No, because computers can't tell clients that "you're fucking stupid for pissing your money away like that because you won't use the policies that we've formulated on your behalf" with a degree of tact.
― I've seen it in your eyes and I've read it in blogs (King Boy Pato), Sunday, 1 May 2011 11:34 (thirteen years ago) link
I am a computer programmer. My current job is to find ways to automate processes that a lot of the end users would probably be surprised to hear needed someone to work on instead of them just working by magic.
So, someone's still got to do that for these supercomputers, I guess. But on the other hand, in my current case, the end users are pretty much right - even basic, obvious things have been a surprising pain in the arse to get automated. So my current specific job definitely contains large elements that a computer really ought to be able to do.
― russ conway's game of life (a passing spacecadet), Sunday, 1 May 2011 12:16 (thirteen years ago) link
in the year 2400, computers will be the aristocracy
― suge knight rider (Neanderthal), Sunday, 1 May 2011 12:17 (thirteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.
― System, Monday, 2 May 2011 23:01 (thirteen years ago) link
my job bumping this thread was done by a powerful computer
― iatee, Tuesday, 3 May 2011 00:19 (thirteen years ago) link
Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.
― System, Tuesday, 3 May 2011 23:01 (thirteen years ago) link
so I guess 27 / 58 of us will have full-time jobs
― iatee, Wednesday, 4 May 2011 01:05 (thirteen years ago) link
I mean a few of us will have to feed the robots too I guess
― iatee, Wednesday, 4 May 2011 01:06 (thirteen years ago) link
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/opinion/sunday/our-unpaid-extra-shadow-work.html
― iatee, Sunday, 30 October 2011 19:12 (twelve years ago) link
ilx is at 17% unemployment apparently! that's gonna hurt obama in the election
― mylo & xylotis (some dude), Sunday, 30 October 2011 19:25 (twelve years ago) link
my job could be better done by a powerful computer tbh, implacability a bonus
― interim dn (darraghmac), Sunday, 30 October 2011 19:29 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.economist.com/blogs/babbage/2011/11/artificial-intelligence
― iatee, Sunday, 13 November 2011 04:09 (twelve years ago) link
They already have robots that can lift and carry patients, and I'm assuming that changing their diapers will be the next automated task.
― Christine Green Leafy Dragon Indigo, Sunday, 13 November 2011 04:21 (twelve years ago) link
Lawyers are in a similar boat now that smart algorithms can search case law, evaluate the issues at hand and summarise the results. Machines have already shown they can perform legal discovery for a fraction of the cost of human professionals—and do so with far greater thoroughness than lawyers and paralegals usually manage.
Anyone know what this is referring to? I'm certain this is a crazy exaggeration of what the software does - I'd guess they're just talking about a fancy search engine whose results need to be filtered/summarised by experts - but I'm curious anyway.
― fun drive (seandalai), Sunday, 13 November 2011 13:13 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/05/science/05legal.html?pagewanted=all
here's an article on that.
I think the fact that law firms get to bill by the hour and don't strictly compete on price is one reason why places might be hesitant to adopt this tech. but as w/ siri etc. this software is gonna improve and the efficiency gains are gonna be too attractive to pass up.
― iatee, Sunday, 13 November 2011 15:10 (twelve years ago) link
my job being done by a computer looks like horse_ebooks, basically
― max, Sunday, 13 November 2011 15:11 (twelve years ago) link
ya but what if google invests a billion dollars developing snarky blogger AI
― iatee, Sunday, 13 November 2011 15:25 (twelve years ago) link
Thanks for the link iatee - as I figured, it's mostly retrieval with a bit of network analysis and sentiment. You're still going to need humans to make sense of everything (for the time being anyway) but I see how it gets rid of a lot of high-paid routine work.
― fun drive (seandalai), Sunday, 13 November 2011 15:52 (twelve years ago) link
i've never seen that legal software, but it makes sense. it won't replace lawyers, though. for instance, software that "evaluates the issues at hand," and maybe predicts a likely outcome, depends on how a human lawyer inputs and describes the facts (a client could also input and describe facts, but presumably they're far more biased than the lawyer). and a client may reject the predicted outcome from such a program. and many times, a client pursues a litigation strategy for reasons arguably apart from the likelihood of success (e.g., to gain leverage in negotiations; as a matter of pride, not economics; to achieve a broader institutional goal, regardless of the outcome in a given case). finally, software can't craft persuasive, fact-sensitive briefs. even if it could, you'd need human lawyers to refine the work and argue it before a Judge.
― Daniel, Esq., Sunday, 13 November 2011 15:58 (twelve years ago) link
yeah I don't think anyone thinks computers can completely replace lawyers anytime soon, right now this is mostly w/r/t the act of legal discovery. that's work done by struggling temp lawyers and is gonna make the struggling temp lawyer market even more miserable.
otoh I think where computers will replace lawyers-lawyering will be people willing to look at increasingly sophisticated online legal info sites instead of consulting w/ a lawyer over something small.
― iatee, Sunday, 13 November 2011 16:11 (twelve years ago) link
i guess. broadly speaking, that phenomenon is already true: people or businesses with small issues "wing-it" many times. i'm a litigator, so i think this type of software would impact me less (it could impact the consulting work i do (e.g., advising companies or people about how to avoid litigation problems)).
― Daniel, Esq., Sunday, 13 November 2011 16:21 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.creditwritedowns.com/2012/01/bifurcated-society-technology-jobs.html
― iatee, Saturday, 14 January 2012 19:35 (twelve years ago) link
And one notable area of consumption that by definition differentiates the classes, that of conspicuous consumption, is going by the wayside. Yes, I believe we are seeing the twilight of the era of conspicuous consumption. Not that Gucci and Chanel are going to go out of business, but for most people that sort of status statement is increasingly becoming irrelevant. No matter what you are wearing and driving, a far better picture of you and your status is just a few clicks away. You don’t have to drive a Ferrari to let everyone know you are rich and successful. If you are driving a Ferrari, what it will convey is that you – who as everyone who cares to Google you knows is running a hedge fund and is worth tons of money – must like a Ferrari.
I'm not sure I buy this, but it's an interesting argument
― iatee, Saturday, 14 January 2012 19:37 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.newgeography.com/content/002656-the-three-laws-future-employment
― iatee, Tuesday, 7 February 2012 17:12 (twelve years ago) link
Law #1: People will get jobs doing things that computers can’t do. Law #2: A global market place will result in lower pay and fewer opportunities for many careers. (But also in cheaper and better products and a higher standard of living for American consumers.) Law #3: Professional people will more likely be freelancers and less likely to have a steady job.
y/n
― iatee, Tuesday, 7 February 2012 17:22 (twelve years ago) link
I predict more adult babies.
― Jeff, Tuesday, 7 February 2012 17:28 (twelve years ago) link
these arguments have been around since, if not the industrial revolution, then at least the time of the production line, iirc?
― Dr Frogbius (darraghmac), Wednesday, 8 February 2012 00:52 (twelve years ago) link
i can't remember how it works out, something along the lines of increased leisure time & consumption & existential angst, keeping modern economies running on the triple engines of hbo, ten buck lattes and pyschotherapy.
― Dr Frogbius (darraghmac), Wednesday, 8 February 2012 01:00 (twelve years ago) link
who will the american consumers be
unless it means machines
that consume americans
― quick brown fox triangle (schlump), Wednesday, 8 February 2012 01:31 (twelve years ago) link
'american consumers' will be a hit tv show devised by cowell where awful people by crap in front of a crowd then tv viewers vote for the awful person buying the crap they liked the most.
Because we will all have so much leisure time, this will get 3 billion viewers, 24 hrs a day
― Dr Frogbius (darraghmac), Wednesday, 8 February 2012 01:34 (twelve years ago) link
yeah but technological change back then is not comparable to the kinda change that's happening now - machines that can replace physical labor vs. machines that can beat people at jeopardy
― iatee, Wednesday, 8 February 2012 01:45 (twelve years ago) link
Inventing a machine that replaces physical labour has a considerably greater impact on humankind than a machine that wins jeopardy
― badg, Thursday, 9 February 2012 19:26 (twelve years ago) link
I wouldn't argue w/ that, but that led to a world where people could do service sector jobs, the machine that wins jeopardy doing your legal paperwork or whatever frees up labor but doesn't necessarily create demand for a new type of labor
― iatee, Thursday, 9 February 2012 19:30 (twelve years ago) link
no, but it'll probably create demand & space for non-necessary labour
― Dr Frogbius (darraghmac), Thursday, 9 February 2012 19:32 (twelve years ago) link
there's no economic principle that suggests that that demand for non-necessary labor will make up for what's lost
― iatee, Thursday, 9 February 2012 19:33 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2012/04/can-the-computers-at-narrative-science-replace-paid-writers/255631/
― iatee, Monday, 16 April 2012 16:30 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-05-03/the-recovery-squeezes-the-middle-class
― iatee, Friday, 4 May 2012 14:22 (twelve years ago) link
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/10/14/why-were-facing-a-mcjob-recovery/
― iatee, Sunday, 14 October 2012 23:59 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/01/the-end-of-labor-how-to-protect-workers-from-the-rise-of-robots/267135/
― iatee, Monday, 14 January 2013 19:55 (eleven years ago) link
thanks for these links, iatee. it's been interesting watching this subject start to come up in Krugman's recent columns -- by chance it's happening as I'm getting around to reading Norbert Wiener's books on Cybernetics, written in the 40's & 50's. a lot of the work of the Macy Conferences has been sidelined as utopian: in the conclusion of his introduction to 'Cybernetics: Or, Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine', he basically states that the rise of productive machines will prompt a societal crisis which will force us to find an enconomy of time that values a human life in other ways than a wage. Easy to dismiss as hopelessly utopian, and yet too many of the sentences in these books utterly nail everything Krugman's been inching towards in his recent columns.
Been thinking of starting a Gregory Bateson thread, but maybe not yet
― Milton Parker, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:13 (eleven years ago) link
yeah the subject has def begin to creep into the mainstream economics dialogue lately
krugman's article from 1996: http://mit.edu/krugman/www/BACKWRD2.html
actually predicted a lot of what's happening tho maybe was too pessimistic about robot plumbers /drivers etc.
― iatee, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:23 (eleven years ago) link
from the other side of the fence, this hilarious article just posted
http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/12/10-reasons-why-2013-will-be-the-year-you-quit-your-job/
― Milton Parker, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:24 (eleven years ago) link
What's the general crisis scenario look like? Because a workforce that is forced to go on half-time and still get the same real wages due to robot efficiencies seems pretty good to me.
― Philip Nunez, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:26 (eleven years ago) link
the robot efficiencies don't go to labor, is the crisis
― iatee, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:32 (eleven years ago) link
blame our workaholic culture; don't blame the robots!
― Philip Nunez, Monday, 14 January 2013 20:33 (eleven years ago) link
No, & I can prove it mathematically.
I’ll alert Nick Woodhouse.
― Allen (etaeoe), Monday, 14 January 2013 20:36 (eleven years ago) link
lol at the techcrunch article
This is not true. Everyone is an entrepreneur. The only skills you need to be an entrepreneur: an ability to fail, an ability to have ideas, to sell those ideas, to execute on those ideas, and to be persistent so even as you fail you learn and move onto the next adventure.
― iatee, Monday, 14 January 2013 21:18 (eleven years ago) link
always felt like the entrepreneur meme was a nice way to rationalize tearing up the social contract. "ehhh, you guys are on your own now ... start, like, a business or something ... worked out for those three guys over there."
― Spectrum, Monday, 14 January 2013 21:29 (eleven years ago) link
if techcrunch were replaced by a robot you can't tell me all parties involved wouldn't be better off.
― Philip Nunez, Monday, 14 January 2013 21:30 (eleven years ago) link
St3ve Din3rman
Wow! Just this morning I was sitting here thinking , how in 50 years from now historians will look back on this time and discuss just how wrong we all were by blaming this whole problem of a dwindling middle class on political mistakes by both sides rather then the reality of what really was taking place.The fact is there has never been a better time in the past 100 years to create products and ideas, and get very wealthy doing so..The downside is those that don't realize or are unable to transition to this new world of innovation in technology and thinking are getting left behind, and thus is the reason for the continuing divide between the haves and have nots.Anyone unable to imagine and create will get left behind. Sad but true........
― iatee, Monday, 14 January 2013 21:34 (eleven years ago) link