Robotic Nation (Robots take over by 2050)

How Stuff Works ^ | 7-22-03 | Marshall Brain

[dogbyte12]

I went to McDonald's this weekend with the kids. We go to McDonald's to eat about once a week because it is a mile from the house and has an indoor play area. Our normal routine is to walk in to McDonald's, stand in line, order, stand around waiting for the order, sit down, eat and play.

On Sunday, this decades-old routine changed forever. When we walked in to McDonald's, an attractive woman in a suit greeted us and said, "Are you planning to visit the play area tonight?" The kids screamed, "Yeah!" "McDonald's has a new system that you can use to order your food right in the play area. Would you like to try it?" The kids screamed, "Yeah!"

The woman walks us over to a pair of kiosks in the play area. She starts to show me how the kiosks work and the kids scream, "We want to do it!" So I pull up a chair and the kids stand on it while the (extremely patient) woman in a suit walks the kids through the screens. David ordered his food, Irena ordered her food, I ordered my food. It's a simple system. Then it was time to pay. Interestingly, the kiosk only took cash in the form of bills. So I fed my bills into the machine. Then you take a little plastic number to set on your table and type the number in. The transaction is complete.

We sat down at a table. We put our number in the center of the table and waited. In about 10 seconds the kids screamed, "When is our food going to get here???" I said, "Let's count." In less than two minutes a woman in an apron put a tray with our food on the table, handed us our change, took the plastic number and left.

You know what? It is a nice system. It works. It is much nicer than standing in line. The only improvement I would request is the ability to use a credit card.

I will make this prediction: by 2008, every meal in every fast food restaurant will be ordered from a kiosk like this, or from a similar system embedded in each table.

As nice as this system is, however, I think that it represents the tip of an iceberg that we do not understand. This iceberg is going to change the American economy in ways that are very hard to imagine.

[dogbyte12]

I encourage everybody to read the full article. It is long. It comes from the guy behind the how stuff works website. Basically, he is saying with Moore's law, robots will take over every job that the "working class" does by 2050. Fast food, retail, mail delivery, construction, can all be done cheaper and quicker with robots when they get to a certain point of "skill". I have often had this feeling my self. We need to eventually have a debate on this in this country/world. If you can teach a robot to do just about anything physical in nature. All forms of physical labor done by humans are redundant. You would have to slum to get a human to clean your house for example.

Why get Rosarita to clean your house, when a robot will detect any disturbing lint in the room with sensors, keep scrubbing the walls, floors, without quitting until the cleanliness matches their pre-defined parameters.

Why would you get a 16 year old to flip your burger, when a robot can probe it with sterilized sensors, detecting exact temperatures, salt content, etc so you get an exactly identical burger every time you order.

We are seriously going to have to choose what to do. We either pay people with "charity", or those among us with a lower than say 120 IQ are not going to have any work to do that couldn't be done better, other than perhaps sales, or intangible social skills.

[kimmie7]

Very interesting. Thanks for the post.

[joesnuffy]

[Question_Assumptions]

Two major factors that will slow the adoption of robots are vandalism and theft. And an increase in robots should, in theory, create an increase in skilled service technician jobs to create and maintain them. Of course if too many jobs disappear, there will be an even more natural factor limiting the expansion of robots -- there will be no need for a robotic McDonalds because there won't be enough people with paying jobs going to McDonalds to justify them.

That said, there is a line in the Original Star Trek episode "The Ultimate Computer" where Dr. Daystrom claims that "Computers will free man so that man may achieve." That always makes me wonder, "Achieve what? And what about the people who don't want to achieve? What are all those idle hands going to do and who is going to feed them?"

[dogbyte12]

If for say $20,000 you could get a robotic "maid, butler" who would pretty much do every household chore that you could think to program it to do, would ya metaphorically speaking... fire the pool boy, the gardner, the woman who comes in 2 times a week to clean, etc.

I would. No point in having strangers mucking around in your house, when you could have the job done better, for cheaper.

[Georgia_JimD]

When that happens I'll take a job fixing the robots.

[Question_Assumptions]

Just bear in mind that any robot as strong as a human can be deadly if it malfunctions or is reprogrammed with malicious intent. I was recently talking to a friend's father who was a safety officer at GM and he told is, in pretty graphic detail, what could happen to a person if they wandered into the area with the robotic welders while the assembly line was running. A robot will only respond to what it is programmed to respond to. The robotic pool boy may not realize that it has knocked your elderly mother or infant into the pool and will not try to save them or call 911.

[dogbyte12]

For me so much it isn't about the top half of the gene pool, but the lower half. What exactly purpose will they serve in an economy. If you have an IQ of 80, but are a hard worker, you can mop floors today. Those who are smarter, more aggressive can do something better. When robots come into full force, the smart people can work on source code, design, sales, etc, that is what always happens when technology comes.

The key difference I think here though is, what happens when the technology is created specifically to get rid of the lower functioning people?

[ClearCase_guy]

I used to have debates with socialists about this all the time. My view:

If we encourage capitalism, industrialization, and free-marker entrepreneurialism, the end result will be a proliferation of machines that do the work that humans used to do. The socialist response: WE CANNOT ALLOW IT! Human must be slaves! They must toil in fields and in factories! The Proletariat is vitally important and we must preserve their grubby way of life!

Socialists do not want to free humans from dangerous or boring work. They want humans to be slaves in a vast, impersonal economic system. What I want:

Really cheap fuel because the machines make it.
Really cheap steel because the machines make it.
Really cheap cars, because the machines make them.
Really cheap food because the machines grow it.
Really cheap books, DVD's, swimming pools -- because the machines make them.

If I can live a life of leisure on $4.50 a year, I'd be happy. Can anyone argue that such a desire will be forever impossible? Can anyone argue that such a desire is inherently anti-Conservative or anti-Capitalist?

And where do I get my annual income of $4.50? Heck, maybe I don't even need that. Automation is bad for socialists -- but good for anyone who cares about freedom.

[Dubh_Ghlase]

Wow! I remember reading that comic, and probably that installment!

[gedeon3]

Raise of the machines?

[Bernard Marx]

Ask any Democrat and they'll tell you constant increases in the minimum wage have no effect on the fast-food industry. Neither do those distorted order-taking speakers that further fuzz-up thick foreign accents, making them completely indecipherable. Nope - just keep increasing the wages and benefits for illegal workers (who only do the jobs Americans won't do!), support an ambulance-chasing assault from greedy lawyers and PETA, and further stigmatize an industry that now employs many thousands of people and see what happens in the long run.

Add to that an "education" lobby that seeks to dumb-down even smart students and make them unemployable in order to protect incompetent union members and their own wage, benefit and vacation packages and you have the recipe for social disaster.

[WestPacSailor]

Bernard, when are you running for president?

[WestPacSailor]

[MineralMan]

"If for say $20,000 you could get a robotic "maid, butler" who would pretty much do every household chore that you could think to program it to do, would ya metaphorically speaking... fire the pool boy, the gardner, the woman who comes in 2 times a week to clean, etc.

I would. No point in having strangers mucking around in your house, when you could have the job done better, for cheaper
"

Nah. I'd just keep doing all that stuff myself, like I always have, and spend the $20K on something else.

[ClearCase_guy]

Something else to consider: What do the defenders of illegal immigrants always say? “They do the work that Americans refuse to do!” Well, what if machines did all that work? What would the illegal immigrants do then? Collect Welfare? How many defenders would they have then??

Increased automation helps in the fight against illegal immigration because it removes the need for low-skilled workers.

But what about lazy stupid Americans who also need low-skill work?

Fewer low-skill jobs increase the incentive to improve our education system to that a higher percentage of American citizens can do the jobs that machines cannot. You see, we can limp along with poor-quality government schools if McDonald’s will hire the “graduates”. But if McDonald’s won’t do that anyone, we have a problem. The solution is to make sure that the schools churn out people who use the English language well, and can handle math and computer skills. If the NEA stands in the way, they will be swept away.

My bottom line: Free Market, pro-capitalist Conservatives (IMO) should not argue against technical and economic advances which decrease labor costs for major businesses.

[PeterPrinciple]

When that happens I'll take a job fixing the robots.


Along with the robots there will be a lot of government regulation..........but I suppose the robots can do that also.

[Mr. Bird]

From the article:

. Keep this fact in mind: the workplace of today is not really that much different from the workplace of 100 years ago. Humans do almost all of the work today, just like they did in 1900. A restaurant today is nearly identical to a restaurant in 1900. An airport, hotel or amusement park today is nearly identical to any airport, hotel or amusement park seen decades ago. Humans do nearly everything today in the workplace, just like they always have.

That, simply put, is a load of crap. Information systems have wiped out millions of clerical jobs, to name just one very large change in the workplace. Why must everyone continue to use some sort of static analysis when looking at technological change? As we all know, free market economies are not zero sum games. I hate to break it to the author, but "employment" is merely a means to an end. People work in exchange for money, which is currently the primary vehicle used to acquire goods and services.

In a society of huge efficiencies and automation, the methods of exchange could be altered drastically. "Employment" could become a hobby, rather than an essential aspect of existence. There's just no possible way to assess, on a macro scale, what the future would look like.

[Salgak]

Where do they go ? Same place they go now. HR Departments, Civil Service, and Law School. . . . (g)

[RightWhale]

what happens when the technology is created specifically to get rid of the lower functioning people?

Look around. The lower functioning units are already partying day and night. They not only don't know what's going on outside of who is going to be at which party, but they don't care what trip the higher functioning units are on. Keep those gov't checks coming.