886 replies to this topic

[mag1]

Wow, it is just so quiet out there! This is a large development. I am not sure why there is not more thread interest.

Sure, these buggies might look cute and innocuous, though they could profoundly change our lives. This is the techno solution that poses the least risk for the community. It feels right. The idea of having millions of rapidly flying drones overhead in a major urban setting does not feel right and neither does millions of autonomously driven cars. Millions of these buggies is highly plausible.

It will be interesting to see how much these buggies will reduce mortality rates.

I have been considering my new life with these buggies. I start with my delivered paper, with fresh bread, and freshly squeezed orange juice. And it would not have to be just any mass consumed newspaper. Some days I might be interested in what the London Times had to say, other times perhaps the Washington Post, and occasionally the Peking Times. Life would not need to be one size fits all. Hopefully we could avoid more group think.

So, this would be my first delivery for the day, many others would follow.
For example, not long after reading the paper and finishing breakfast, another transbot, would arrive to pick up these items for recycling. Garage day would no longer occur once a week. It might happen several times a day. Why would people bother buying garage cans?

Then a transbot with the day's mail might arrive, before it left, I could give it any mail that needed posting.

Then lunch, shopping, dinner ...

This would be the California cool lifestyle for the world to enjoy. We could all escape the mass produced and consumed life for a life in which the economy delivered what consumers actually desired. It often seems perverse how the economy often feels like a diseconomy: it is not so much about fulfilling the wishes of the consumer and more about focusing on providing employment and mass markets. Unfortunately this is very short term thinking. Not concentrating on the customer merely creates an increasingly hollow economic system.


This thread, though, has suggested that such transbotic technology could profoundly change our employment economy. Shifting from a highly inefficient distribution system to a highly efficient transport distribution system could have very disruptive effects. A consumer paradise where everyone is unemployed?

[mag1]

I have circled back to the fear side on these buggies.

 

All the previous comments about how robotic technology could profoundly reshape employment in our communities still applies, though now

this might not be a discussion about something that might be years away: buggy technology is something that could be wheeled out at almost anytime.

 

It has been previously noted on the thread that much of the retail infrastructure in cities might no longer be required with robotic transport.

If these buggies became hitchbots on mass transport, then essentially all retail would become superfluous. In such a scenario there would be essentially

suburban moonscape.

 

For some towns their entire economic base would vanish.

So, the nightmare of hundreds of millions of hungry, desperate unemployed people roaming large urban barren economic zones is now on the horizon.

It is best not to make such near term predictions (as this could be all wrong, hopefully it is), though it is too important to ignore.

 

I'd love to hear some comments!

It might not seem so cold and bleak if we could all be despondent together! 

 

 

[aribadabar]

I think you are unnecessarily gloomy - I don't see this being implemented in next 2 years, let alone months for several reasons.

 

First, they need to smooth out the technological requirements/challenges and provided they managed to do that anytime soon then, and that , I think, would be the more time-consuming phase, comes the regulatory approval which may be stalled, delayed and impeded by the incumbent stakeholders, especially if they are to use the existing mass transit infrastructure and address safety concerns along the roads/sidewalks.

The driverless car of Google is not going mainstream anytime soon (<2 years) even though it has been tested for more than 500 000 miles without accidents already. These buggies cannot boast any safety track record so that would count against their (expeditious) approval.

Third , it comes the consumer acceptance - in North America, people prefer convenience, while in Europe, I notice, they (still) prefer human interaction over convenience delivered by robo buggies.

These are the biggest markets where the buggies can potentially be implemented on a large scale and they face challenges in both.

[mag1]

I am not sure that I find this overly comforting. The world is not coming to an end in the next few months, though maybe in 2 years?

Time to start crying in my cold milk!

 

The reason why this will not move forward is the inevitable stalling tactics by the status quo?

One of the problems I am afraid of is that ostensibly inferior and less safe alternatives are already working their way through the regulatory process (helibots and autonomous cars).

Obstructing the better technology will in the end give us a less desirable result.

 

Using the buggies on typical residential sidewalks should create the least safety implications. During usual business hours during the week day suburban sidewalks are often 

deserted. Perhaps they could set aside off hours say 11-12 pm or 5-6 am to trial these buggies.

 

The point of interest with these buggies is that they are so technologically simple. A small buggy that moves at walking speed on a sidewalk with human oversight on quiet hours poses almost no safety issues.

While hundreds of pounds of steel moving at high speeds autonomously on roads creates substantial possible safety concerns.

 

It is notable that the financial implications that we are raising on the thread should not be considered to be years distant.

Financial markets are assumed to discount everything into current pricing.

If we are now suggesting that the above outlined scenario is plausible within a 2-4 year time horizon, then this should be reflected in forward pricing of real estate etc.

It would be very interesting to see such futures prices to see what the all knowing market is now indicating for the likelihood of the suburban moonscape scenario.

 

Current forecasting for the impact on government would also be informative.

 

If I were one of the stakeholders involved, I do not know whether I would have the heart to obstruct this technology.

The current means of transporting people and things through our urban environments is so extremely dangerous.

In fact, transportation fatalities are one of the leading causes of death in the modern world. 

 

The people who finally create a technological fix for this carnage obviously, should be awarded a Nobel Prize in Medicine.

They will have made a contribution to the improvement of health and well-being that few doctors could match.

 

Every day that the roll out is delayed will simply result in yet more morbidity and mortality.

It would be very difficult to be put in the position of enforcing a regulatory freeze while the carnage continued day after day after day; funeral after funeral.

 

It should not be completely unexpected that once the technology has been introduced that transport fatalities and injuries will approach zero.

Nations that chose to not implement this new technology would be quickly seen to be barbaric.

 

Humans should never have been given the keys to drive cars!

Even those who do not drink and drive, or drug and drive, or sleep and drive, etc. are still often not competent to drive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by mag1, 09 November 2015 - 12:40 AM.

[Elus]

Robots may shatter the global economic order within a decade

 

"In a sweeping 300-page report, Bank of America predicts that robots and other forms of artificial intelligence will transform the world beyond recognition as soon as 2025, shattering old business models in a whirlwind of “creative disruption”, with transformation effects ultimately amounting to $30 trillion or more each year."

 

Artificial intelligence: ‘Homo sapiens will be split into a handful of gods and the rest of us’

 

"A new report suggests that the marriage of AI and robotics could replace so many jobs that the era of mass employment could come to an end"

 

Reddit comments section

 

Finland is considering a radical plan to give everybody free money

 

Basic income — the concept of giving people money with no strings attached— is having anything but a basic year. Three months ago, the Dutch city of Utrecht announced it would launch a program to give people on welfare unconditional free money. The plan was so popular that it has spread to more than two dozen Dutch towns. Now Finland wants in on the action.

Edited by Elus, 09 November 2015 - 01:22 AM.

[mag1]

Thanks for the happy news!

I'll just have a big ole cry.

 

I would love to see one of the reports from one of the financial houses that analyzed the implications of transbotics.

Also love to see the money! What futures markets are available that would give us an assessment of what the big money is thinking about all of this?

 

 

We are stuck with the status quo holding onto their economic position at the cost of the lives of our children.

In the modern world for much of the younger ages, transport accidents are their largest health risk.

At some ages this is true by a large margin.

 

Transport automation has been my main fixation as the technology seems so easy and the benefits would be so widespread.

However, this is increasingly about everything. As noted above we are also talking simultaneously about a wave of robotics.

How could a company possibly justify paying a human $25 per hour when a robot would do the same job for $10 per hour?

 

Of course, medicine is also on the verge of disruptive change as well.

My family has had a family member exomed. Even without CRISPR, this knowledge will have profound implications for our 

future health needs. Simply selecting the best chromosomes out of those available (that is no genetic modifications) would

result in an extremely different future for our family. Choosing the most adaptive genome among 10 ^^46 has a way of doing this.

This is primitive technology, though it will have truly far reaching implications.

We should also be feeling badly for medical professionals as well.

Genetic engineering will have truly disruptive implications for medicine.

 

 

We are quickly moving to a no employment world.

One can always look to some places in Europe to see what 50% youth unemployment implies for the well being of their communities.

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

Edited by mag1, 09 November 2015 - 01:42 AM.

[mag1]

Possibly even more disturbing than a no employment world would be something close to what is increasingly true of our own world: empty employment.

People going day after day to their jobs and not actually producing anything!

 

A sort of Orwellian world where everyone is busy, though they are completely unproductive.

Sadly some might simply never realize that they were living in such a reality.

 

This seems all too plausible.

As we have seen repeatedly on this thread, the human impulse (generally male) is to a life which must be about bringing home the paycheck.

This is so deeply ingrained that without such an outcome, many would question the meaning of living.

 

This is very sad and pathetic.

We can predict with near certainly that this will result in a future of adult day care centers also known as jobs without actual productive value.

Instead the entire basis of existence for these jobs will be psychological.

 

It is not difficult to look out even in the current world and see all sorts of workers that appear to, in a technological sense, be producing negative marginal output.

The world would be such a better place if these people would simply stop subtracting from gross national product and simply accepted free money from government.

 

 

 

 

 

[aribadabar]

Possibly even more disturbing than a no employment world would be something close to what is increasingly true of our own world: empty employment.

People going day after day to their jobs and not actually producing anything!

 

A sort of Orwellian world where everyone is busy, though they are completely unproductive.

Sadly some might simply never realize that they were living in such a reality.

 

This seems all too plausible.

As we have seen repeatedly on this thread, the human impulse (generally male) is to a life which must be about bringing home the paycheck.

This is so deeply ingrained that without such an outcome, many would question the meaning of living.

 

This is very sad and pathetic.

We can predict with near certainly that this will result in a future of adult day care centers also known as jobs without actual productive value.

Instead the entire basis of existence for these jobs will be psychological.

 

It is not difficult to look out even in the current world and see all sorts of workers that appear to, in a technological sense, be producing negative marginal output.

The world would be such a better place if these people would simply stop subtracting from gross national product and simply accepted free money from government.

 

This is already present - it is called (most) government employees

[mag1]

Yeah, that's about the size of it.

However, for men this feels almost like castration.
The primary driver of male psychology is to conquer.
In a world of empty achievement there are no true conquerers.
It would be a world of unmanly men.

Women would not be caught in the same bind.
When your psychology is based more on exploring relationships there is no great trauma in accepting a world not predicated on the triumph of an alpha male.

[mag1]

It appears that the genetic singularity event is now imminent!

This is simply massive!

It is like staring into infinity!

 

CRISPR!

Welcome to humans from 1 billion years in our evolutionary history arriving at any time!

 

Almost in such a complete state of shock that I do not know what to say.

 

http://www.longecity...e-2#entry752062

[Mind]

They wont be flipping burgers for long Mag, not with automated fast food machinery in the making.

 

http://www.salon.com...ist_disruption/

 

I re-read Manna by Marshall Brain the other week. It is one of the best near future sci-fi's ever IMHO.

http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm

 

He is also publishing a new book with the optimistic name

The Second Intelligent Species: How Humans Will Become as Irrelevant as Cockroaches

http://marshallbrain...ent-species.htm

 

I re-read Manna again today. Uncanny how he nails the near future so precisely.

 

What made me think about Manna today was this article at Technology Review about software managing people: http://www.technolog...uber-algorithm/

 

It is so similar to Manna I almost freaked out (almost).

[Mind]

Not sure if this was posted yet. Adidas will have robots making shoes this year: http://futurism.com/links/19419/

[mag1]

http://www.scienceda...51229070713.htm

[mag1]

Would a water based energy economy be disruptive?

 

http://www.scienceda...60104164212.htm

[Elus]

[Mind]

I am still amazed at the people who say robots and AI do not pose any threat to productive human labor. Do they live in a cave?

[mag1]

{That robot was impressive! As a real game changer, I am still more worried about the robo-shopping cart.}

Yes, but from the same page noted above there was this:

 

http://singularityhu...rld-unemployed/

 

Half the world unemployed wouldn't be unemployed by technology because our society would then completely collapse.

{Isn't there a logical fallacy here? Something really bad cannot happen because that would be really bad.}

The article continues by suggesting that while half of the people will not be unemployed, perhaps a quarter would be.

Some European nations have already experienced unemployment rates of 25% with over half their young people unemployed.

 

Feel so much better knowing that all our worries about the future can be dismissed as so much hot air, even if the logic is somewhat 

suspect.

[mag1]

I have stayed away from this thread because it has destroyed my ratings profile, though it is too important to let ratings stand in the way of what must be said.

 

Perhaps somewhat off-topic, would anyone on the thread like to comment on how the present and increasingly severe environmental risks (caused by human activities)

might impact on future employment potential? We still largely live in a world economy that is highly integrated into the natural environment. What happens if the collapse

in the population of pollinators were to continue? Or if the phytoplankton were to stop producing the oxygen that we need to survive (as seems to be happening)?

 

The collapse of the global amphibian and coral, and North American bat populations are sending us an ominous message about the state of our environemnt.

 

What could we do if there were a sudden collapse in one of the inputs that we need to survive?

It is no longer about saving the planet: increasingly it is unclear whether we could save ourselves.

 

We might already have reached the point where the Singularity event, while posing challenges to the social structure of human society, might be necessary to 

save us from our own inability to carefully manage the global biosphere. However, it is not entirely clear that we will make it to the Singularity before a severe ecological

catastrophe occurs on our planet. 

[niner]

What could we do if there were a sudden collapse in one of the inputs that we need to survive?

It is no longer about saving the planet: increasingly it is unclear whether we could save ourselves.

 

 

Maybe that's what it will take to get the US Senators(!) who think that global warming is a "hoax" to wake up.  Lately we've been seeing pandemic threats, like Ebola and now Zika.  Neither of those represent an existential threat to the developed world, but it wouldn't take much to see something that does.  A novel flu would do it, or any number of other viri.  A multi-drug-resistance plasmid has spread around the globe recently. 

[resting]

They used to call global warming God in the past.

[Elus]

Google's AlphaGo AI beats Lee Se-dol again to win Go series 4-1

 

The Go Champion, the Grandmaster, and Me: Millions just watched a computer program beat Lee Sedol at the game he dominates. Welcome to the club. By Ken Jennings

Edited by Elus, 16 March 2016 - 12:21 AM.

[Mind]

Best quote about the match from Lee Se-dol:

 

 

Lee Sedol "I don't know what to say," he said through an interpreter. "I kind of felt powerless."

 

Very soon we (humans) will all be saying this.

[Elus]

Deep Learning Is Going to Teach Us All the Lesson of Our Lives: Jobs Are for Machines

 

Edited by Elus, 17 March 2016 - 05:15 AM.

[mag1]

What is so surprising to me is how little notice Singularity issues are attracting in the current political cycle.

All the parties are defining the trade problem as a result of poorly conceived free trade agreements.

In this conception of reality America would be so much better off if trade with China or Mexico and others

was on fairer terms. They are conflating the problems from unbalanced human-human trade and

the much more worrisome implications of human-machine trade.

 

With China or Mexico there is at least a plausible political response that might have public support.

What about the Singularity? What agreement could be rewritten that would prevent the unemployment

of humanity?

 

When is the Singularity finally going to be front page news?

 

[mag1]

Apparently I was not the only one among the 10 million who saw the Atlas robot video and thought: "Wow! That is so cool,

would love one of those robots to do some roofing for me!" Obviously, this prompted Google to deinvest itself of this wow technology. (?)

 

Google's recent decision to sell this technology seems to spring from social pressure arising from fear of unemployment that would result from it. Perhaps the large

technology companies will simply be unable to move these technologies forward due to counterbalancing social forces (implications for substantial

unemployment ...). Other smaller less diversified companies might be left to bring these disruptive technologies to market.

 

 

Edited by mag1, 18 March 2016 - 03:28 PM.

[Mind]

Apparently I was not the only one among the 10 million who saw the Atlas robot video and thought: "Wow! That is so cool,

would love one of those robots to do some roofing for me!" Obviously, this prompted Google to deinvest itself of this wow technology. (?)

 

Google's recent decision to sell this technology seems to spring from social pressure arising from fear of unemployment that would result from it. Perhaps the large

technology companies will simply be unable to move these technologies forward due to counterbalancing social forces (implications for substantial

unemployment ...). Other smaller less diversified companies might be left to bring these disruptive technologies to market.

 

I think Google's divestment has more to do with money. The pay off for those robots is many years into the future. They have to turn a profit. That is why they dumped their solar project as well. http://addins.waow.c...inted-in-google

[mag1]

With the solar you can obviously see that you would be fighting an uphill battle against an entrenched reasonably competitive alternative.

It is not as clear to me about the robotics.The Atlas video showed what appeared to be a highly competent robot that might in some markets have

few obvious alternatives. Economies of scale would help drive down the price considerably.

 

Me want.

Me want one NOW!

 

The issue of the strategic thinking of a consumer orientated company moving such a robot to market still looms large for me. No large diversified technology company

might be especially enthusiastic about introducing any of the disruptive technologies that we have discussed on this thread.The split screen showing

100 million unemployed people contrasted to the glittering new technotoy would simply be a corporate relations disaster. 

[Elus]

Carl’s Jr. CEO wants to try automated restaurant where customers ‘never see a person’

[Elus]

[Elus]

South Korea trumpets $860-million AI fund after AlphaGo 'shock'

 

The feat was hailed as a milestone for AI research. But it also shocked the Korean public, stoking widespread concern over the capabilities of AI, as well as a spate of newspaper headlines worrying that South Korea was falling behind in a crucial growth industry.