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| Thread: GREED - Machines versus Human-Beings |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 3 4 5 6 · «PREV / NEXT» |
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JollyJoker
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posted June 27, 2016 01:34 PM |
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Artu, I think you miss the obvious here.
Look at these tables.
In the second one you see that the average weekly working time in France in 1913 was 62 hours. 62 hours. In 2000 that has nearly halved to less than 36 hours. In 1960 it was still 10 hours more.
Then - urban life has changed a lot in that time. For example, the amount of restaurants, bistros, fast-food joints, cafés and places in general where you can eat and drink something is STAGGERING. However, the amount of old-fashioned "pubs" - hangouts for people to drink a beer or five - has been massively on the decline. That's of course because pubs as places to meet people, talk, drink and so on has been given way to internet forums.
Yes, people still go out, but for different reasons and different places.
Then - the urban landscapes are CLEAN nowadays. No garbage lying around. Lighting. CCTV cameras. Loads of bicycles, a wealth of shops to buy food in. Cars and bikes are rented/shared. Whole city landscapes are changed because industry has died or relocated.
These are areal pictures of my city of birth Dortmund - yes, the second one shows the same area; they deconstructed the steel mills and there is now an artificial lake where they stood.
You certainly remember pictures of giant waste dumps, steaming and stinking - no more, though.
In the 20s and 30s there wasn't much smog over cities. Changed, though, and in the 70s it became so massive that we had a thing called "smog alarm". When there was the alarm, private cars must not drive and people had to stay at home otherwise they would endanger their health. Smog in Germany? Thing of the past.
Think about the change in energy consumption and what that means...
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artu
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posted June 27, 2016 04:23 PM |
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Edited by artu at 16:24, 27 Jun 2016.
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I'm not saying nothing changes at all, or all that changed has zero importance. I hardly think shorter shifts or cleaner city zones are contradictory to what I said though.
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JollyJoker
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posted June 27, 2016 04:49 PM |
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If you look at how urban life was 2000 years ago you can say as well that some things haven't fundamentally changed.
But that's entirely not the point I was trying to make. In 100 years from now, Paris may still look and feel like Paris - still the actual life of the people with regard to the thread issue will definitely be different in a way people didn't foresee a century ago either.
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markkur
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Once upon a time
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posted June 27, 2016 05:53 PM |
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Well I've had 4 posts that are just a wee bit too much for me at the moment since I'm in detoxification to a degree, especially when one got toxic with self-intelligence boasting.  Sorry
No one here is truly getting what I am saying because of too strict an outlook about what the future could be. I understand the steady drum-beat of <ahem> progress but things have changed now and as has been said at least a couple of times by others, now people are the target "more than ever". Robotics will take it to a more damaging level - you are not in your Mother's arms; no Corporation will give you a caring-cuddle.
Mix in the destruction of jobs, wages and families. humanity may better survive a flu epidemic or do some nifty stuff now but I am talking about the heart of humanity...livelihood and I might as well be speaking Martio/Venusian.
Check this out and see that the 50s were NOT the stone age. My point, whether you like it or not is at some point Governments needed to intervene and say no more taking the masses off their jobs and leaving them to scrabble to something else that will disappear to do this over and over. See the production line that was working human halved, from 10 - 4.
Over and over and over and over and over and over...this has happened since then and no one has the common sense to understand that removing work of all kinds (not just grunt work, i.e. ever heard of engineering software or the Telecommunications Industry?) added to growing population across the globe is a recipe' for serious crisis and is already in your face.
Britain in The 50s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DqVwc6nrHjI
Too much TECH-dependency has, is and will prove destructive to humanity in the end. As I've said...it's just a matter of time. Remember, there are other things on our natural Earth that can topple your "electronic routine".
Related to the above, I am not a brilliant man and I am not known now but when I consider Terrorism I could bring millions to their knees because of what we DID do and should NOT have and for me that is a scary reality to fully realize. And I think it is very reasonable and sane to ask, if I know this how many more thinkers? Lots I would guess. I don't like that thought for a second.
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Ebonheart
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Rush the rush
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posted June 27, 2016 07:28 PM |
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Markkur, many of your fears are granted but I think you are stressing out too much about it all. Not that it's not going to happen, for problems will come, but don't get so much into the worrying or doom and gloom that you drain yourself of the very power needed to stop this or change things when the time for change comes.
So try to relax a little bit. Besides, people seldomly change until their own shoes and house burn - and it takes a while before you get to that point.
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markkur
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Once upon a time
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posted June 27, 2016 09:46 PM |
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Ebonheart said:
Markkur, many of your fears are granted but I think you are stressing out too much about it all. Not that it's not going to happen, for problems will come, but don't get so much into the worrying or doom and gloom that you drain yourself of the very power needed to stop this or change things when the time for change comes.
So try to relax a little bit. Besides, people seldom change until their own shoes and house burn - and it takes a while before you get to that point.
I very much appreciate what your post to me is about...thank you. I'd give you a manly-man hug if it would not make you blush.
However, I need to clarify me a bit it seems. I am not stupid, high, deluded nor scared about any of this...I am concerned about what I have said indeed...but not about me.
Imagine a time when you have pain everywhere when you walk and if you walk for any length of time it feels like someone told you to swallow a watermelon and once you did, they are cutting it in half in your stomach with a sharp, large knife from the middle of your back - that says "go lie down a bit". Now add in a neck that has gotten bad enough to crack like knuckles when you simply read a book etc. that can also send your head spinning, even when laying down at times. Now add a lumbar region that can sit for a bit or lay for a bit but then says "go lie down or go sit up". For good measure the destruction long ago has spread to your shoulders so it is hard to lay on your sides and it says..."go sit up a bit". Then you also get the thrills of shooting pains that travel like lightning from the spine to explode in a toe or hip-pointers that suddenly burn like red-hot pokers.
No friends I am speaking to you about you. My brain is very clear now and it's the only way I can help my brothers and sisters today. Poor silly Superman died a while back.
Anyway, watch the Video I linked, it has its funny/silly (ladies hats)moments too.
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Zenofex
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posted June 28, 2016 06:58 AM |
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You are missing something very important - robots won't pay taxes, won't buy products, won't rent houses, etc. (if we ever reach a point where they will be able to do that, the problem would be completely different). Money for these greedy b******s have to come from somewhere and if a big part of the human population becomes unemployed and no alternative source of income exists, that would essentially result in an economic suicide.
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mvassilev
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posted June 28, 2016 07:10 AM |
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Robots don't pay taxes, but their owners or those who buy their products do. Suppose we both have robots and we trade their products with each other - the government could tax the income we get from trade, or put a sales tax on what we sell.
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Zenofex
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posted June 28, 2016 07:47 AM |
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You first have to own a robot.
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markkur
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Once upon a time
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posted June 28, 2016 11:46 PM |
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If I can't get people to see that robots are totally destructive in a world of unemployment (except for dangerous-to-humans efforts, I am not even trying to state what really needs to happen....NOW. It's not about brilliance but common-sense and seems a wee bit lost today.
Folks can and will run to their "individual Machine Utopias" but soon it will not exist for most people. Today is as good as it will get and it is not actually very good.
Take away all livelihoods except various classes of machine-tenders...you will destroy humanity. It IS being destroyed but "present" comforts will not let most here understand we have been and are on a dangerous path with our worship of the Machine.
For those that understand biology, Machines are a product of "Collective Thinking by Man" and are NOT naturally part of civilization but again I waste my text because of Sci-fi Utopian paradigms.
If I snapped my fingers and all the Machines disappeared, few here or anywhere for that matter, would have a clue what to do? By all means enjoy life this moment but don't be misled by the "ease of your present surroundings", be prepared, to at least some measure, for unforeseen events.
Markkur, over and out of here
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EnergyZ
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posted June 29, 2016 12:05 AM |
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Wait a minute. While it is true that machines are starting to replace humans in work, this is also true:
* not every business will convert people with machines. They may not have that kind of money to buy, or at least maintain the machines.
* the process is quite slow, actually. It certainly won't happen overnight and people may find/discover new jobs. Besides, the case of China is a different matter, since you got the anti-population politics, where they want to reduce the number of born babies.
* maybe, after certain years, usage of robots will be reduced, since some can be used to spy on corporations, or even attack the surroundings.
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markkur
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posted June 29, 2016 10:32 PM |
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Edited by markkur at 22:32, 29 Jun 2016.
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EnergyZ said:
Wait a minute. While it is true that machines are starting to replace humans in work.
Had to come back for that one. The following is not directed to you but what I have been saying here is from my experience and is my resulting opinion. As always, no matter the speaker, they will either listen or they will not. But for all of us to never say anything because, it is uncomfortable, has never actually been a good solid option.
"Starting?"
I worked in Production environments for 30 years and I saw the steady replacements in slow motion. When the Techs really got going and destroyed any advancement for middle-management on down to entry-level workers, the mantra became "we are moving to a service economy". What happened then? Then the service sector was decimated and the new Mantra became "We are moving to an information society". In other words our true economy was finally gutted, spread around the world like peanut-butter and is now based on Data-Collection or Market Manipulation and not on actually making a damn thing. See, the truth is economically this nonsense has been sustained by the FED printing worthless paper and calling it money.
Ftr, Robots and A.I. WILL be the last phase of human replacement for the Masses and not the Elite...after countless inventions that on the bottom line (think happy investor getting a tidy profit every business quarter)save the big-bucks because they replace human workers.
I doubt anyone here can know this without having spent a lot of research but for a time in America we had what were called "Hinchmen or Axemen". Now these guys were called in from the outside of a company to make that company more profitable. Several of the men were paid millions and also given stock-options for millions more in the years to come, if they righted the ship.
Now what was their "magical-managing"? or the "new business model"? There was no such thing, they came in and "cut as many jobs as it took" "to immediately produce a profit" and that made the investors happy, happy, happy. It was not a better run company, there was no leadership or innovations that caused the turn around; they got rid of people and to get rid of overhead. It's simple math and it was done in phases...1. Cut their wages = save money. 2, Strip their benefits = save money or 3. just get rid of the job entirely.
But again what happened to these Hired-guns? Back-up, I've already told you they were nothing greater than hired-cleavers and were made rich by destroying the livelihoods of those on down the chain of command. One of the men I was affected by was nicknamed "Lefty" = now there's a name for the leader of men and women. Btw, not sure why...he swung the AX with both hands.
At the end of the day, as I attempted to imply by the title of this thread...GREED! + TECH to maximize GREED is not going to make a wonderful The Jetson's world or some sweet Sci-Fi-utopia. The destruction that has already happened has always been about POWER over others and getting even MORE MONEY...you know, for "their babies in the generations to come" the peasant class like myself have not and will not figure in with the plan.
People could organize in many ways and affect Multi-National Corporations but my guess is they will have to have something serious shake them up first. Most folks in prosperous societies, in general, unfortunately too often reflect Pink Floyd's song-title...Comfortably Numb or maybe more likely this week, Uncomfortably Numb.
I think people MUST set aside their differences and with level-heads get smarter together and stop falling for all the rhetoric designed to split the people and space-them-out with misdirection-media.
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EnergyZ
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posted June 29, 2016 11:17 PM |
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I agree. But that's all the negative side of the capitalism. You can fire everyone and it not even illegal. Protesting could help, but it won't stop incidents like those.
I'm more convinced technology (well, most of it, since you got nukes and guns) is to help people. People would do anything to money and even have the robot manufacturer pay to save a lot. And if you start destroying robots, the police will certainly arrest you.
There is obviously a need for some order, laws and policies in the free market, else shady deals like these will continue on.
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mvassilev
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posted June 30, 2016 03:39 AM |
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Machines have been replacing humans for a long time - see technology in agriculture, for example, which has enabled us to produce more food with a much lower percentage of the population working in that sector. And yet we don't have hordes of unemployed former farmers wandering the streets. Or look at the unemployment rate statistics, where is currently around 1955 levels, far from what the technological unemployment hypothesis would predict. And due to comparative advantage, workers should continue to be able to trade with robot owners, even if the robots are better at everything.Quote:
If I snapped my fingers and all the Machines disappeared, few here or anywhere for that matter, would have a clue what to do?
Then don't snap your fingers! 
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markkur
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posted June 30, 2016 05:44 PM |
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mvassilev said:
Then don't snap your fingers!
That was MY own reality check of my "non-aided abilities" or iow SELF. I would never "Snap" against other people and I think you know that...at least I hope so. Enhancing CONTROL and NOT unleashing uncontrolled social experiments is a much different matter and would entail/demand true progressive thinking, planning and imaginative and intelligent efforts.
As far as unemployment stats; most anyone I have talked to from Left, Center, Right and all the in-betweens for years, understand that the Gambling-Casino called Wall-Street hangs on bad-words and Reports (scares or fears)or real single problems worldwide now but you should already know this too, unless I'm giving you too much credit...which I do not think I am.
Both parties have manipulated unemployment numbers for years by "not counting the people that drop-off the short-lived program". It's simple propaganda that the power-trips use to paint a much prettier picture. Treating folks that pass the benefit period as gainfully employed in the American-Dream, when in truth they drop-off the radar-screen and are scrounging & settling for a step-down job that demands even more of them...is not a new tactic.
Ftr, when my own industry was gutted by the GREED mongers in Washington I did not publicly whine, nor march nor picket anyone or cry "down with the Government". I griped to some friends, which I think is quite natural, However, instead I changed direction and tried to make the best of it. I went from 45,000 a year career(salaried, I'd made more before going into management)with medium benefits to a 10 dollar an hour job, with zero benefits making kitchen-cabinets. Actually, I was excited about this in a positive hopeful way, even while "losing all my savings for retirement" etc. because I had for many years been a very good carpenter and home remodeler for myself and others. i.e. I owned and improved 7 homes through the years in "my spare time" or "on-vacations" . For my future; I envisioned my building custom woodworks, shelves, trims and furniture to my end of days. But Arthur-Ritus had other facts I did not yet know.
Just wanted to share that, so no judgmental nonsense is used to paint my words with false impressions & BS. I may have not liked what happen to my own industry but I did not get active/vocal about "the $-gutting of all our business-sectors" until I saw everyone around me have the same damn situations happen to them over and over during the next 10-15 years. Much worse...most were NOT near as adaptable as I had always been in life. "A rolling stone gathers no moss".
Back to today; How much sense does it make to keep slashing all of those "menial-beneath-everyone-jobs" with human-replacement TECHS when the market-forces have been driving the old middle-class towards those same damn jobs? Then add the boom in global-population, Science keeping people living longer, of course minus the mass-deaths of course from the world-wide Military-Industrial-Complex that dominates many Government budgets; HOW exactly is the mantra of everyone is going to be working in Sci/TECH-bliss going to work? AND I AM...asking but please keep the answer concrete and rational.
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mvassilev
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posted June 30, 2016 05:54 PM |
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If you want to look at a broader definition of unemployment, we can look at U-6, which unfortunately only goes back to 1994:
But even according to that measure it doesn't seem like unemployment has increased much in the past 20 years.
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Ebonheart
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posted June 30, 2016 06:00 PM |
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Um but you miss two very important key points:
1. That the value of "employed" has changed. If you work 1h/week, you are counted as employed and working, but if you were to meassure "people able to support themselves", the prognosis would be much darker.
2. Due to the above, you can be sure many reports are being adjusted on purpose to not strike up disturbance on the market.
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mvassilev
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posted June 30, 2016 06:12 PM |
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U-6 includes people "marginally attached to the work force" and "part-time for economic reasons".
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markkur
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posted July 01, 2016 09:11 AM |
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mvassilev said:
U-6 includes people "marginally attached to the work force" and "part-time for economic reasons".
Does not the graph and the info above make any Stats still heavily jaded and meaningless? If most everyone here is above manual labor would they take part-time work without benefits to raise a family? Answer, only if they had too and there were no CEO positions left.
Besides, you have opened yet another can of worms. Once upon a time in America when ALL employers hired someone there was a 90 day grace period and after that time-frame the worker either did not work out or was hired permanent full time w/ benefits. Now companies fudge the new worker any way they can because there is no one to stop them. Desperate times call for desperate workers and companies simply love it.
"On-call" pizza delivery people. That used to be for Doctors or emergency personnel only. Not now. Phone-call to your house= "You better get in here to work now or you will lose your drive your own vehicle delivering our Pizza for tips job!"
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mvassilev
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posted July 01, 2016 05:36 PM |
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That post is so full of non-sequiturs that I'm having difficulty making sense of it.
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