Automation vs Today's Jobs
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@HardwareGeek Right, and the sentence immediately after that one addressed the exceptions.
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@pie_flavor said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden I got dragged to California. Worked out just fine.
And how would you have felt being dragged around repeatedly?
Being a military brat... It sucks. A lot. And we didn't even move across the country. (MA->WV->OH->IL->GA->WV->OH)
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@pie_flavor said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Zenith You can't decide to be Indian but you can decide to move to India. And funnily enough we were just talking about the implications of moving.
Where is the "implications of moving to India" thread? That one should be interesting!
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@pie_flavor said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@HardwareGeek Right, and the sentence immediately after that one addressed the exceptions.
But which side are the exceptions, I wonder?
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@Gribnit said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
This - I have observed entire teams and departments that have no reason to exist except to exist.
I had a manager once go "But X is doing this manually. Why are you trying to make it run automatically in the codezzzz? Don't do it."
X was a 40 year old guy who'd been doing nothing but writing SQl Queries to manually process some Invoice data and write them into tables that were used to generate reports. I was told how to streamline the process but then they didn't want to do it cos X would have nothing else to do. I learnt what X was actually doing that day and I also learnt it is very easy to automate certain people in the workforce.
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@cvi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Besides, how do you expect people to pick up new skillsets and stay on top? You're relatively lucky to work with computers, where you can learn new related skills with very little investment. Picking up jobs that come with specialized machinery/equipment on your own is much much harder. Especially if you already work full time elsewhere.
It's even similar once you leave the very narrow field of software development towards sysadmin. If your employer wants a Cisco certification, 10 years of experience administrating HP or Juniper equipment that does basically the same job are worth fuckall. Sure, a good understanding of routing and switching concepts will help you pick that up, but only if you have something to train on. The last test setup we built with the bare minimum to try out some more advanced features of just a bunch of switches had about $45000 worth of hardware in it. Not exactly something a job seeker can just whip up and fiddle with in their idle time.
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@Magus said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@DogsB My take is that if it goes far enough, there will end up being businesses whose sole purpose is providing meaningless jobs for people. And they will be very successful.
Does anyone else find it utter lunacy to subsidize people doing work that's objectively unnecessary (or else legally mandate that such work cannot be automated) just to be able to stick to the idea that an entitlement to live can only come through something bearing the name of "work"?
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@LaoC I completely agree that it is insane. It's an amazing kind of double-think where people are convinced that people should be productive to earn their food, but also jobs should not be eliminated even if they destroy value.
We can probably trace these to an underlying belief that people are wholly responsible for their place in life. If you are rich it's because you deserve it, and if you're poor it's because you didn't work hard enough. Automation breaks that, because suddenly someone that did things correctly and had a job is rendered redundant through no fault of their own.
Since resolving that contradiction is too much work, people opt for rejecting reality and trying to keep things as they were. If you don't automate the jobs, you don't have to face the fact that random happenstance can have a huge impact on your situation.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@pie_flavor ...to go on riots.
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@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Does anyone else find it utter lunacy to subsidize people doing work that's objectively unnecessary (or else legally mandate that such work cannot be automated) just to be able to stick to the idea that an entitlement to live can only come through something bearing the name of "work"?
There's a tiny difference between "objectively unnecessary" and "legally mandated that such work cannot be automated" - namely, the former kind of work doesn't contribute to the society literally at all, while the latter is still of some value, even if it can be easily replaced by automation - which only makes things cheaper if you ignore (or deny access to) welfare money.
Also, I don't think we're at the point where we really need to worry about those things yet. Maybe in 20, 30 years. But now is way too early. There's still enough jobs for everyone capable of low level, physically demanding work. Developing countries are still developing. US unemployment is the lowest since the beginning of time. And EU, while faring worse than both of the above, is still very far from the point where general population is unable to find real work.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
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@pie_flavor said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Zenith You can't decide to be Indian but you can decide to move to India.
But will India go along with your decision?
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@boomzilla said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@pie_flavor said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Zenith You can't decide to be Indian but you can decide to move to India.
But will India go along with your decision?
They'll do the needful.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
Also, "real" jobs? Really? Since when are you the arbiter of truth?
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
I think the point is that it's not all bad news and some of that creation is happening. Is it OK for the world to be like that?
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
Also, "real" jobs? Really? Since when are you the arbiter of truth?
Do you disagree with what I said, or do you just disagree with how I said it?
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@boomzilla said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
I think the point is that it's not all bad news and some of that creation is happening. Is it OK for the world to be like that?
Yes. However, the problem is that the trend is quite clear: Towards higher-skill jobs.
Which means that we have to think about the people who, for one reason or another, cannot progress into one of the available jobs.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
Also, "real" jobs? Really? Since when are you the arbiter of truth?
Do you disagree with what I said, or do you just disagree with how I said it?
I'm disagreeing with your notion that it's only a "future" problem. I'm also disagreeing that it's a growth in "real" jobs (whatever that is supposed to actually mean).
You do realize that there's a reason why there's something called the Rust Belt and why the people who live there are so discontent?
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
That's a fun thing to say in a thread which includes bullshit jobs.
The growth was mostly in real jobs. Absolute numbers are less important for this discussion than the trend, and the trend looks good.
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Also, hey, sure, we can see the writing on the wall but let's not prepare for that! Let's try to do something about it only when panic mode has set in!
It's less of seeing the writing and more of acknowledging that even though there's no writing at all right now, somewhere in the future, such writing might or might not appear, and if it appears, it might be very, very bad - however, solving the problem will have tremendous consequences for both the economy and the society and its culture, so it's much preferable not to solve anything until the problem actually happens (or at least, actually gets on horizon).
Yes, please go on ignoring the issue until you have declared that it's a problem
Also, "real" jobs? Really? Since when are you the arbiter of truth?
Do you disagree with what I said, or do you just disagree with how I said it?
I'm disagreeing with your notion that it's only a "future" problem.
Like, young, able-bodied, willing people without any specific skills are unable to find any job - not a decent job, literally any job - at mass scale right now? Or even in the near future?
I'm also disagreeing that it's a growth in "real" jobs (whatever that is supposed to actually mean).
I mean the opposite of whatever YOU meant by "bullshit" jobs.
You do realize that there's a reason why there's something called the Rust Belt and why the people who live there are so discontent?
You do realize that the situation in the Rust Belt is changing for the better right now?
Local unemployment rates reveal a surprising amount about what's going on in the economy — and they're hinting at a boom in manufacturing
UBS looked at changes in county unemployment rates across the US, and that local data illustrated some bigger trends.
The researchers conclude by observing that falling unemployment rates in industrial areas stretching from the "rust belt" counties of the Midwest through the more recently industrialized parts of the inland Southeast suggest a possible uptick in manufacturing investment
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Does anyone else find it utter lunacy to subsidize people doing work that's objectively unnecessary (or else legally mandate that such work cannot be automated) just to be able to stick to the idea that an entitlement to live can only come through something bearing the name of "work"?
There's a tiny difference between "objectively unnecessary" and "legally mandated that such work cannot be automated" - namely, the former kind of work doesn't contribute to the society literally at all, while the latter is still of some value, even if it can be easily replaced by automation - which only makes things cheaper if you ignore (or deny access to) welfare money.
I'm not saying it's the same thing, it's not even the same category. "Objectively unnecessary" is description of the kind of work and "legally mandated that such work cannot be automated" is a moronic way to deal with its consequences.
Of course you can always argue how some kind of work "contributes to society". 19th century forced labor in European prisons used to be something mind-numbing like making paper bags (for the "regular" criminals that didn't get 10 years of quarry work straight away). Undoubtedly useful work still today; we still need paper bags. I don't know what the throughput of a paper bag machine is today but a rough guess would be about 20 bags per second, 24/7, for a useful life of a decade or so with a machine that costs in the mid five digits. Sure, if it wasn't for welfare, you could still have people doing the job for about 10 cents a day if they're hard workers who can do a bag in 5s for 20h a day.Also, I don't think we're at the point where we really need to worry about those things yet.
This thread exists because even @boomzilla has seen some kind of vague scribbling on his lawn.
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Which means that we have to think about the people who, for one reason or another, cannot progress into one of the available jobs.
The problem, we have learned, is that they still have food on their plate.
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@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Of course you can always argue how some kind of work "contributes to society".
I use the simplest definition: "what would change if you stopped doing what you're doing?" If the answer is anything else than "literally nothing", then it means you're contributing to the society in some way. It's the only definition that won't get @Rhywden all riled up at me for acting like a moral arbiter, and it's good enough for this discussion.
@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Which means that we have to think about the people who, for one reason or another, cannot progress into one of the available jobs.
The problem, we have learned, is that they still have food on their plate.
The real problem is people taking things out of context.
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@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
This thread exists because even @boomzilla has seen some kind of vague scribbling on his lawn.
FLAGGED FOR LIBEL. My lawn is pristine, though currently dormant due to the season.
More seriously, the present and future of un/low-skilled workers has been a concern I've posted about many times around here.
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@boomzilla said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
My lawn is pristine, though currently dormant due to the season.
All the more reason for us to stay off it, of course.
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I find it somewhat amusing (or depressing?) that we, as a whole, seem utterly unable to use lessons from the past. To me, as several people said here, this isn't much different from the continuous shift that happened since at least 100-150 years (depending on the places, types of jobs etc. but I guess you could take the Luddite as an emblematic starting point, 200 years ago!).
And yet when I see stuff about the current trend of automation, there is little discussion of the effects and more importantly the remedies of the past. I'm not saying these would give us the solution to today's problems, but at least they would give some framework for trying to analyse what worked and what didn't. But no, it's a brand new problem brought by <scare quotes>AI</square quotes>, ooh, spooky!
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@remi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
And yet when I see stuff about the current trend of automation, there is little discussion of the effects and more importantly the remedies of the past.
Such as (especially remedies)?
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@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Does anyone else find it utter lunacy to subsidize people doing work that's objectively unnecessary (or else legally mandate that such work cannot be automated) just to be able to stick to the idea that an entitlement to live can only come through something bearing the name of "work"?
No. People want to feel like they're doing something useful - it's a natural human drive. And there's no guarantee that they'll be able to forever.
People who don't feel like they're able to do anything productive, or that they're worthless, get up to all kinds of horrible things. It messes with their heads.
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@boomzilla Wat?
(I don't have a clue what you tried to say...)
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@remi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@boomzilla Wat?
(I don't have a clue what you tried to say...)
You're complaining that people aren't talking about past remedies. We've been discussing things like new jobs and welfare and make work.
What are the other things that we're not talking about that you say we should be talking about?
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@boomzilla Well I was more talking about all the articles like the one you posted (maybe the "we" in my first post was ambiguous). I mean, in this thread here, some people already mentioned what I said, so it's not like I can claim to have had a brand new insight (as if...). It's more when you read any kind of article about it, it's almost always presented as if it was a uniquely new problem, whereas in my mind it's nothing but.
Idly throwing around a couple of sentences like we all do in this thread doesn't really count like "discussing" things, except in the most cursory way.
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@Kian said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
you don't have to face the fact that random happenstance can have a huge impact on your situation.
I don't think anyone said random things don't happen in a capitalist system.
@Kian said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
people are convinced that people should be productive to earn their food
However, a lack of productivity does negatively affect one's life, even if they have all they could possibly need.
I see the same entitlement and depression among the rich as I do among the welfare recipients, having access to both groups. I've spoken with homeless people who said they were tired of hand-outs and wanted to work a job and be productive.
Productivity is good for your mental health.
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@remi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
It's more when you read any kind of article about it, it's almost always presented as if it was a uniquely new problem, whereas in my mind it's nothing but.
Well, don't blame us for standard journalist incompetence.
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@xaade said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Kian said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
people are convinced that people should be productive to earn their food
However, a lack of productivity does negatively affect one's life, even if they have all they could possibly need.
I see the same entitlement and depression among the rich as I do among the welfare recipients, having access to both groups. I've spoken with homeless people who said they were tired of hand-outs and wanted to work a job and be productive.
Productivity is good for your mental health.
But is it inherent in all humans, or is it just an effect of our capitalistic culture (and other cultures that greatly focus on the importance of hard work, like... basically everything ever, so far)?
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@xaade said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Kian said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
people are convinced that people should be productive to earn their food
However, a lack of productivity does negatively affect one's life, even if they have all they could possibly need.
I see the same entitlement and depression among the rich as I do among the welfare recipients, having access to both groups. I've spoken with homeless people who said they were tired of hand-outs and wanted to work a job and be productive.
Productivity is good for your mental health.
But is it inherent in all humans, or is it just an effect of our capitalistic culture (and other cultures that greatly focus on the importance of hard work, like... basically everything ever, so far)?
From an evolutionary and biological standpoint, I would find it hard to believe we are predisposed to being lazy and unproductive. Not only because in any underdeveloped society which humankind has been in for millennia before today, such a person would not survive long, but also because it leads to physically unhealthy effects such as obesity.
I mean, you said it yourself. Basically every culture ever so far has focused greatly on the importance of hard work because otherwise those cultures would have collapsed. I think people are innately driven to work hard to be both mentally and physically healthy.
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@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
From an evolutionary and biological standpoint, I would find it hard to believe we are predisposed to being lazy and unproductive.
OTOH if that was true, why do we even have lazy and unproductive people? Do you think something in our societies is actively training people to go against their natural instinct to be non-lazy and productive, to make them lazy and unproductive? (
inb4: socialism )I'd rather say that we are likely predisposed to be only as productive as is needed to free up time for other more re-productive activities.
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@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@xaade said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Kian said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
people are convinced that people should be productive to earn their food
However, a lack of productivity does negatively affect one's life, even if they have all they could possibly need.
I see the same entitlement and depression among the rich as I do among the welfare recipients, having access to both groups. I've spoken with homeless people who said they were tired of hand-outs and wanted to work a job and be productive.
Productivity is good for your mental health.
But is it inherent in all humans, or is it just an effect of our capitalistic culture (and other cultures that greatly focus on the importance of hard work, like... basically everything ever, so far)?
From an evolutionary and biological standpoint, I would find it hard to believe we are predisposed to being lazy and unproductive.
We aren't evolutionarily or biologically predisposed to virtually unlimited food either, but most people manage to do just fine.
I mean, you said it yourself. Basically every culture ever so far has focused greatly on the importance of hard work because otherwise those cultures would have collapsed.
On the other hand, every culture ever until USA had the concept of the nobility deeply embedded within it - and there were many philosophers who argued this is the natural order as well - and yet nowadays, it's become a marginal phenomenon. Inb4 - no, millionaires and billionaires aren't (all) nobility; there's a huge difference between being genetically predisposted to be Ubermensch and being born with a great set of inalienable rights that other people aren't, and just being rich.
Society changes. Just because something has never happened before, it doesn't mean it cannot happen in the future. Especially if you take away the main reason why societies historically had to have everyone hard at work - there just not being enough resources to take care of everyone otherwise.
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@remi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
From an evolutionary and biological standpoint, I would find it hard to believe we are predisposed to being lazy and unproductive.
OTOH if that was true, why do we even have lazy and unproductive people?
For the same reason we have people who smoke cigarettes and/or have addiction issues of various forms, even though that also isn't in our best interests biologically or evolutionarily.
Do you think something in our societies is actively training people to go against their natural instinct to be non-lazy and productive, to make them lazy and unproductive? (
inb4: socialism )Yes, absolutely. @xaade even mentioned there are homeless people who want to be productive and not lazy, but their situation prevents them from really getting out of their hole. It becomes a feeling of intense despair and hopelessness, where the path leading to fulfillment and productivity has a very steep hill that in effect requires too much work to overcome.
I'd rather say that we are likely predisposed to be only as productive as is needed to free up time for other more re-productive activities.
Of course, I'm not saying leisure is not something people strive for. But that doesn't mean they are striving to be sitting on the couch all day eating cheetos.
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Society changes. Just because something has never happened before, it doesn't mean it cannot happen in the future. Especially if you take away the main reason why societies historically had to have everyone hard at work - there just not being enough resources to take care of everyone otherwise.
Right, but my point is how do you counteract the fact that study after study has shown that laziness has very bad effects on one's physical health? Yes, society can condition people to be lazy to counteract their innate urges. After all, you're trying to argue the opposite is happening: Society has conditioned people to be hard-working when their innate urge is to be lazy. But, I don't see how having such lazy predispositions could have gotten humankind to the point it is today. How did we even go as far as invent fire or the wheel if it wasn't for a desire to work hard and innovate?
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@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Right, but my point is how do you counteract the fact that study after study has shown that laziness has very bad effects on one's physical health?
Assuming you haven't typoed any words and you mean that lack of exercise causes all kinds of health problems, then the solution is very simple - encourage people to exercise more. This has nothing to do with employment.
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Yes, society can condition people to be lazy to counteract their innate urges. After all, you're trying to argue the opposite is happening: Society has conditioned people to be hard-working when their innate urge is to be lazy.
There's a difference between laziness as in not feeling like spending half of your time everyday getting paid for doing things you don't enjoy in the least, and laziness as in not feeling like moving your ass up from the couch. One does not imply the other, in either direction.
But, I don't see how having such lazy predispositions could have gotten humankind to the point it is today.
I'm not saying the culture of hard work wasn't extremely beneficial to our civilization - of course it was. I'm saying that it's just that - culture. Once a huge part of population finds it literally impossible to find any job whatsoever, just letting them do nothing won't necessarily make our civilization collapse.
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I actually felt a lot of sympathy for "Gary"...
Erin Winick was a sophomore mechanical engineering student when she took a summer internship at a southern California tech company. She was enthusiastic about 3D printing, so a manager there soon asked her to use the technology to streamline an older mold-making process. That meant studying up with the man then in charge of the process, whom I”ll call Gary. It soon dawned on both of them that if her project succeeded, Gary would be out of a job.
“I remember explicitly feeling my heart beat faster when we had the initial conversation,” Winick tells me in an email. “It was some nervousness and some guilt for sure. When I first got the project I didn’t realize what it would involve.” Winick would later write about the experience for MIT Technology Review, where she’s now an associate editor: “As he described the process and his role in it, I realized that making molds was Gary’s sole responsibility. He had spent over 30 years perfecting these tools and parts.” This was his life’s work.
Until I read on.
... the project moved ahead, and the company said it would retrain Gary to work on the new printers.
Great! Perfect! The buggy whip manufacturer is going to work in the Ford plant; he doesn't need to lose his job. All is well. Or...
It turned out he wasn’t much interested in learning a new job three decades into his career, however, and took the news as the latest in a long line of slights from management.
...not. Oh.
Sucks to be you, I guess. The times changed, but you didn't. I feel much less sympathy for you, now, because frankly, your job is obsolete. The job you used to do is no longer useful. You were given the opportunity to adapt and become useful again, but instead of adapting, you preferred to take it personally.
I guess it's true; you can't teach an old dog new tricks. But that is true of a particular mindset, not physical age.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Right, but my point is how do you counteract the fact that study after study has shown that laziness has very bad effects on one's physical health?
Assuming you haven't typoed any words and you mean that lack of exercise causes all kinds of health problems, then the solution is very simple - encourage people to exercise more. This has nothing to do with employment.
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Yes, society can condition people to be lazy to counteract their innate urges. After all, you're trying to argue the opposite is happening: Society has conditioned people to be hard-working when their innate urge is to be lazy.
There's a difference between laziness as in not feeling like spending half of your time everyday getting paid for doing things you don't enjoy in the least, and laziness as in not feeling like moving your ass up from the couch. One does not imply the other, in either direction.
But, I don't see how having such lazy predispositions could have gotten humankind to the point it is today.
I'm not saying the culture of hard work wasn't extremely beneficial to our civilization - of course it was. I'm saying that it's just that - culture. Once a huge part of population finds it literally impossible to find any job whatsoever, just letting them do nothing won't necessarily make our civilization collapse.
It's not about a collapse of civilization, but rather the natural strive people have for accomplishment and fulfillment which would otherwise cause a feeling of depression and hopelessness. I mean, maybe you're right in the sense that if there truly is nothing more to do but sit back and let our robot overlords take care of us, then we will naturally be inclined to play challenging games that stimulate our minds and keep us feeling happy about ourselves. (Think "Ready Player One" but hopefully less dystopian) I'm open to that possibility, but I still think the fact that we play games and sports voluntarily in our leisure time as a way to fulfill goals, as arbitrary and objectively useless as they might be other than to feel good about ourselves and take pride in our accomplishments demonstrates to me there is a natural drive within us to do more than just "lazy" leisure.
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@izzion said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
I suspect that if you were to go back in time to the early 1900s, Henry Ford's assembly line would have been considered equally mystical.
The magic of his assembly line was actually that it broke down a mystical task into repetitive, mechanical jobs that were not. Screw this bolt into this hole. Screw this nut onto it. Tighten. Repeat 50,000 times. That's your full job description this year. It took a genius to dream up the assembly process, to be able to visualize it from begin to finish... but once it was broken down into its representative parts, a crew of ditch diggers could easily do it.
This advantage was also its biggest downfall, in fact, because many of the jobs that it created in the new factories were repetitive, boring jobs that involved little intellect or skill, and they were eventually easy to automate completely away so a person wasn't needed in them at all.
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@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Right, but my point is how do you counteract the fact that study after study has shown that laziness has very bad effects on one's physical health?
Assuming you haven't typoed any words and you mean that lack of exercise causes all kinds of health problems, then the solution is very simple - encourage people to exercise more. This has nothing to do with employment.
@The_Quiet_One said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Yes, society can condition people to be lazy to counteract their innate urges. After all, you're trying to argue the opposite is happening: Society has conditioned people to be hard-working when their innate urge is to be lazy.
There's a difference between laziness as in not feeling like spending half of your time everyday getting paid for doing things you don't enjoy in the least, and laziness as in not feeling like moving your ass up from the couch. One does not imply the other, in either direction.
But, I don't see how having such lazy predispositions could have gotten humankind to the point it is today.
I'm not saying the culture of hard work wasn't extremely beneficial to our civilization - of course it was. I'm saying that it's just that - culture. Once a huge part of population finds it literally impossible to find any job whatsoever, just letting them do nothing won't necessarily make our civilization collapse.
It's not about a collapse of civilization, but rather the natural strive people have for accomplishment and fulfillment which would otherwise cause a feeling of depression and hopelessness.
And that wouldn't happen either. Because you don't necessarily need to be paid for sacrificing half of your day to feel accomplishment and fulfillment. Not to mention most jobs aren't that fulfilling anyway.
I mean, maybe you're right in the sense that if there truly is nothing more to do but sit back and let our robot overlords take care of us, then we will naturally be inclined to play challenging games that stimulate our minds and keep us feeling happy about ourselves. (Think "Ready Player One" but hopefully less dystopian) I'm open to that possibility, but I still think the fact that we play games and sports voluntarily in our leisure time as a way to fulfill goals, as arbitrary and objectively useless as they might be other than to feel good about ourselves and take pride in our accomplishments demonstrates to me there is a natural drive within us to do more than just "lazy" leisure.
Once again - being physically lazy and being professionally lazy are two different, unconnected things. I'm only talking about the latter.
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@stillwater said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
@Gribnit said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
This - I have observed entire teams and departments that have no reason to exist except to exist.
I had a manager once go "But X is doing this manually. Why are you trying to make it run automatically in the codezzzz? Don't do it."
X was a 40 year old guy who'd been doing nothing but writing SQl Queries to manually process some Invoice data and write them into tables that were used to generate reports. I was told how to streamline the process but then they didn't want to do it cos X would have nothing else to do. I learnt what X was actually doing that day and I also learnt it is very easy to automate certain people in the workforce.
I was sure that I remembered an article that was about some fresh new programmer who mashed heads with some old-timey guy who had an obnoxiously repetitive job. I think the way it went was that the pup realized that a particular task that consumed a lot of the old-timey guy's time could be streamlined greatly, and set about working on a script that would simplify it to pushing a couple of buttons, with the express intent of making the old coot's life easier. Finally it's done and he goes to show the guy his masterpiece and they both realize with increasing horror that the old guy would basically have nothing at all to do, so he deletes the codes and speaks nothing of it ever again. Fortunately management was not informed that coot is basically a robot, and he got to keep his job.
I tried to find the article, but Google decided that I'm a robot and its captcha is broken so I gave up.
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@LaoC said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Does anyone else find it utter lunacy to subsidize people doing work that's objectively unnecessary (or else legally mandate that such work cannot be automated) just to be able to stick to the idea that an entitlement to live can only come through something bearing the name of "work"?
Hm? You're free to go hew down some trees and build a cabin with your bare hands and plant or hunt your own food.
Unfortunately that does kind of sound like "work", though. You'd probably rather just surf along on other people's accomplishments.
It's socialism in action! Here, you over there, you've become very efficient and your output is far more than you need to survive; so let me just take that and give it to this other person over here. He doesn't have anything useful to do, and he'd rather die (or steal) than to be put to an honest day's work if he had to, but by god he still deserves to survive!
Alternately, you can basically just enslave people who would rather work than die. It's kind of a damned if you do, damned if you don't sort of situation, and I admit, I'm not sure what the answer to it is. I don't think the answer is just to block any sort of technological progress that might put people out of work, though. What I do know is that socialism tends to put things on a downward spiral, because the folks who are smart enough to be society's means of production are also the ones who are smart enough to figure out that they're wasting their efforts for very little reward, while they could just sit back and ride on the backs of whomever's dumb enough to keep on working.
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@brie I haven't found the article you're thinking of, but I did find this amusing one:
The Robot Guys
Business was booming during the formative years of SuperbServices, Inc. It was a blessing and a curse; like any startup, there was more work to do than people to do it. Telling the sales team to be less successful wasn’t an option, so the tech team had to adapt. The CEO of SuperbServices tasked...
Ending spoilers, do not read
When disaster finally did strike, it didn’t come in the form of fraudulent transaction. The donut box fell over, late on Friday night. Roland had to call Roy, who had to commute into the office to stand the box back up. After doing some root cause analysis, Roy also taped the box to a server rack, thus guaranteeing continual uptime.
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@hungrier I did find that one before Google decided that I had made too many repetitive requests and asked me to verify my humanship by reading a token from some webcam that had apparently fallen over.
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@Gąska said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
US unemployment is the lowest since the beginning of time.
TIL time began in 1970. I thought it began at nightfall preceding Sunday, October 3, 4004 B.C.
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@Rhywden said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
Since when are you the arbiter of truth?
This is TDWTF. We are all, individually, arbiters of not mere truth, but The Truth. But only in the
.
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@remi said in Automation vs Today's Jobs:
there is little discussion of the effects and more importantly the remedies of the past.
Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it.
Not only do we not learn from the past, we don't learn the past. I'd say we rewrite the past to fit a preferred narrative, but so far this thread has managed to stay out of the Garage, and I don't want to be the cause of the
s having to work.
