Rise of the robots: Humans will compete with droids for jobs by 2040, study claims

[Gingersnap]

Rise of the robots: Humans will compete with droids for jobs by 2040, study claims

Plastic surgeons will be able to offer additional brain processing power
Study claims we will have bionic implants to perform as fast as machines
The current 37.4 hour working week will increase by a third to 50.5 hours
We will have less sex in a lifetime as a result of reduced human interaction

By ELLIE ZOLFAGHARIFARD
PUBLISHED: 06:39 EST, 21 April 2014 | UPDATED: 10:50 EST, 21 April 2014

In less than 30 years, we may also be requesting bionic implants for our hands that will make us able to perform tasks as fast as any machine

By 2040, cabs will be driven by Google robots, shops will become showrooms for online outlets and call centres will be staffed by intelligent droids.

That’s the scenario depicted in recent research which suggests robots could be taking over our lives and jobs in less than 30 years. The competition for work caused by a rise in the robots population will see us heading to surgeons for ‘additional processing power for our brains’, they claim.

We may also be requesting bionic implants for our hands that will make us able to perform tasks as fast as any machine.

Futurologists, commissioned by global job search website xpatjobs.com, say workers will have less job security and will work more unsociable hours. Those who take these risks and innovate with their own bodies will be the biggest earners in 2040, they claim.

However, the study added that workers may be left with poor eyesight, smaller sexual organs, and constantly-furrowed brows as they struggle to keep up to life in the 21st century.

Experts expect the current 37.4 hour working week to increase by a third to 50.5 hours.

More at the link. I do think robotics will adversely affect human employment very shortly but I don't think humans can get any implants or whatever to compete or that we will compete for robotic tasks. We can't.

Robotic devices are never sick, pregnant, or hot to date the gal in Marketing. They don't leave early for kid-related tasks. They don't have interpersonal conflicts. They can work whatever hours. They don't sue or use Worker's Comp.

I can see many, many tasks taken over by robotic systems very shortly.

The question is what will actual humans do when that happens? Most of the world's work is non-creative, non-interpersonal, and non-decision-making. It's routine and physical - things robotics are really good at doing.



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[Adam]

More at the link. I do think robotics will adversely affect human employment very shortly but I don't think humans can get any implants or whatever to compete or that we will compete for robotic tasks. We can't.

Robotic devices are never sick, pregnant, or hot to date the gal in Marketing. They don't leave early for kid-related tasks. They don't have interpersonal conflicts. They can work whatever hours. They don't sue or use Worker's Comp.

I can see many, many tasks taken over by robotic systems very shortly.

The question is what will actual humans do when that happens? Most of the world's work is non-creative, non-interpersonal, and non-decision-making. It's routine and physical - things robotics are really good at doing.

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Now, that's partially in jest, but also it leads to a point.

We're getting to the point where we're maximizing mechanization. All sorts of menial and even relatively skilled jobs are now performed by autonomous mechanization. Most notably are things like welding and painting in factories, along with "pick-and-pack" jobs that were common "light industrial" jobs that the most uneducated people could count on being able to get even just ten years ago. There comes a point, somewhere along the line, where there is total mechanization. The ditch-digger is not just replaced by a guy who can operate a backhoe, but in fact by a backhoe that runs itself and digs a perfect ditch without outside influence. This is happening already in a lot of big-time farms: cultivators and such are guided by GPS to an accuracy of inches, to the point that the "operator" literally just sits in the cab and is along for the ride. There are already trains around the world that operate without an engineer (or indeed a conductor or anyone else). These are limited to very narrow operations right now: point-to-point and back at airports and the like, but it's plenty obvious that this will ultimately progress to more and more fully-automated trains.

The list goes on and on, and the point remains the same: automation has been on the march since the 1800s (and one could argue even earlier, with things like European windmills and water wheels and the like), and it's not going to stop.

There comes a point at which just automation stops and reasoning begins. There is already a degree of this in a lot of factory automation: robots are equipped with cameras to let them calculate the very best place to put that spot-weld, for example. That's hardly the only place, but it's an example.

Once you get to reasoning, then where is the line between reasoning and sentience? Ethicists have argued over this for decades, but all agree that there is a line somewhere between sentience and reasoning. And once there is sentience, what's to say that robots won't have interpersonal conflicts? What's to prevent that from happening? Right now, robots are effectively limited to inserting flap A into slot B, but if they are reasoning on their own, what's to stop them from developing a personality? Getting upset with a fellow robot?

At some point, the line will be crossed. I rather doubt that it will happen in our lifetimes, but that day ultimately is coming.