4 ms·

I think the news here is that robots are NOT killing people. They seem to be MUCH safer than human involved industrial equipment. Anyone who has worked in a fac

by foxyv 3y ago

I think the news here is that robots are NOT killing people. They seem to be MUCH safer than human involved industrial equipment. Anyone who has worked in a factory probably has a story of their co-worker being sucked into a planer or their skull caved in by a forklift. Not to mention the thousands dying of chronic illnesses. The average life expectancy of welders is 50-60 years. Every welder we replace with a robot is saving 20-30 years of human life. With AI safety features we can only see the gains in human life growing. At least until the robot dogs with needles for teeth start hunting down people who read books or the justice drones start shooting protestors with exploding freedom rockets.

julianeon 3y ago
Wow, I never knew welders died young - I just thought it was a great working class profession, unfairly looked down upon. Guess I won't be recommending that to anyone: I can't justify 20-30 years of lowered life expectancy for any job.
- jabroni_salad 3y ago
  Fumes from melted metal, it'll get ya. And welding seems like a great job, you surely hear about someone's cousin making good money that does it. Everyone does, which is why there's a huge glut of talent at the entry level end struggling to find work. It is not the labor printer outsiders think it is. I guarantee you that at any given walmart you can find 3 employees there who own a welder and aren't awful with it.
mortureb 3y ago
Welders really should start wearing full P100 masks when they are working. Their issues seem to be primarily around respiratory causes.
- mindslight 3y ago
  nit: P100 is only for particulates. As DIYer I'd add an activated carbon organic vapor filter. If I were doing a lot of welding I'd research exactly what type of cartridges are appropriate for the particular materials. From the DIYer perspective you can get a good and comfortable silicone half face respirator setup for like $50. There's really no reason not to have one. I tend to favor 3M 7503 (or 7502/7501 for size), plus 60921 or 2297 (OV or not).
- snypher 3y ago
  There exists plenty of options for fume extractors but the bosses don't ever buy them.
  - mortureb 3y ago
    A welder can afford to buy a $50 mask himself- fume hood or not. Not that he should have to but you gotta protect yourself in a bad situation.
  - talldatethrow 3y ago
    I sold cars for a living. I could have bought $50 shoes, but soon I learned to buy $200 shoes that lasted longer and were better on my feet. I still bought them pretty often since I walked TONS on asphalt and concrete. No doubt I invested well over $1000 in shoes and even more on suits while I sold cars. Are you telling me a welder can't spend his own money to make his life better like I did?
shortcake27 3y ago
I find it so curious how people are perfectly happy to accept human casualties so long as it’s the the status quo / caused by a human. Every time an autonomous vehicle causes a car accident, there are many people calling to ban them. Yet when a human causes an accident, it’s “just the way it is, people need to get to work, nothing we can do about it”. Doesn’t matter if the rate of incidence is lower, people would rather have more accidents they can emphasise with. Human bias is so fascinating.
- alexb_ 3y ago
  It's not really that curious: - People put the probability of them getting involved in an accident that is their fault at 0. - People put the probability of them getting involves in an accident that is a robot's fault at >0 This is why people are afraid of flying and not driving. The agency is the big problem. If your objection is "what about others" - humans are naturally selfish and will hold whatever belief that are incentivized to.
  - talldatethrow 3y ago
    Not only that, we usually know when we're doing something risky and agree to do it. But I don't agree to let YOU do that while I'm the passenger. For example, I know driving is somewhat dangerous... But I also know that if I have my newborn in the car with me on the way home from the hospital, I am able to drive 1000x more cautiously than my typical drive to work at 6am.
- SirMaster 3y ago
  This doesn't seem hard to understand at all to me. Someone getting hurt or killed by a machine in a factory likely wasn't following the proper and ideal safety protocols for one reason or another. Lots of people are careless and don't care enough about safety rules in my experience. So it's not hard to end up with a lower number of total incidents when robot are put in charge. But for some person who is not careless and who does follow safety protocols religiously, a robot causing them harm could be outside of their own control, even if they are following all the safety protocols and are always very careful. Can you see how that could be a problem?
fakedang 3y ago
> At least until the robot dogs with needles for teeth start hunting down people who read books or the justice drones start shooting protestors with exploding freedom rockets. At our current trajectory, we're more likely to get those rather than welding robots replacing the blue collar workforce.
SirMaster 3y ago
I have no doubt that robots are safer than the average human. So overall incidents would go down. But are robots safer than all humans? Safer than the humans who religiously follow all safety protocols? It's hard to fault a person who normally operates very safely for being afraid of losing control of their equipment to a robot which could be unpredictable. Surely it's valid to worry about a robot making a deadly mistake that you wouldn't have ever made yourself.
- fatfingerd 3y ago
  If humans were rational the human average would keep going up as anyone bellow average leaves it to robots, but instead it sounds like a lot of people with illusory superiority will keep hurting themselves.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority
  - SirMaster 3y ago
    So even though overall fatal traffic accidents would go down with self-driving cars for example. You personally wouldn't be upset at all if a loved one died to a bug in the software that caused the self-driving car to make an obvious mistake that the loved one would never in a million years have made themselves? I can see how people can have concerns at least, when control it taken away.
    - fatfingerd 3y ago
      I think you should expect to die if you spend a lot of time on the road. Does it matter what bug the driver has that runs you down?
      - talldatethrow 3y ago
        Get over yourself. If you don't speed, don't drink and drive, and don't road rage, the odds of dying on the road are not that bad. Riding a motorcycle is 60x more dangerous than a car per mile. I have easily done over 100,000 miles on a sportsbike in California traffic. That's the equivalent of 6 Million miles in a car. I have had one close call in 10 years. Never even stubbed a toe on a motorcycle.
I_Am_Nous 3y ago
My dad was a pipeline welder for a long time. He smoked as well (which definitely hasn't helped his lungs) but I read a couple of years back about how pipeline companies will reuse pipes, including pipes that carried radioactive waste water from wells. Welding a radioactive contaminated pipe sounds like a bad time. My dad learned he had lung cancer because the tumor migrated to the base of his skull and started damaging his vision until he had a car accident. Then the scans revealed his lung cancer and the migrated tumor. Welding and metalwork for so many years probably played a part in his cancer. They removed 1/3rd of his right lung and now he has a metal plate in his head from getting that tumor removed. He was 63 when diagnosed, and is a stubborn old Texas Marine who is still around about 5 years later. Overall, I think he spent more time doing other work than welding, but I remember him always talking about any time he welded it always gave him black boogers.
- mushbino 3y ago
  I used to be a pipe welder and that's exactly the reason I quit. Toxic fumes, grinding dust. We could make it safer but it slightly lowers profit margins.
1letterunixname 3y ago
Then you've must've never set foot on a farm, a factory, or a construction site. There is a great deal of semi-automated and automated machines and situations that can easily you if you are unfamiliar with them.

by foxyv 3y ago

julianeon 3y ago

Wow, I never knew welders died young - I just thought it was a great working class profession, unfairly looked down upon. Guess I won't be recommending that to anyone: I can't justify 20-30 years of lowered life expectancy for any job.

jabroni_salad 3y ago
Fumes from melted metal, it'll get ya. And welding seems like a great job, you surely hear about someone's cousin making good money that does it. Everyone does, which is why there's a huge glut of talent at the entry level end struggling to find work. It is not the labor printer outsiders think it is. I guarantee you that at any given walmart you can find 3 employees there who own a welder and aren't awful with it.

mortureb 3y ago

Welders really should start wearing full P100 masks when they are working. Their issues seem to be primarily around respiratory causes.

mindslight 3y ago
nit: P100 is only for particulates. As DIYer I'd add an activated carbon organic vapor filter. If I were doing a lot of welding I'd research exactly what type of cartridges are appropriate for the particular materials. From the DIYer perspective you can get a good and comfortable silicone half face respirator setup for like $50. There's really no reason not to have one. I tend to favor 3M 7503 (or 7502/7501 for size), plus 60921 or 2297 (OV or not).
snypher 3y ago
There exists plenty of options for fume extractors but the bosses don't ever buy them.
- mortureb 3y ago
  A welder can afford to buy a $50 mask himself- fume hood or not. Not that he should have to but you gotta protect yourself in a bad situation.
- talldatethrow 3y ago
  I sold cars for a living. I could have bought $50 shoes, but soon I learned to buy $200 shoes that lasted longer and were better on my feet. I still bought them pretty often since I walked TONS on asphalt and concrete. No doubt I invested well over $1000 in shoes and even more on suits while I sold cars. Are you telling me a welder can't spend his own money to make his life better like I did?

shortcake27 3y ago

I find it so curious how people are perfectly happy to accept human casualties so long as it’s the the status quo / caused by a human. Every time an autonomous vehicle causes a car accident, there are many people calling to ban them. Yet when a human causes an accident, it’s “just the way it is, people need to get to work, nothing we can do about it”. Doesn’t matter if the rate of incidence is lower, people would rather have more accidents they can emphasise with. Human bias is so fascinating.

alexb_ 3y ago
It's not really that curious: - People put the probability of them getting involved in an accident that is their fault at 0. - People put the probability of them getting involves in an accident that is a robot's fault at >0 This is why people are afraid of flying and not driving. The agency is the big problem. If your objection is "what about others" - humans are naturally selfish and will hold whatever belief that are incentivized to.
- talldatethrow 3y ago
  Not only that, we usually know when we're doing something risky and agree to do it. But I don't agree to let YOU do that while I'm the passenger. For example, I know driving is somewhat dangerous... But I also know that if I have my newborn in the car with me on the way home from the hospital, I am able to drive 1000x more cautiously than my typical drive to work at 6am.
SirMaster 3y ago
This doesn't seem hard to understand at all to me. Someone getting hurt or killed by a machine in a factory likely wasn't following the proper and ideal safety protocols for one reason or another. Lots of people are careless and don't care enough about safety rules in my experience. So it's not hard to end up with a lower number of total incidents when robot are put in charge. But for some person who is not careless and who does follow safety protocols religiously, a robot causing them harm could be outside of their own control, even if they are following all the safety protocols and are always very careful. Can you see how that could be a problem?

fakedang 3y ago

> At least until the robot dogs with needles for teeth start hunting down people who read books or the justice drones start shooting protestors with exploding freedom rockets. At our current trajectory, we're more likely to get those rather than welding robots replacing the blue collar workforce.

SirMaster 3y ago

I have no doubt that robots are safer than the average human. So overall incidents would go down. But are robots safer than all humans? Safer than the humans who religiously follow all safety protocols? It's hard to fault a person who normally operates very safely for being afraid of losing control of their equipment to a robot which could be unpredictable. Surely it's valid to worry about a robot making a deadly mistake that you wouldn't have ever made yourself.

fatfingerd 3y ago
If humans were rational the human average would keep going up as anyone bellow average leaves it to robots, but instead it sounds like a lot of people with illusory superiority will keep hurting themselves.. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illusory_superiority
- SirMaster 3y ago
  So even though overall fatal traffic accidents would go down with self-driving cars for example. You personally wouldn't be upset at all if a loved one died to a bug in the software that caused the self-driving car to make an obvious mistake that the loved one would never in a million years have made themselves? I can see how people can have concerns at least, when control it taken away.
  - fatfingerd 3y ago
    I think you should expect to die if you spend a lot of time on the road. Does it matter what bug the driver has that runs you down?
    - talldatethrow 3y ago
      Get over yourself. If you don't speed, don't drink and drive, and don't road rage, the odds of dying on the road are not that bad. Riding a motorcycle is 60x more dangerous than a car per mile. I have easily done over 100,000 miles on a sportsbike in California traffic. That's the equivalent of 6 Million miles in a car. I have had one close call in 10 years. Never even stubbed a toe on a motorcycle.

I_Am_Nous 3y ago

My dad was a pipeline welder for a long time. He smoked as well (which definitely hasn't helped his lungs) but I read a couple of years back about how pipeline companies will reuse pipes, including pipes that carried radioactive waste water from wells. Welding a radioactive contaminated pipe sounds like a bad time. My dad learned he had lung cancer because the tumor migrated to the base of his skull and started damaging his vision until he had a car accident. Then the scans revealed his lung cancer and the migrated tumor. Welding and metalwork for so many years probably played a part in his cancer. They removed 1/3rd of his right lung and now he has a metal plate in his head from getting that tumor removed. He was 63 when diagnosed, and is a stubborn old Texas Marine who is still around about 5 years later. Overall, I think he spent more time doing other work than welding, but I remember him always talking about any time he welded it always gave him black boogers.

mushbino 3y ago
I used to be a pipe welder and that's exactly the reason I quit. Toxic fumes, grinding dust. We could make it safer but it slightly lowers profit margins.

1letterunixname 3y ago

Then you've must've never set foot on a farm, a factory, or a construction site. There is a great deal of semi-automated and automated machines and situations that can easily you if you are unfamiliar with them.