance, running high speed rail without computer signalling would be a huge risk there's no sense in taking ( due to the speeds involved, by the time you see anything of issue like a train or damage in the tracks in front, it's too late to stop).
- bmitc 5y ago
  I think that's a bit of a leap from what I was saying. I didn't imply that all software and computation is bad. Obviously, a human cannot live handle any control system that needs even remotely fast operation. The point is that due to scaling issues, we're removing humans from systems where humans excel or could serve as backups in the event of failure (and actually vice versa). Scale creates problems that are partially solved via software systems, which only handle a subset of the existing variety and new variety introduced by scaling. This makes the systems leaky with regards to unhandled variety and incredibly rigid (i.e., not robust) against exceptions, exceptions that could often be readily be handled by humans. By software being a snapshot of some small group of humans' knowledge of a system, it is completely unable to respond to live operational exceptions. Stafford Beer's work is interesting background on this type of thing. > A much more efficient automation. There are many, many examples where that is both not true and true. For the not true cases, just see literally any customer service interaction with a large company in the past half decade. I suppose this could be arguable though if one asks the question "efficient for who?".
  - tsimionescu 5y ago
    > There are many, many examples where that is both not true and true. For the not true cases, just see literally any customer service interaction with a large company in the past half decade. I suppose this could be arguable though if one asks the question "efficient for who?". Another example I love, that is even less ambiguous, is restaurants (traditional, not fast food) that require waiters to take orders on touchscreen PoS systems, instead of taking the orders on a notepad and inputting them later. The touch screens are incredibly slower on a bigger party ordering appetizers, a main course, drinks and desert - it takes forever to navigate back and forth and find the right item, and usually has to be done again and again for each diner. By comparison, a notepad allows the waiter to write down exactly what they hear, often just making small extra notes to indicate duplicate items. Of course, this particular one could be improved by arranging the menus more naturally for someone taking orders, and several other conveniences (such as always keeping the current order on screen, to easily tap to add "oh, and another beer for me", "I'll have the same desert as her" etc).
burntoutfire 5y ago
A couple years ago, politicians in Poland wanted to do a quick change to the country's universal pension system. The change had to be quick to score some kind of political win. They wrote the new law and went on with quickly pushing it through parliament. To their surprise, sometime along the legislative process , the contractor responsible for maintenance and changes in the pension system informed them that they can indeed implement the change - by June next year. The politicians learned that, in the mordern computerized world, just passing a new law does not change how the state bureucracy operates.
- throwaway48375 5y ago
  Could they not make it retroactive?
  - burntoutfire 5y ago
    Yes possibly, but the whole point was for people to get more money into their pockets ASAP (as opposed of just a promise of more money in the future, which has lesser impact), so that they feel gratitude come elections day.

by bmitc 5y ago

sofixa 5y ago

A much more efficient automation. For instance, running high speed rail without computer signalling would be a huge risk there's no sense in taking ( due to the speeds involved, by the time you see anything of issue like a train or damage in the tracks in front, it's too late to stop).

bmitc 5y ago
I think that's a bit of a leap from what I was saying. I didn't imply that all software and computation is bad. Obviously, a human cannot live handle any control system that needs even remotely fast operation. The point is that due to scaling issues, we're removing humans from systems where humans excel or could serve as backups in the event of failure (and actually vice versa). Scale creates problems that are partially solved via software systems, which only handle a subset of the existing variety and new variety introduced by scaling. This makes the systems leaky with regards to unhandled variety and incredibly rigid (i.e., not robust) against exceptions, exceptions that could often be readily be handled by humans. By software being a snapshot of some small group of humans' knowledge of a system, it is completely unable to respond to live operational exceptions. Stafford Beer's work is interesting background on this type of thing. > A much more efficient automation. There are many, many examples where that is both not true and true. For the not true cases, just see literally any customer service interaction with a large company in the past half decade. I suppose this could be arguable though if one asks the question "efficient for who?".
- tsimionescu 5y ago
  > There are many, many examples where that is both not true and true. For the not true cases, just see literally any customer service interaction with a large company in the past half decade. I suppose this could be arguable though if one asks the question "efficient for who?". Another example I love, that is even less ambiguous, is restaurants (traditional, not fast food) that require waiters to take orders on touchscreen PoS systems, instead of taking the orders on a notepad and inputting them later. The touch screens are incredibly slower on a bigger party ordering appetizers, a main course, drinks and desert - it takes forever to navigate back and forth and find the right item, and usually has to be done again and again for each diner. By comparison, a notepad allows the waiter to write down exactly what they hear, often just making small extra notes to indicate duplicate items. Of course, this particular one could be improved by arranging the menus more naturally for someone taking orders, and several other conveniences (such as always keeping the current order on screen, to easily tap to add "oh, and another beer for me", "I'll have the same desert as her" etc).

burntoutfire 5y ago

A couple years ago, politicians in Poland wanted to do a quick change to the country's universal pension system. The change had to be quick to score some kind of political win. They wrote the new law and went on with quickly pushing it through parliament. To their surprise, sometime along the legislative process , the contractor responsible for maintenance and changes in the pension system informed them that they can indeed implement the change - by June next year. The politicians learned that, in the mordern computerized world, just passing a new law does not change how the state bureucracy operates.

throwaway48375 5y ago
Could they not make it retroactive?
- burntoutfire 5y ago
  Yes possibly, but the whole point was for people to get more money into their pockets ASAP (as opposed of just a promise of more money in the future, which has lesser impact), so that they feel gratitude come elections day.