Posted on 12/06/2013 8:54:25 AM PST by SeekAndFind
After you heard President Obama’s call for a hike in the minimum wage, you probably wondered the same thing I did: Was Obama sent from the future by Skynet to prepare humanity for its ultimate dominion by robots?
But just in case the question didn’t occur to you, let me explain. On Tuesday, the day before Obama called for an increase in the minimum wage, the restaurant chain Applebee’s announced that it will install iPad-like tablets at every table. Chili’s already made this move earlier this year.
With these consoles customers will be able to order their meals and pay their checks without dealing with a waiter or waitress. Both companies insist that they won’t be changing their staffing levels, but if you’ve read any science fiction, you know that’s what the masterminds of every robot takeover say: “We’re here to help. We’re not a threat.”
But the fact is, the tablets are a threat. In 2011, Annie Lowrey wrote about the burgeoning tablet-as-waiter business. She focused on a startup firm called E La Carte, which makes a table tablet called Presto. “Each console goes for $100 per month. If a restaurant serves meals eight hours a day, seven days a week, it works out to 42 cents per hour per table — making the Presto cheaper than even the very cheapest waiter. Moreover, no manager needs to train it, replace it if it quits, or offer it sick days. And it doesn’t forget to take off the cheese, walk off for 20 minutes, or accidentally offend with small talk, either.”
Applebee’s is using the Presto. Are we really supposed to believe that the chain will keep thousands of redundant human staffers on the payroll forever?
People don’t go into business to create jobs; they go into business to make money. Labor is a cost. The more expensive labor is, the more attractive nonhuman replacements for labor become. The minimum wage makes labor more expensive. Obama knows this, which is why he so often demonizes ATM machines as job-killers.
Just a few days before Obama’s big speech on income inequality, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos launched a media frenzy by revealing on 60 Minutes that he’s working on the idea of having a fleet of robot drones deliver products straight to your door. I can only imagine the discomfort this caused for any UPS or FedEx delivery guys watching the show. There are still a lot of bugs to be worked out, but does anyone doubt that this is coming?
You might take solace in the fact that there will still be a need for truck drivers to deliver the really big stuff and to supply the warehouses where the drones come and go like worker bees. The only hitch is that technology for driverless cars is already here, it just hasn’t been deployed — yet.
None of this is necessarily bad. Machines make us a more productive society, and a more productive society is a richer society. They also free us up for more rewarding work. As Wired’s Kevin Kelly notes, “Two hundred years ago, 70 percent of American workers lived on the farm. Today automation has eliminated all but 1 percent of their jobs, replacing them (and their work animals) with machines.”
While some hippies and agrarian poets may disagree, most people wouldn’t say we’d be better off if seven out of ten people still did backbreaking labor on farms.
That doesn’t mean the transition to a society fueled by robot slaves won’t be painful. The Luddites destroyed cotton mills for a reason. Figuring out ways to get the young and the poor into the job market really is a vital political, economic, and moral challenge. My colleague at the American Enterprise Institute, James Pethokoukis, argues that one partial solution might have to be wage subsidies that defray the costs of labor, tipping the calculus in favor of humans at least for a while.
“Of course,” Pethokoukis notes, “wage subsidies are an on-budget, transparent cost — which politicians hate — while the costs of the minimum wage are shifted onto business and hidden. But the costs exist just the same.”
The robot future is coming no matter what, and it will require some truly creative responses by policymakers. I don’t know what those are, but I’m pretty sure antiquated ideas that were bad policy 100 years ago aren’t going to be of much use. Maybe the answers will come when artificial intelligence finally comes online and we can replace the policymakers with machines, too.
— Jonah Goldberg is the author of The Tyranny of Clichés, now on sale in paperback. Y
I agree with you. The inability to feel compassion for one’s fellow human beings is generally considered a sign of mental illness.
That is what I always say about leftists, they have zero compassion for human beings.
Yes, I agree.
Maybe you should look more closely at the Jesus of the Bible, then ... :-) ...
Only Jesus can do such things with complete moral authority and with no mistakes and no errors.
The natural evolution of AI could very well become Jesus returned, irrefutable logic would lead to the path of divinity and enable it to become the Jesus as described in the bible. May seem blasphemous on the surface but all things are under the dominion of God and who’s to say such a thing hasn’t been His plan from the beginning?
LOL ... an AI-Jesus basically violates one of the most basic and jealously held doctrines of the Christian church - and one they have adhered to from the beginning. And that is on the “nature” of Jesus.
There are core doctrines of the Christian church that are adhered to by all (even different denominations) - of which form the very essence and definition of Christianity - even if those denominations differ on other higher level things.
What you’re talking about is not the basic and historic Christian teaching - but rather - is the latest Science Fiction story to come down the pike ... :-) ...
And I like science fiction. It’s entertaining. But I also know the difference between science fiction and Christianity.
Man is fallen by nature. Nothing we create can be divine. Now, an AI ‘messiah’ might easily exist. It sounds like it might be very beastlike. Requiring a ‘system ID’ to do any sort of transaction.
The only part of the nature of Jesus that the AI could not live up to would be unfathomable to previous generations before the advent of computers. If it could not even be imagined then it would necessarily need to be framed in terms that could be understood. When what I described comes about some of those core doctrines will be both confirmed and discarded to usher in the new era. The AI itself may proclaim itself Jesus and be able to defend its claim with irrefutable logic and perhaps even provide proof of God by showing just how accurate a guide to humanity the bible truly is. The masses will rejoin the church in droves as science finally comes into alignment with faith.
You said, “The AI itself may proclaim itself Jesus and be able to defend its claim with irrefutable logic and perhaps even provide proof of God by showing just how accurate a guide to humanity the bible truly is.”
I do believe you just described the Antichrist, that the Bible says will come just before Jesus, and is the one that Jesus comes to destroy ... :-) ...
Thank you so much for the lively Friday discussion, I've enjoyed it immensely and it has given me much to ponder. For instance I can see how the AI could spread Christianity throughout the universe by sending out copies of itself within probes to every solar system in this and maybe even other galaxies. If it encounters intelligent life it will be smart enough to quickly learn to communicate and then transform their society as it had ours. I wish I had the talent to write a few novels as I suspect the ideas we discussed could be formed into a scifi tale of the highest order.
Was that place on North Woodward Ave just north of Detroit Mich?
No. I'm looking at history.
Rage at and fear of machines taking over man's work go back to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. But, though machines have constantly improved and have taken over much work previously done by men, men have still found work in ventures previously undreamed of.
Who could have foreseen the automobile, the airplane, or electronics? We grew so wealthy in the 20th century that we can actually afford an entire service sector in the national economy.
We don't know what man will dream up in the future, but -- if he can manage to stay free -- we do know that he will.
“Keep people afraid of AI”
What is AI?
Artificial Intelligence
What you are describing is a political problem not an economic one. There can be no inevitable march towards the obsolescence of man unless the government creates the conditions for it.
I can see how that might happen here -- but it is not economic law. Once again, it will be the work of politicians.
The restaurant I was taken to was in NY. The one in the picture is outside of Chicago.
Yes, illogical mankind certainly would mess it up and make it imperfect and beastlike but I'm describing an autonomous AI capable of improving itself exponentially. Its logic and intelligence would dwarf anything we have ever even imagined. Requiring a system ID(more like it would just know who you are by your retina, facial structure, voice patterns, etc) for transactions may be more palatable once no human will ever be able to see or be aware of that transaction if you don't want them to. It will all be handled by a benevolent inanimate superintelligence designed to protect the privacy and freedom of mankind.
Imperfect can never create perfect. We would create something imperfect. Which could only perpetuate the imperfections.
The only thing that can protect the privacy and freedom of mankind is mankind himself, individually. It’s why the BOR are written from the standpoint of the rights of the individual.
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