Posted on 05/16/2016 10:59:11 PM PDT by Trumpinator
Mark Harris 2 hrs ago
The Man Who Built Google’s First Self-Driving Car Is Now a Trucker
A group of ex-Google engineers have just launched Otto, an autonomous trucking startup
Otto’s first vehicle is twice as long and six times as heavy as Google’s cute prototype car, but has exactly the same number of drivers: zero.
Founded by four ex-Google engineers — including Anthony Levandowski, the man who built Google’s very first self-driving car — Otto is applying Google’s all-or-nothing approach to commercial big rigs: ditch human drivers, avoid thousands of road deaths, help the environment, and if all goes well, make a ton of money along the way.
(Excerpt) Read more at backchannel.com ...
Your doomsaying is ridiculous.
Nothing uncharted about it.
The reason we have less well-paying jobs is due to govt wreaking misery upon society and not allowing markets to work. Has nothing inherent to do with automation.
Re: “there’s no reason to believe it [new jobs for humans] won’t be true with the proliferation of robotics.”
I can think of two reasons.
When affordable machines become as agile, or as intelligent, as the average person, 50% of the work force is going to be unemployed.
That will take decades, but it is going to happen, and within this century.
The good news - robotics and Artificial Intelligence will create unprecedented wealth, unemployment will lose its stigma, and welfare will be increased until all Americans enjoy a modest, but completely secure, standard of living.
I think AI is pipe dream that’ll never really materialize. We’ll see increasingly sophisticated algorithms for carrying out specific tasks, but nothing that approaches a thinking, planning, sentient being which can create and direct its own goal-oriented actions.
But I do agree that the growth in automation will necessarily lead to greater wealth for all. Such that it’s possible for a society to institute basic income policies without bankrupting itself. Nevertheless, I remain skeptical of the economic fatalism that we’re going to somehow run out of jobs.
When you can bad up your statement by lusting all the jobs that cannot be automated, no matter how sophisticated the algorithms, then you can tell me I’m overblown.
There are a growing number of mines in Australia which are using driverless dump trucks and freight trains. I can easily see automation removing humans from the entire transportation chain from farm/factory to the home.
Over the next few decades the need for humans to be employed to do stuff will drop dramatically. Mass unenployment of billions with no prospect earning an income will challenge the whole foundation of capitalism.
“robotics and Artificial Intelligence will create unprecedented wealth, unemployment will lose its stigma, and welfare will be increased until all Americans enjoy a modest, but completely secure, standard of living.”
What’s not to “enjoy”? /s
Unfortunately, you are technically correct!
regarding automation...watch for a massive increase in theft from automated trucks.
only a matter of time before people realise how to get the automated truck to stop (namely standing in front of it) before raiding it....
Take your Soma.
Well, I’m safe. No self respecting robot would want my job.
Are these guys this stupid? Do they have any idea the kind of routes required in trucking? The virtually unlimited amount of things that can go wrong? Trucking is not driving from point A to point B in a straight line. Why do we have people today who assume computers are now at the level of human intelligence? That we have a bunch of robots running around with A.I.?? Where are they?
Sometimes, I really hate my phone. I will repeat what I said with all the corrections.
When you can back up your statement by listing all the jobs that cannot be automated, no matter how sophisticated the algorithms, then you can tell me I’m overblown.
If it's automatable, it wasn't a good job.
Exactly, what galls me is these people think computers have now reached a level of human intellect. That we have all these high intellect A.I. robots running around. Where are they? The only thing that’s changed in computers is they’ve gotten smaller and faster, but other than that, they pretty much have the same intellect they did 20 years ago. New programs does not mean a higher intellect.
For who?
I would not leave out the UNION....... They might have something to say about this around the ports where this would could be utilized to automate loading and unloading.
Why is this doomsaying? It is the future just like automatic coffee makers or tomato pickers
Anyone working in the automation field or robotics will tell you, anything can be automated.
I worked in the automation field since the late '70s and have watched it grow from room size computer systems to hand held devices that carry 1000 times the computing power. It has grown exponentially.
The jobs will be in designing the next evolution, repairing and maintaining the systems in the future.
There will soon be a day, probably in our lifetime, where we will look back on the days where men drove trucks as the “dangerous” days. It is so obvious where this is heading. Dedicated lanes on our highways to automated trucks. Our children will marvel that we used to dodge and weave among them and they will think us nuts for having done so.
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