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I think the broad consensus was AI would replace Manual, Knowledge and Creative workers in that order. Seems to be trending the other way. Recently seen more

I think the broad consensus was AI would replace Manual, Knowledge and Creative workers in that order. Seems to be trending the other way. Recently seen more tele-operational solutions in robotics space to replace or compliment manual labour. There seems to be something to this where full automation is not feasible or where it fails and needs recovery.

rickdeckard 4y ago
Maybe we are also seeing a revision for the definition of "creative" work. Executing a task like "I want a pic of a doplhin jumping out of the sunset with a cereal box, winking at the camera" is maybe not going to be in the same bracket of other creative work in the future...
pessimizer 4y ago
> Seems to be trending the other way. Their order never made any sense anyway. Manual laborers are doing the most complicated, varied, movements optimized over time. Every new movement for a robot requires more mechanical creativity and introduces more fragility. Knowledge and creative workers click on things and type stuff. Manual workers are expected to maintain themselves, generally don't get any health insurance, and if they get damaged are expected to repair themselves or be replaced. Complicated machines break down and require specialized maintenance and repair from highly skilled professionals. You can also pay knowledge and creative workers trash, but their output is very slow compared to the machines that will replace them. Manual workers can be abused and ignored, and if they roll their eyes about it, fired without cause. If you have a robot, that is now the center of your business, and if the robot isn't happy, no one is happy. Knowledge and creative workers are more likely to kick up a stink when abused. Manual workers and robots complement each other, raising productivity. As knowledge workers and creatives start working with ML tools instead of Creative Suite and MS Office, it will gradually become harder and harder to justify why the robots need the artist's help; you can be a good photographer by taking a good photograph, or you can be a good photographer by traveling to interesting places, taking 1000 photographs, and choosing the one you like best. ML gives us the analog of the latter case for free. It really comes down to the fact that maintaining complicated machinery (to replace a manual worker) is a lot more expensive than maintaining a bunch of commodity servers (to replace a knowledge worker.)

rickdeckard 4y ago

Maybe we are also seeing a revision for the definition of "creative" work. Executing a task like "I want a pic of a doplhin jumping out of the sunset with a cereal box, winking at the camera" is maybe not going to be in the same bracket of other creative work in the future...

pessimizer 4y ago

> Seems to be trending the other way. Their order never made any sense anyway. Manual laborers are doing the most complicated, varied, movements optimized over time. Every new movement for a robot requires more mechanical creativity and introduces more fragility. Knowledge and creative workers click on things and type stuff. Manual workers are expected to maintain themselves, generally don't get any health insurance, and if they get damaged are expected to repair themselves or be replaced. Complicated machines break down and require specialized maintenance and repair from highly skilled professionals. You can also pay knowledge and creative workers trash, but their output is very slow compared to the machines that will replace them. Manual workers can be abused and ignored, and if they roll their eyes about it, fired without cause. If you have a robot, that is now the center of your business, and if the robot isn't happy, no one is happy. Knowledge and creative workers are more likely to kick up a stink when abused. Manual workers and robots complement each other, raising productivity. As knowledge workers and creatives start working with ML tools instead of Creative Suite and MS Office, it will gradually become harder and harder to justify why the robots need the artist's help; you can be a good photographer by taking a good photograph, or you can be a good photographer by traveling to interesting places, taking 1000 photographs, and choosing the one you like best. ML gives us the analog of the latter case for free. It really comes down to the fact that maintaining complicated machinery (to replace a manual worker) is a lot more expensive than maintaining a bunch of commodity servers (to replace a knowledge worker.)