Author Topic: Robots and their impact on the future  (Read 537970 times)

Bateaux

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1650 on: May 24, 2018, 02:37:37 AM »
Uber just took a huge step backwards in the race to autonomous service.  I'm sure competition will take full advantage.

tomsang

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1651 on: May 24, 2018, 08:34:08 AM »
Uber just took a huge step backwards in the race to autonomous service.  I'm sure competition will take full advantage.

Yeah, the governor barred them from testing so their decision makes sense.  From watching the video, I wonder if it was a human driven car if the accident would have been avoided.  The pedestrian was hard to see.

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1652 on: May 24, 2018, 09:12:35 AM »
Uber just took a huge step backwards in the race to autonomous service.  I'm sure competition will take full advantage.

Yeah, the governor barred them from testing so their decision makes sense.  From watching the video, I wonder if it was a human driven car if the accident would have been avoided.  The pedestrian was hard to see.

i thought the same thing but this was discussed at length and a human has better low light vision than that camera did- basically it wasnt as dark as the camera made it look.  While i still question it i think the human IF paying attention stops in time. 

AlanStache

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1653 on: May 24, 2018, 10:18:16 AM »
Uber just took a huge step backwards in the race to autonomous service.  I'm sure competition will take full advantage.

Yeah, the governor barred them from testing so their decision makes sense.  From watching the video, I wonder if it was a human driven car if the accident would have been avoided.  The pedestrian was hard to see.

i thought the same thing but this was discussed at length and a human has better low light vision than that camera did- basically it wasnt as dark as the camera made it look.  While i still question it i think the human IF paying attention stops in time.

But in theory the lidar should have detected the obstacle and the control system stopped the car.  Merging and acting upon different sensors each with different noise/error profiles and acting appropriately is hard.

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1654 on: May 24, 2018, 10:25:21 AM »
Uber just took a huge step backwards in the race to autonomous service.  I'm sure competition will take full advantage.

Yeah, the governor barred them from testing so their decision makes sense.  From watching the video, I wonder if it was a human driven car if the accident would have been avoided.  The pedestrian was hard to see.

i thought the same thing but this was discussed at length and a human has better low light vision than that camera did- basically it wasnt as dark as the camera made it look.  While i still question it i think the human IF paying attention stops in time.

But in theory the lidar should have detected the obstacle and the control system stopped the car.  Merging and acting upon different sensors each with different noise/error profiles and acting appropriately is hard.

no it shouldnt have b/c it wasnt enabled - if enabled the lidar would have stopped the car i believe i dont think its a theory at this point lidar is very effective at its job and google is now rolling out a full fleet of driverless lidar cars in the same state.

AlanStache

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1655 on: May 24, 2018, 11:36:30 AM »
....

no it shouldnt have b/c it wasnt enabled - if enabled the lidar would have stopped the car i believe i dont think its a theory at this point lidar is very effective at its job and google is now rolling out a full fleet of driverless lidar cars in the same state.

Yes exactly.  But the point was the difficulty in making a decision based on conflicting information; lidar says there is an object, camera says there is not.  The system must work out what to trust, when, while incorporating what is safe (stopping is not always safe) but not being so safe it never drives over 10mph.  All in all it would seem Uber has a hacked together amateur system if they thought disabling lidar would be good.

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1656 on: May 24, 2018, 11:49:00 AM »
....

no it shouldnt have b/c it wasnt enabled - if enabled the lidar would have stopped the car i believe i dont think its a theory at this point lidar is very effective at its job and google is now rolling out a full fleet of driverless lidar cars in the same state.

Yes exactly.  But the point was the difficulty in making a decision based on conflicting information; lidar says there is an object, camera says there is not.  The system must work out what to trust, when, while incorporating what is safe (stopping is not always safe) but not being so safe it never drives over 10mph.  All in all it would seem Uber has a hacked together amateur system if they thought disabling lidar would be good.

i dont know that its hacked together or that the low light tech isnt there.  Many companies including tesla are trying to move away from LIDAR if they can i belive due to the royalties they would have to pay google.  i could be wrong here but i think that new teslas have no LIDAR.

maizefolk

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1657 on: May 24, 2018, 12:32:48 PM »
I thought Tesla's didn't have lidar in the first place just because the sensor systems are so much more expensive than basically every other sensor you can put on a self driving car combined (radar/sonar/RGB cameras/infrared cameras etc).

Bateaux

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1658 on: May 24, 2018, 12:45:40 PM »
What is amazing is the butterfly effect of this unfortunate death.  This could change the entire ride share future.  Uber coukd lose market share to another company with better tech.  Self driving systems will most certainly be much better now, thry have no choice but to improve.  The death of that individual could cause improvements that will save thousands of lives in the future.

Watchmaker

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1659 on: May 24, 2018, 01:26:35 PM »
What is amazing is the butterfly effect of this unfortunate death.  This could change the entire ride share future.  Uber coukd lose market share to another company with better tech.  Self driving systems will most certainly be much better now, thry have no choice but to improve.  The death of that individual could cause improvements that will save thousands of lives in the future.

Agreed, but it could also cost tens of thousands of lives if these events delay the large-scale adoption of driverless cars.

Bateaux

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1660 on: May 24, 2018, 01:29:16 PM »
What is amazing is the butterfly effect of this unfortunate death.  This could change the entire ride share future.  Uber coukd lose market share to another company with better tech.  Self driving systems will most certainly be much better now, thry have no choice but to improve.  The death of that individual could cause improvements that will save thousands of lives in the future.

Agreed, but it could also cost tens of thousands of lives if these events delay the large-scale adoption of driverless cars.

Yep.  Dang butterfly. 

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1661 on: May 25, 2018, 03:53:20 AM »
I thought Tesla's didn't have lidar in the first place just because the sensor systems are so much more expensive than basically every other sensor you can put on a self driving car combined (radar/sonar/RGB cameras/infrared cameras etc).

Lidar has dropped significantly in price and there is a startup in Florida using a different cheaper raw material in theirs that has better vision and no silicon for the actual collection sensor.

That video I posted above about them becoming 10 bucks and the size of a postage stamp in the next couple years is very close to happening.

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1662 on: May 25, 2018, 04:04:12 AM »
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/05/22/luminar-building-sensors-for-self-driving-cars-near-space-coast.html

Can produce them for hundreds of dollars with better vision than the sensors that cost thousands.

It's gonna get real really quick.

tomsang

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1663 on: June 03, 2018, 07:11:15 AM »
Vegas casino workers are seeing this as a future problem. Like a frog on a pot of water on the stove, automation will slowly eliminate low skilled jobs. What is considered low skilled will ramp up year after year. I am sure bartenders a decade ago felt like there is no way a robot could make a complicated drink. Kind of like a software programmer feels like their job is too complicated. Give it 15 years and AI and automation will be eliminating high level white collar jobs.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/jun/02/las-vegas-workers-strike-automation-casinos


lost_in_the_endless_aisle

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1664 on: June 03, 2018, 06:29:59 PM »
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/05/22/luminar-building-sensors-for-self-driving-cars-near-space-coast.html

Can produce them for hundreds of dollars with better vision than the sensors that cost thousands.

It's gonna get real really quick.
I'm not convinced the limiting probelm is the cost of lidar but is rather the efficacy of the AI. Driving likely requires elements of general AI to cover many of the edge and corner cases; e.g.: this. Though when I do drive around, I find myself noting how poor the human competition is in the way of driving skills.

maizefolk

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1665 on: June 03, 2018, 06:37:28 PM »
I'm not convinced the limiting probelm is the cost of lidar but is rather the efficacy of the AI. Driving likely requires elements of general AI to cover many of the edge and corner cases; e.g.: this. Though when I do drive around, I find myself noting how poor the human competition is in the way of driving skills.

Current AI + LIDAR sensors + RGB cameras may not be up to human safety standards yet (or it may I haven't seen the data), but current AI + LIDAR sensors + RGB cameras is clearly a much better at driving than current AI trying to drive with just RGB images.

dougules

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1666 on: June 04, 2018, 11:00:53 AM »
What is amazing is the butterfly effect of this unfortunate death.  This could change the entire ride share future.  Uber coukd lose market share to another company with better tech.  Self driving systems will most certainly be much better now, thry have no choice but to improve.  The death of that individual could cause improvements that will save thousands of lives in the future.

Agreed, but it could also cost tens of thousands of lives if these events delay the large-scale adoption of driverless cars.

The incident with Uber is going to get scrutinized very thoroughly and the lessons are going to get propagated into future development.  Think about all the other traffic deaths happening in the world that barely get a one-liner in the news because it was a human driver alone.  There's not much happening to fix those problems, and everybody just takes them for granted. 

robartsd

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1667 on: June 04, 2018, 12:32:52 PM »
I'm not convinced the limiting probelm is the cost of lidar but is rather the efficacy of the AI. Driving likely requires elements of general AI to cover many of the edge and corner cases; e.g.: this. Though when I do drive around, I find myself noting how poor the human competition is in the way of driving skills.
Thanks for the link to Piekniewski's Blog. I thought the February post on Autonomous Vehicle Safety was very interesting.

TempusFugit

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1668 on: June 04, 2018, 05:16:01 PM »

The incident with Uber is going to get scrutinized very thoroughly and the lessons are going to get propagated into future development.  Think about all the other traffic deaths happening in the world that barely get a one-liner in the news because it was a human driver alone.  There's not much happening to fix those problems, and everybody just takes them for granted.


I often think about the US traffic fatality numbers when other 'dangers' are in the news and get everyone so agitated.  ~37,000 people in the US died in auto accidents in 2016 (almost 3K of those were teenagers - children), representing 12 fatalities per 100,000 people.  It's climbing again these past couple of years into the 40's. 

Can you imagine any product being sold to the general public that killed 37 thousand people every year?   And these are not volunteer soldiers or <insert dangerous occupation here> but regular people going about their lives. 

As you say, we don't think about this because everyone just accepts it as a normal factor in modern life. I think most of us also are in denial about our own risk. We all think that we are good drivers, so we will be fine.  But what about that guy texting his girlfriend and not paying attention to the traffic light? 

Even with those statistics, I think self-driving cars will still be a tough sell to the general public.  Most of us like to feel like we are in control and that we are the exception to the norm.  Giving up that sense of control to a machine? I dunno how quickly people will be ok with that. 

I guess we'll find out in about a decade. 

DreamFIRE

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1669 on: June 04, 2018, 05:37:24 PM »
As you say, we don't think about this because everyone just accepts it as a normal factor in modern life. I think most of us also are in denial about our own risk. We all think that we are good drivers, so we will be fine.  But what about that guy texting his girlfriend and not paying attention to the traffic light?

Yes, there's a lot of evidence of that in recent threads that discuss bicycling as well.  People think they can make eye contact with drivers and be smart to avoid accidents and will throw in a few anecdotes that they haven't been in an accident, but that doesn't help when a 16 year old girl is texting her friend and never sees you as she runs over you.  I would rather be in a car when that happens.

mozar

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1670 on: June 04, 2018, 10:11:25 PM »
A lot of fatalities/ accidents are due to infrastructure problems, lack of lighting, confusing intersections, lack of bike lane separators. I think all of the new options are really interesting (driverless cars, one or 3 wheeled transport etc.) but it won't matter until this country invests in its infrastructure. Maybe once cars are 100% automated and it is illegal to drive there will be fewer accidents but as long as their are self interested humans driving I doubt fatalities will change much. Fatalities are at the same rate as the 60's, and cars are so much better now.

I do believe trucking and short urban trips will change, which is where the money is.
Chart:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year

Quote
Can you imagine any product being sold to the general public that killed 37 thousand people every year?

I don't get it either.

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1671 on: June 05, 2018, 05:34:27 AM »
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cnbc.com/amp/2018/05/22/luminar-building-sensors-for-self-driving-cars-near-space-coast.html

Can produce them for hundreds of dollars with better vision than the sensors that cost thousands.

It's gonna get real really quick.
I'm not convinced the limiting probelm is the cost of lidar but is rather the efficacy of the AI. Driving likely requires elements of general AI to cover many of the edge and corner cases; e.g.: this. Though when I do drive around, I find myself noting how poor the human competition is in the way of driving skills.

correct edge and corner cases really will exist much more in the interim as we get those terrible humans who suck at driving off the roads.  i have a strong feeling there are very few people who actually enjoy the utility of driving compared to those who would rather not have to worry about steering their car daily back and forth to work and on trips.  People keep echo'ing that people want control.  i think once the driving tech is proven - which i believe will be working very well this year contrary to the link above.  Just like in the stock markets there are people who will call a crash and people who say it will keep going up - the difference here is tech really doesnt regress so while the future may take a year or two longer than the optimistists are predicting the pessimists will be wrong in the end.   Tech may have been overstated in the short term by an aggressive Musk - but GM has cars with out pedals or steering wheels getting approval from the NHTSB for testing in seattle and Google is moving to full autonomy in Phoenix this year.  And like most tech once that is proven its adoption typically starts to follow exponential curves. 

robartsd

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1672 on: June 05, 2018, 08:33:16 AM »
correct edge and corner cases really will exist much more in the interim as we get those terrible humans who suck at driving off the roads.  i have a strong feeling there are very few people who actually enjoy the utility of driving compared to those who would rather not have to worry about steering their car daily back and forth to work and on trips.  People keep echo'ing that people want control.  i think once the driving tech is proven - which i believe will be working very well this year contrary to the link above.  Just like in the stock markets there are people who will call a crash and people who say it will keep going up - the difference here is tech really doesnt regress so while the future may take a year or two longer than the optimistists are predicting the pessimists will be wrong in the end.   Tech may have been overstated in the short term by an aggressive Musk - but GM has cars with out pedals or steering wheels getting approval from the NHTSB for testing in seattle and Google is moving to full autonomy in Phoenix this year.  And like most tech once that is proven its adoption typically starts to follow exponential curves.
Piekniewski isn't predicting that we'll never get there, just that the tech is harder and further away than many people think. Even if we stop letting humans pilot large, fast, vehicles there will still be erratic humans walking around and riding bikes to create edge cases that humans may still be better at dealing with than AI. The post I linked to used data from Google's testing in California (because that was the best data available) to show that progress had slowed Google's system failed more than ten times as often as human drivers crashed per 1000 in 2017. Not all of those failures would have resulted in a crash, but it does mean the tech isn't there yet, and the progress from 2016 to 2017 was slight. I think expecting autonomous vehicles by 2020 is optimistic.

dougules

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1673 on: June 05, 2018, 11:39:03 AM »
As you say, we don't think about this because everyone just accepts it as a normal factor in modern life. I think most of us also are in denial about our own risk. We all think that we are good drivers, so we will be fine.  But what about that guy texting his girlfriend and not paying attention to the traffic light?

Yes, there's a lot of evidence of that in recent threads that discuss bicycling as well.  People think they can make eye contact with drivers and be smart to avoid accidents and will throw in a few anecdotes that they haven't been in an accident, but that doesn't help when a 16 year old girl is texting her friend and never sees you as she runs over you.  I would rather be in a car when that happens.

This is another one where intuition is overriding math.  Don't get me wrong. I don't have any illusions that biking isn't dangerous, but way more people die or get sick from lack of exercise than accidents.  When you add the fact that being in a car is not nearly as safe as it seems, the math is on the side of cycling. 


lost_in_the_endless_aisle

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1674 on: June 05, 2018, 08:40:35 PM »
As you say, we don't think about this because everyone just accepts it as a normal factor in modern life. I think most of us also are in denial about our own risk. We all think that we are good drivers, so we will be fine.  But what about that guy texting his girlfriend and not paying attention to the traffic light?

Yes, there's a lot of evidence of that in recent threads that discuss bicycling as well.  People think they can make eye contact with drivers and be smart to avoid accidents and will throw in a few anecdotes that they haven't been in an accident, but that doesn't help when a 16 year old girl is texting her friend and never sees you as she runs over you.  I would rather be in a car when that happens.

This is another one where intuition is overriding math.  Don't get me wrong. I don't have any illusions that biking isn't dangerous, but way more people die or get sick from lack of exercise than accidents.  When you add the fact that being in a car is not nearly as safe as it seems, the math is on the side of cycling.
The problem is when it comes to public policy, emotions rule over math. 20 million people who are fat, sick, & nearly dead is likely a much bigger tragedy than 20K road deaths but there are few problems with that argument provided we aren't talking trying to convince homo economicus: 1) people suffer from scope neglect so the numerical difference is not properly assessed; 2) in many car accidents, it's possible to ascribe fault, while people with bad diets who don't exercise "did it to themselves" 3) suspicion of technology and scrutiny of tech companies of increasing power may make them ever larger targets for regulation (e.g. GDPR) that impact speed and scale of deployment

edit: oh and if you were just steel-manning cycling and not trying to tie this back to self-driving cars then I'm probably off track a bit
« Last Edit: June 05, 2018, 08:42:20 PM by lost_in_the_endless_aisle »

tomsang

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1675 on: June 12, 2018, 09:09:58 AM »
https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/32240/10000-jobs-could-be-lost-to-robots-says-citi

Some interesting quotes and stats in this article:

"US bank Citi has warned that it could shed half of its 20,000 tech and ops staff in the next five years due to the rise of robotics and automation."

"Meanwhile a 2016 report from the World Economic Forum predicted that  advances in automation will lead to the loss of over 5 million jobs in 15 major developed and emerging economies by 2020."

"And Barclays injvestment bank chief Tim Thorsby added that anyone whose job involves "a lot of keyboard-hitting" is "less likely to have a happy future"."

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1676 on: June 12, 2018, 09:42:48 AM »
https://www.finextra.com/newsarticle/32240/10000-jobs-could-be-lost-to-robots-says-citi

Some interesting quotes and stats in this article:

"US bank Citi has warned that it could shed half of its 20,000 tech and ops staff in the next five years due to the rise of robotics and automation."

"Meanwhile a 2016 report from the World Economic Forum predicted that  advances in automation will lead to the loss of over 5 million jobs in 15 major developed and emerging economies by 2020."

"And Barclays injvestment bank chief Tim Thorsby added that anyone whose job involves "a lot of keyboard-hitting" is "less likely to have a happy future"."

I work for a large regional bank.  I recently attended a demonstration of the "Robotic Process Automation" project that is beginning here.  I expected actual robots, but instead learned they are using software to automate the keypresses and mouse clicks that employees make when completing rote tasks.  This is trivial to do in many cases, and the software they are using makes it simple.

When the Q&A session started, the first question was, "Will this eliminate jobs?"  The presenter answered along the lines of, "That is not our intent, but rather to allow humans to focus on the things humans are good at, and let the robots do the boring, rote stuff."

I suspect both will be true.  Automation of this type is MUCH easier to implement than rebuilding systems to make the processes automated.  This will accelerate the adoption across bank systems (and probably corporate accounting depts, insurance claims processing, etc).  At first the folks who are doing less "keyboard-hitting" will get to focus on the interesting, human parts of their jobs -- but there is only so much of that work to go around. (Some of that work is probably a side-effect of mistakes made by humans that will decline in number as robots take their jobs).

So not now, but not never, I expect to see 10's of thousands of layoffs in these white-collar, but medium-skilled jobs.

GuitarStv

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1677 on: June 12, 2018, 09:43:39 AM »
Wait.. so does this mean that 9 robots can have a baby on one month?

This year, sure.

Next year, 4.5 robots will be able to have a baby in two weeks.

4.5 robots creating a baby out of wedlock?  That's going to piss off the social conservatives.

mozar

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1678 on: June 12, 2018, 07:45:18 PM »
Quote
(Some of that work is probably a side-effect of mistakes made by humans that will decline in number as robots take their jobs).

When I was a financial auditor that was all I did. There would be no work (in my field) if the accountants did it correctly. Same for IT, a lot of work is fixing bad code or dealing with networks going down. Imagine how many people would lose their jobs if everything worked.

aceyou

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1679 on: June 14, 2018, 09:53:43 PM »
A lot of fatalities/ accidents are due to infrastructure problems, lack of lighting, confusing intersections, lack of bike lane separators. I think all of the new options are really interesting (driverless cars, one or 3 wheeled transport etc.) but it won't matter until this country invests in its infrastructure. Maybe once cars are 100% automated and it is illegal to drive there will be fewer accidents but as long as their are self interested humans driving I doubt fatalities will change much. Fatalities are at the same rate as the 60's, and cars are so much better now.

I do believe trucking and short urban trips will change, which is where the money is.
Chart:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motor_vehicle_fatality_rate_in_U.S._by_year

Quote
Can you imagine any product being sold to the general public that killed 37 thousand people every year?

I don't get it either.

Junk food?   There's a product that kills far more than 37k/year. 

For the record, I'm on your side with the car debate.  Self-driving cars can't come fast enough if you ask me.  But there are other products sold to the general public that kill more than cars. 


tomsang

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1680 on: June 16, 2018, 01:32:09 PM »
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/15/spyce-is-developing-robotic-restaurants-with-help-from-daniel-boulud.html

Interesting video and story about an automated kitchen being developed by MIT engineers and a top notch chef.

mozar

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1681 on: June 16, 2018, 05:20:00 PM »
I don't get junk food either but I should say that in the "I don't get it thread."

tomsang

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1682 on: June 23, 2018, 07:53:23 AM »

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1683 on: June 23, 2018, 07:55:55 PM »
I am not really a futurist, but I have a lot of clients that are involved in automation and technology.  This has provided me the opportunity to think about the future and how it will impact the equilibrium of the haves and have nots. As technology and automation replaces all of the "manual" jobs", what is the role in the undereducated class?  If they are unable to provide value as their jobs are automated by technology created by engineers and scientists, how as a society do you create jobs and meaning to this class?  It seems like technology has the potential to further the divide between the haves and have nots. Anyone else think about this and how it impacts Financial Independence and our children?



I am not a futurist either but like you I do think about the future.

When I was in college  I took a futurology course.

I wrote a paper on Future Shock written by futurist Alvin Toffler who predicted increased customization of consumer products in  economies that provided more leisure time.


I have no specialized knowledge of the labor market or 21st-century workplace technologies.

Having said that I am firmly in the camp of the experts who predict widespread robotization  and attendant job loss for humans.

I've thought about what I call the "creative destruction ratio,"  work done by machines and technology/work done by humans.

I believe the ratio will increase which of course does not augur well for the employment of humans.

I think the ratio's increase portends more redistributionist policies that will erode the economic and financial liberty of some of today's  taxpayers, and increasingly, that of tomorrow's  taxpayers.
« Last Edit: July 09, 2018, 10:19:22 AM by John Galt incarnate! »

OurTown

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1684 on: June 25, 2018, 02:08:08 PM »
Can we get an AI for shareholder proxy voting on behalf of all of us holding S&P 500 index funds?  The guiding principle would have to be long-term growth of the index. 

AlanStache

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1685 on: June 25, 2018, 03:12:45 PM »
Can we get an AI for shareholder proxy voting on behalf of all of us holding S&P 500 index funds?  The guiding principle would have to be long-term growth of the index.

Wont happen.  No one would profit from it <sarcasm - not sarcasm>.  How much more in management fees would you pay for this? 

maizefolk

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1686 on: June 25, 2018, 05:15:30 PM »
Can we get an AI for shareholder proxy voting on behalf of all of us holding S&P 500 index funds?  The guiding principle would have to be long-term growth of the index.

Wont happen.  No one would profit from it <sarcasm - not sarcasm>.  How much more in management fees would you pay for this?

I believe that right now Vanguard (or whoever) is already voting your shares if they are held as part of an index fund, and my guess is that they are indeed voting them based on an interest in the overall growth of the index.

That was the logic behind whats-his-name who was claiming* index funds were terrible because they tended to vote against management that pursued cut throat competition between competitors in the same market sector, since the overall profits are the index are served by reduced, rather than increased, competition on pricing.

... Azar was his name: https://paw.princeton.edu/article/are-index-funds-hampering-corporate-competition

*Note: Just to be clear I personally am not claiming index funds are a bad thing, just saying that someone else made such an argument.

EscapeVelocity2020

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1687 on: June 26, 2018, 12:33:38 AM »
However, I'm more than willing to step in and make the claim that the 'popularity' of index funds may very well be propelling individual stocks higher than they otherwise might be on their own merits.  Once the individual stocks are given a 'free pass' and a wider than 'natural' market is sold on throwing money indiscriminately at equities - well, here we are.  And there probably isn't much more upside, but what do I know?

Fortunately I don't need the returns that I received after 2009 to stay retired, especially now.  Not that I wanted to retire anyway, but it was a fun challenge, to attain the ability to retire in my 30's.  Now that I'm in my 40's, it is fun to watch what others are up to while I continue to enjoy my FI life.  And, in a way, it might be interesting to see what happens if the S&P returns to the 600's, how American's behave.  But otherwise, I doubt anything will surprise me...  Even if robots entirely replace the manual labor workforce. 

AlanStache

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1688 on: June 26, 2018, 05:43:59 AM »
Based on information from the Internet Wayback Machine:
On Oct 1 2015 GE was 1.5% and the fifth largest component of iShares IVV etf.

Today it is 0.48% (now there are 509 companies in IVV.)

This does not show that GE's price is not artificially being held up but it does show that things adjust.

OurTown

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1689 on: June 26, 2018, 07:47:15 AM »
Can we get an AI for shareholder proxy voting on behalf of all of us holding S&P 500 index funds?  The guiding principle would have to be long-term growth of the index.

Wont happen.  No one would profit from it <sarcasm - not sarcasm>.  How much more in management fees would you pay for this?

I believe that right now Vanguard (or whoever) is already voting your shares if they are held as part of an index fund, and my guess is that they are indeed voting them based on an interest in the overall growth of the index.

That was the logic behind whats-his-name who was claiming* index funds were terrible because they tended to vote against management that pursued cut throat competition between competitors in the same market sector, since the overall profits are the index are served by reduced, rather than increased, competition on pricing.

... Azar was his name: https://paw.princeton.edu/article/are-index-funds-hampering-corporate-competition

*Note: Just to be clear I personally am not claiming index funds are a bad thing, just saying that someone else made such an argument.

Hmm.  Maybe that is where our future almighty oracle will emerge.  A Vanguard / Fidelity AI robo-voter S&P 500 algorithm.   

Just Joe

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1690 on: July 08, 2018, 09:42:52 PM »
I am curious to see how the American political and economic machine will cope with tens of millions of Americans out of work due to automation. Sure they can move on to other topics - if there are other topics they are qualified and capable of pursuing. See coal miners being retrained for programming. Some of them are capable and motivated while others are not even close.

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1691 on: July 09, 2018, 10:06:05 AM »
I am curious to see how the American political and economic machine will cope with tens of millions of Americans out of work due to automation.

Larry Kudlow thinks that it is Luddite to worry that increasing robotization will negatively affect the labor market.

I disagree.
« Last Edit: July 09, 2018, 10:08:25 AM by John Galt incarnate! »

dougules

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1692 on: July 09, 2018, 10:39:41 AM »
I am curious to see how the American political and economic machine will cope with tens of millions of Americans out of work due to automation.

Larry Kudlow thinks that it is Luddite to worry that increasing robotization will negatively affect the labor market.

I disagree.

I think you're already seeing how the American political and economic machine is coping with people out of work.  This thread seems to be about speculating on the future of automation, but a lot of that future is already in the past.  US manufacturing output is almost at an all time high.  The US manufactures twice as much as it did in 1984 with 2/3 the people.  Offshoring gets blamed for taking jobs, but domestic automation and process improvements took more than other countries. 

I agree that the economy will probably surprise us with what new jobs will come along to absorb displaced workers, but the problem is the constant churn and upheaval.  This is also a continuation of what's already been happening since the 18th century.  Just look at farm workers in Nebraska or steel workers in Pittsburgh.  There are plenty of new jobs for people like them, but the real problem is the upheaval of shifting to a completely new career.   People will likely have to leave family and move to a new place.  People have to train or go to school for new skills, and that's after they figure out exactly what it is they're going to do.  A lot of people have just been left behind.  Look at how that has already been for people then project what that will look like as that process really accelerates. 

toganet

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1693 on: July 10, 2018, 06:52:47 AM »
I think you're already seeing how the American political and economic machine is coping with people out of work.  This thread seems to be about speculating on the future of automation, but a lot of that future is already in the past.  US manufacturing output is almost at an all time high.  The US manufactures twice as much as it did in 1984 with 2/3 the people.  Offshoring gets blamed for taking jobs, but domestic automation and process improvements took more than other countries. 

I agree that the economy will probably surprise us with what new jobs will come along to absorb displaced workers, but the problem is the constant churn and upheaval.  This is also a continuation of what's already been happening since the 18th century.  Just look at farm workers in Nebraska or steel workers in Pittsburgh.  There are plenty of new jobs for people like them, but the real problem is the upheaval of shifting to a completely new career.   People will likely have to leave family and move to a new place.  People have to train or go to school for new skills, and that's after they figure out exactly what it is they're going to do.  A lot of people have just been left behind.  Look at how that has already been for people then project what that will look like as that process really accelerates.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/05/there-are-more-jobs-than-people-out-of-work.html

Quote
Employers have been complaining for years about a skills mismatch, or the inability to find workers with the right training for the positions available. In the meantime, companies are adding other incentives to retain workers and pull new ones in.

...

"While more people are getting into jobs, folks aren't moving around much once they do," she said. "Unfortunately, the lack of mobility means that employers face little pressure to raise wages. They just aren't competing over jobholders."

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1694 on: July 10, 2018, 06:59:28 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

toganet

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1695 on: July 10, 2018, 07:37:41 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

I can see things going this way, too, and I worry about the folks who fall "below the line" as that line continues to rise.  Since we value work not just for earning a living, but as part of identity and a measure of value to society, the folks who are shut out are going to have hard time.  Maybe defending against this is why so-called "bullshit jobs" are on the rise?

toganet

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1696 on: July 10, 2018, 07:39:45 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

I can see things going this way, too, and I worry about the folks who fall "below the line" as that line continues to rise.  Since we value work not just for earning a living, but as part of identity and a measure of value to society, the folks who are shut out are going to have hard time.  Maybe defending against this is why so-called "bullshit jobs" are on the rise?

boarder42

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1697 on: July 10, 2018, 08:00:51 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

I can see things going this way, too, and I worry about the folks who fall "below the line" as that line continues to rise.  Since we value work not just for earning a living, but as part of identity and a measure of value to society, the folks who are shut out are going to have hard time.  Maybe defending against this is why so-called "bullshit jobs" are on the rise?

how old are you - the millenial generation does not identify and measure value based on their profession like the previous generations did.  Most of my generation identifies with the activities and things we enjoy doing in life not who gives us the money to allow us to do those things.  So while this may be more difficult for previous generations to grasp i believe the way the younger crowd is trending the job is part of my life identity wont be a hurdle.  the hurdle will be paying those that fall below that line a UBI. 

toganet

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1698 on: July 10, 2018, 08:06:30 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

I can see things going this way, too, and I worry about the folks who fall "below the line" as that line continues to rise.  Since we value work not just for earning a living, but as part of identity and a measure of value to society, the folks who are shut out are going to have hard time.  Maybe defending against this is why so-called "bullshit jobs" are on the rise?

how old are you - the millenial generation does not identify and measure value based on their profession like the previous generations did.  Most of my generation identifies with the activities and things we enjoy doing in life not who gives us the money to allow us to do those things.  So while this may be more difficult for previous generations to grasp i believe the way the younger crowd is trending the job is part of my life identity wont be a hurdle.  the hurdle will be paying those that fall below that line a UBI.

I'm a Gen X'er, so I understand what you're saying -- though I think it's risky to over-generalize.  Boomers are going to be around a long time, and they vote.  I expect them to continue to see the world through the lens of their own values, and judge those who don't conform to their view of things.  That's a significant drag against something like UBI, gov't guaranteed jobs, or even subsidized re-training.

By the River

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Re: Robots and their impact on the future
« Reply #1699 on: July 10, 2018, 08:10:08 AM »
yep there are jobs we just dont have the skills to fill the jobs currently and this will continue to increase over time as we drop menial labor jobs in favor of automation - like truck drivers what marketable skill do they have - or fry cooks - they could potentially move to more upscale restaurants and be cooks.  but as we automate jobs away and more skills are required to do the new jobs employers may be forced into doing more  training and bring in people with better soft skills/EQ that have an apptitude to learn. 

So whats the outcome of this- employers may start doing testing of potential employees to understand their apptitude for learning.  In the engineering world its not uncommon to test potential hires on the skill set but a basic apptitude or IQ or EQ test could be the new norm to obtain a job since the employer will be forced to commit extra resources to training.  It may also come with a pay back clause to keep you around or you forfeit some of the cost to train you.  similar to college reimbursement plans.

Agree with what you say but the basic IQ test has been effectively outlawed as a job requirement (Supreme Court case Griggs vs. Duke Power).   An unforeseen effect was that companies couldn't test so they took a college degree in lieu of an IQ test which led to many jobs requiring degrees which do not need one, leading to increased student debt, yada, yada, yada.   However, specific knowledge tests are still allowed which allows the engineering aptitude or other job specific tests