dagblog - Comments for "Will this all end with a bang or a whimper? - Part II"

Look, up in that buggy seat,

MrSmith1 — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 17:09:34 +0000

In reply to "We're not going to get HAL

Look, up in that buggy seat, it's Luddite Man to the rescue! We're all Lois Lanes now, waiting for the mighty non-tech Luddites to join forces with the disillusioned-with-technology geeks to foment the revolution that will save us all from our angry bird playing, facebook shmoozing, iPod listening selves ... hmmm ...

Actually they're replacing

Donal — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 13:26:49 +0000

In reply to I feel the need to be blunt

Actually they're replacing first world laborers, running advanced machines under OSHA in comfortable, air-conditioned buildings with third world laborers, running primitive machines in sweatshops. The greatest percentage of energy consumption in this country, around 40%, is for buildings - largely because they are mechanically ventilated and cooled. Transportation as a whole is expensive because of personal cars and JIT delivery, but shipping by sea is a relative bargain.

So businesses are paying for shipping to save a great deal on wages, benefits, and working conditions. So actually either the costs of shipping have to surpass the costs of doing business in the US, or the costs of doing business in the US have to drop much closer to the level of the third world - which will mean fewer unions, less enforcement of regulations, and fewer creature comforts on the job.

You may right about #2, but if the costs of shipping become prohibitive, the costs of air-conditioning a US factory will have already become prohibitive, and the reliability of the electric power in that third world country will probably have devolved to the levels Pakistan is seeing right now.

Not sure about HAL, but

EmmaZahn — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 12:11:35 +0000

In reply to Will this all end with a bang or a whimper? - Part II

Not sure about HAL, but D:Wave is already here. I wonder if the name is intentionally punny.

World's first commercial quantum computer sold to Lockheed Martin | VentureBeat: "The world’s first commercially available quantum computer, which uses principles of quantum mechanics rather than classical mechanics, was sold to aerospace, defense and security company Lockheed Martin."

'via Blog this'

"We're not going to get HAL

David Seaton — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 06:45:24 +0000

In reply to We're not going to get HAL

"We're not going to get HAL any time soon"

My train of thought on this came while talking with a friend about his first boyhood computer, an 8-bit, Commodore 64 from the early 1980s and that got me thinking about "Moore's Law" and the incredible, unthinkable changes we have witnessed in computation since then. It was simple to project that curve into the future.

Seen under that prism, the idea of a computer that in a foreseeable time frame could do most of the work that today's post grads can do is not that farfetched... IMHO.

At this point people will become much more redundant then your great-grandfather did. The recycling of a blacksmith into a skilled tool and dye maker is not that difficult. But we can now imagine a future where humans are only needed to clean rich people's bottoms or as sex objects.... or even (shudder) a "Soylent Green" scenario.

That is why I am coming to think that the only "revolutionary vanguard" possible will be the geeks.

They are the only ones who could effectively attack the inhuman system they have done so much to create. They will need a "mass" of lesser mortals behind them to carry the day... building that relationship will be the truly revolutionary act.... we see the germs of it in today's "hacktivists".

I feel the need to be blunt

Michael Wolraich — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 02:50:00 +0000

In reply to Our last Administrative

I feel the need to be blunt here. That blog post is just plain stupid.

1. The third world laborers are not replacing first world machines. They are replacing first world laborers. American manufacturing certainly aren't outsourcing abroad because the energy costs for the robots are too high. They're outsourcing because the human costs are cheaper in third world countries.

2. The greatest energy consumption associated with durable goods, particularly the oil consumption, is not in the manufacturing. It's in the transportation--from shipping all those bits and pieces and products around the world. So if energy prices ever surpass the human costs of manufacturing, then all those factories will come back home where companies don't have to pay so much to move their shit around.

Our last Administrative

Donal — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 01:13:16 +0000

In reply to We're not going to get HAL

Our last Administrative Assistant retired today. She won't be replaced. No one at our firm needs someone else to type letters, memos or specifications anymore.

But Greer had an interesting blog today, and sees it going the other way:

Our machine fetish, as I’ve discussed here more than once in the past, could only be indulged in so long as the extravagant use of fossil fuels made mechanical labor cheaper than human labor. That’s already started to reverse—there are good reasons, after all, why most of the world’s manufacturing is now done in Third World countries using cheap human labor rather than in the industrial world with expensive automated machines—but the cult of the machine retains much of its grip on our collective imagination. Even among those who recognize that the age of cheap energy is ending, the most common first reaction is to try to find some way to keep some favorite type of machine running—automobiles, the internet, the space program, you name it.

We're not going to get HAL

Michael Wolraich — Fri, 16 Sep 2011 00:50:18 +0000

In reply to Will this all end with a bang or a whimper? - Part II

We're not going to get HAL any time soon, but I think it's interesting to think about how technological advances may effect white collar jobs. I think that a more realistic analysis might address the possibility of downgrading jobs that once required higher level skills. Engineering, for example, may require less mathematics as computers take over the brute force work. Consider that train drivers are still called engineers. There used to be a good reason for that nomenclature.

The other issue that you don't address, David, is the long-term versus the short-term. Significant productivity gains through new technology always produce employment crises. Think about what the automobile did to the legions of people responsible for the care of horses. My great-grandfather was a blacksmith who was an expert at shoeing horses. He didn't have much work when he got older.

The question is whether the new technologies open new jobs in the long-term. One concern raised by Tyler Cowan's The Great Stagnation is that recent technological advances have been better mousetraps. Unlike the automobile, which created a huge manufacturing and maintenance industry, the internet has not significantly expanded economic production and created jobs (not that I entirely agree with Cowan).

Comics like Bill Burr are

Richard Day — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 23:54:12 +0000

In reply to Will this all end with a bang or a whimper? - Part II

Comics like Bill Burr are talking about new supermarkets (in LA)where there is not only a lack of carry-outs (that was years ago) but no cashiers or baggers.

You cart your goodies, go to check out and scan in your own groceries. Then you bag them and leave.

Revolution for Burr is when we all gather up our goodies and head for the door. hahahahah

But I cant help thin king

cmaukonen — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 23:13:47 +0000

In reply to Like I said in a previous

But I cant help thin king this is more likely.

Like I said in a previous

David Seaton — Thu, 15 Sep 2011 22:17:25 +0000

In reply to SGI Altix ? The Altix UV

Like I said in a previous post today's Altix should be compared to the Commodore 64 of the early 80s and then apply Moore's Law... with that information, a real nerd could figure out when you get to HAL