Let's Riff on the next Tech/Social Revolution

[Ph64]

Well, here's my issue with technology - I think we're getting stupid with it in some ways. I'd have people - other IT people - come to me at work with a tech question, if I knew the answer I'd help, but often I'd just type their question as a Google search, look at some good examples of exactly what they asked and give them the links with a quick explanation - but these are well paid IT people who apparently can't figure out how to Google things themselves? And, invariably, I'd get the exact same question from the exact same person a year or two later... I even had one coworker ask me for help where I'd done the same thing 2 years earlier and spent a good hour+ figuring it out on my own - answered his question, but when I told him that I'd figured it out 2 years ago his response was "how did you remember that 2 years later, I can barely remember what I did last week".

Of course the same people are obsessed with their "smart" phones. I wonder if we're raising a generation with a world of knowledge at their fingertips 24/7, and yet too constantly distracted to remember it after?

A friend just bought a new Subaru... Yeah, no keys these days, pushbutton start based on proximity to the key-fob remote. I asked "what happens when the car battery dies one cold winter morning - how do you get in the car? And if you can't get in the car, how do you pop the hood release to jump start it or replace the battery?" Nobody seems to have a good answer to that for me, despite me asking 20 different people that, including the dealer reps when I drove him to pick it up.

Yup... so 4 months old, for some reason the battery somehow drained and he couldn't get into his car one morning - he had to call the dealer so they could send someone out to get into his own car. He even had jumper cables, but if you can't get into the car...

Tell me how that's better than an old fashioned key lock?

We're obsessed with technology "improving things", and I agree in many ways it has... but I see a lot of things that just make me question the wisdom of some of the ways we're cramming it in places where, IMHO, the "improvement" seems questionable, if not negative.

My 2¢ rant.

(And can anyone here answer my car question?)

[C-Mag]

Well, here's my issue with technology - I think we're getting stupid with it in some ways. I'd have people - other IT people - come to me at work with a tech question, if I knew the answer I'd help, but often I'd just type their question as a Google search, look at some good examples of exactly what they asked and give them the links with a quick explanation - but these are well paid IT people who apparently can't figure out how to Google things themselves? And, invariably, I'd get the exact same question from the exact same person a year or two later... I even had one coworker ask me for help where I'd done the same thing 2 years earlier and spent a good hour+ figuring it out on my own - answered his question, but when I told him that I'd figured it out 2 years ago his response was "how did you remember that 2 years later, I can barely remember what I did last week".

Of course the same people are obsessed with their "smart" phones. I wonder if we're raising a generation with a world of knowledge at their fingertips 24/7, and yet too constantly distracted to remember it after?

A friend just bought a new Subaru... Yeah, no keys these days, pushbutton start based on proximity to the key-fob remote. I asked "what happens when the car battery dies one cold winter morning - how do you get in the car? And if you can't get in the car, how do you pop the hood release to jump start it or replace the battery?" Nobody seems to have a good answer to that for me, despite me asking 20 different people that, including the dealer reps when I drove him to pick it up.

Yup... so 4 months old, for some reason the battery somehow drained and he couldn't get into his car one morning - he had to call the dealer so they could send someone out to get into his own car. He even had jumper cables, but if you can't get into the car...

Tell me how that's better than an old fashioned key lock?

We're obsessed with technology "improving things", and I agree in many ways it has... but I see a lot of things that just make me question the wisdom of some of the ways we're cramming it in places where, IMHO, the "improvement" seems questionable, if not negative.

My 2¢ rant.

(And can anyone here answer my car question?)

+1
Nice Rant.

I agree. I see one of the unintended side affects of increasing technology is people loosing the ability of critical thinking and problem solving, even planning. Take smart phone navigational tools. Just listen to the voice, no one knows how to navigate without them.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

#chooseMorlock

[Mercury]

(And can anyone here answer my car question?)

Break the window.

[Ph64]

I eagerly await the self-driving cars, fyi, that when it determines you have an outstanding arrest warrant, unpaid taxes, or have been flagged for some other "offense", it promptly locks the doors and drives you to the nearest police station.

Illegals, of course, can just be driven across the border.

[TheReal_ND]

Heh

[C-Mag]

I eagerly await the self-driving cars, fyi, that when it determines you have an outstanding arrest warrant, unpaid taxes, or have been flagged for some other "offense", it promptly locks the doors and drives you to the nearest police station.

Illegals, of course, can just be driven across the border.

An Oldy, but still aging very well.

[doc_loliday]

Warehouses, service, and transportation are getting automated soon... not the distant future.

They are huge employers.

I am sure anyone who fails to strike it rich in our big ol' economy after an amazon bot, a self-service kiosk or a google car takes their job are just unwilling to make the sacrifices required for success.

Interestingly Amazon just inked a deal to open a warehouse in my town and they're hiring 2500 workers.

But sure, some jobs are getting replaced. And again, I doubted that robots are going to take all of our jobs in the near future, so examples of some of the some being replaced isn't a counter point. And we should welcome productivity increases. Moreover all of the well paying jobs I mentioned had nothing to do with warehouses. And by the way, I never mentioned getting rich, all of my attainable examples are those that involve hard work over the course of decades. Just because striking it rich isn't available for all doesn't mean it's all doom.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Warehouses, service, and transportation are getting automated soon... not the distant future.

They are huge employers.

I am sure anyone who fails to strike it rich in our big ol' economy after an amazon bot, a self-service kiosk or a google car takes their job are just unwilling to make the sacrifices required for success.

Interestingly Amazon just inked a deal to open a warehouse in my town and they're hiring 2500 workers.

But sure, some jobs are getting replaced. And again, I doubted that robots are going to take all of our jobs in the near future, so examples of some of the some being replaced isn't a counter point. And we should welcome productivity increases. Moreover all of the well paying jobs I mentioned had nothing to do with warehouses. And by the way, I never mentioned getting rich, all of my attainable examples are those that involve hard work over the course of decades. Just because striking it rich isn't available for all doesn't mean it's all doom.

It is a numbers game. Automation completely obviating all human labor is a way off, but if those three employment opportunities disappear in short order, there might be a legitimate employment crisis.

Keep in mind, when I say "strike it rich" I am describing a very low bar for rich... basically, gainfully employed at a living wage is rich, because the main problem isn't that jobs disappear. The problem is with constantly diminishing the value of human work, and making everyone's economic future precarious. If a load of potential workers floods the labor market and zeros in on the good jobs you did mention... I don't know, I am not holding my breath for the next big idea that hoovers up the excess human capacity and keeps compensation high.

You are right though, a minimum wage gas station employee has it better than a lot of people long dead. It is hard for me to imagine that situation is immune to perturbations.

[Speaker to Animals]

So am I. I don't see automation taking all the jobs for a long, long time.

If a long, long time is less than about 40 years, okay.

Nor am I talking about automation taking *all* the jobs. It only needs to take up a sizable portion of the jobs to create a massive population of welfare-dependent people.