I was thinking more of animal husbandry than arable when I spoke about ‘eye’, a stocksman knowing and understanding his animals will take more advances. I’ve little doubt that it will happen but I don’t think it’s there just yet.

Ah, I was thinking more along the lines of http://www.naio-technologies.com/en/agricultural-equipment/weeding-robot-oz/robotic-weeder-oz-benefits/

But I repeat, during my working life there have been promises of reduced working hours and more leisure time for all. There has been no significant change. Indeed people younger than me are going to find themselves working much longer before retirement.

Yes, and that’s because of the point I’m making – that when people are freed up, rather than sitting idle they find something else to do – or someone finds it for them.

Automation and technology are slowly sucking the soul out of everything, including us.
Virtually impossible to strike a balance though

Well, considering those sort of production-line, repetitive jobs are considered by many to be totally soulless, obviously nobody will notice any difference, will they…

This is something that has always interested me. Marx pretty much hit the nail on the head in volume 3 of Capital (chapter 13, comrades) when he wrote about the “Tendency of the rate of profit to fall”.
He understood that it was the increased efficiency at the heart of technologically advanced means of production that would be the undoing of production based capitalism. For me, this is evidenced by the great rise in financial capital, and the flight of the richest within the most developed economies away from production based capital towards financial capital.
The problem comes when no more people can access financial capital through traditional exchanges of labour or production.
This will be the final crisis of capitalism, when access to capital is sealed off completely from those who have only their labour to offer.
However, current robotics and AI technology can only do so much, so can only replace so many.
And yes, other things will be found for us to do, for the time being…
When machines can care for our elderly, teach our children, diagnose our illnesses and tend our flocks (both bovine and spiritual), then we will see the final crisis of Capitalism. That’s not to say the end of humanity, just the socioeconomic conditions that have dictated our collective existence for the past few centuries.
I doubt any of us will be around to see it, but we are all seeing it happen, it’s always been happening. It appears that it might well be inevitable after all.
I’m not a Marxist, but I’m pretty sure Marx was right about this.

There will always be new stuff for people to do. Too valuable of a resource to have sitting around collecting dole.

Well at 7% I’m happy, should offset the complete lack of viable pension.

No need for me to do the quiz
Fairly confident I’ll be safe, I’ve spent the last 20 years making a great living evaluating the long term prospects of various professions. Can’t see a machine making those kinds of judgements!

Meanwhile, down on the farm…

Still needs a human to fill the tank though.

For now…

CountZero – Member
Automation and technology are slowly sucking the soul out of everything, including us.
Virtually impossible to strike a balance though

Well, considering those sort of production-line, repetitive jobs are considered by many to be totally soulless, obviously nobody will notice any difference, will they…

I’m not really talking about assembly line stuff. I’m talking about the craft of making.
Look at Hebtroco trousers and Any number of beautiful crafted items that have the skill and attention of the people that made them embedded into them. Compare that to the automated throwaway things we’re using more and more of and all the wonderful skills being lost. It’s terrible really. 😐

As a craftsperson I can all too easily see the value of the individuality, craft and love that I put into making things becoming less and less…valuable.
Sure, new jobs will evolve from further automation, but they’ll basically all be serving coffee… 😐

My brother works in building management.

They now have AI’s monitoring the CCTV in a lot of buildings. They’re as accurate at spotting ‘anomalies’ (security issues, health and safety issues, maintenance requirements) in the images and categorising them appropriately as the humans they’ve been using for the same task.

They also have a lot going on with ‘smart buildings’ – the systems monitoring them are becoming very effective at managing energy usage (as an example).

There’s still human involvement in all of this but it’s more setting parameters for measurement rather than monitoring outcomes.

I welcome our new robot overlords.

It’s terrible really.

Not necessarily.

If there were only handcrafted trousers, shoes, furniture and everythign else available, then poor people would be properly ****, wouldn’t they?

Individuality and craft are luxury items, remember.

I welcome our new robot overlords.

Thank you, you will be saved

If there were only handcrafted trousers, shoes, furniture and everythign else available, then poor people would be properly ****, wouldn’t they?

Individuality and craft are luxury items, remember.

Maybe they wouldn’t be so poor in that world.

I welcome our new robot overlords.

Thank you, you will be saved[/quote]

On a HDD or an SSD?

How maybe? If all trousers had to be hand made, then there would be far fewer trousers around, but still the same number of legs – so demand would be much greater than supply.

Then we’d have to try and offset that by having tens of thousands of people employed making trousers. Then there’d be fewer people available to make cars, TV shows, artisan bread, handcrafted other things.

Living standards and disposable income have increased hugely since automation became a thing. Ask yourself why….

Sure, new jobs will evolve from further automation, but they’ll basically all be serving coffee…

Ooh, another interesting point.. given that you can get an automatic coffee machine today that does as good of a job as a person and costs a fraction. And yet, people still pay for human service.

Individuality and craft are luxury items, remember.

I’d say that automation has made craft ‘luxury’.
It’s also made us all perhaps less able or willing to turn our hands to things. Why bother when it’s so cheap….
Might have been a time when folks made their own trousers.

😀

Might have been a time when folks made their own trousers.

We all get crochety about DIY clothing these days.

It’s also made us all perhaps less able or willing to turn our hands to things.

I wouldn’t want to make all my own clothes. I have better things to do, like ride bikes. I wouldn’t have wanted to 200 years ago either, but I might not’ve had a choice.

Those who want to buy handcrafted still can, and those who want to make their own stuff still can – they can just choose to do it for pleasure, rather than being forced to.

We all get crochety about DIY clothing these days.

So it seams.

AI and robots do our jobs, remove the existence of money and people just consume what they need or choose too. With limits applied of course.

In effect we all become members of the dole club but in a more affluent way.

Robots wont replace us all entirely, robots don’t pay taxes (yet), government won’t let it happen.

I bring tractors to the conversation. Kayak 23 brings that ^

I think we are in danger of confusing a 40 hour working week (that we may be consider the norm today), with working for 40 hours a week (which might have been common 30 years ago). We most certainly have far more non-productive time in our working days than ever we used to, even if we “work” the same hours as our fathers did. It is also far more mechanised allowing us to relax, listen to the radio, surf t’internet etc while our “jobs” are concurrently being done.

My Grandfather was pretty well known in his youth for his acheivemnts behind a pair of ploughing horses. He once ploughed 100 acres in 100 days aver the course of one winter ploughing season. Bear in mind that menat he walked the best part of 1000 miles in a muddy furrow while staring at the back end of a pair of horses and concentrating on the job in hand every step of the way. My brother works on a big farm and today he can plough the same hundred acres in 2 days while the trator does all the work, satellites control the line, all headland procedures are automated, and all he has to do is watch NEtflix on his tablet and make a few corrections and checks for 90% of the time.

while the trator does all the work

I hope the cab has a nice comfy seat and a spot on the dashboard designed for your feet?

I think we are in danger of confusing a 40 hour working week (that we may be consider the norm today), with working for 40 hours a week (which might have been common 30 years ago).

That is a different argument, and I wouldn’t argue against your point that past generations worked physically harder than most do today (although it could be also argued that a lot of people work far more than their official hours these days, and farming may not be the norm past or present), but we are talking about people getting paid to work as part of a capitalist society structure.

How maybe? If all trousers had to be hand made, then there would be far fewer trousers around, but still the same number of legs – so demand would be much greater than supply.

So trouser makers will also be in demand, and it will be a well paid job rather than minimum wage.

So it seams.

Those fly-by-night DIY trouser makers from days of yore, eh.

I assumed trousers made for h&m etc were made the same way as hebco trews but by people on lower wages?

Surely once a robot has my job I won’t need trousers as i’ll by lying on the sofa in my boxers watching boxed sets?

But I repeat, during my working life there have been promises of reduced working hours and more leisure time for all.

That ignored the fact we’re all competing for the same set of limited resources, if any one society takes their foot of the gas and sits back to relax, they’ll be rapidly overtaken by everyone else. If you want a high standard of living you have to keep competing for it….

We all get crochety about DIY clothing these days.

So it seams. [/quote]
Ah puns, Now there’s a turnup for the books.

But I repeat, during my working life there have been promises of reduced working hours and more leisure time for all.

That ignored the fact we’re all competing for the same set of limited resources, if any one society takes their foot of the gas and sits back to relax, they’ll be rapidly overtaken by everyone else. If you want a high standard of living you have to keep competing for it….

I don’t think it ignores the fact, it just states that was the vision of expectancy, but reality hasn’t matched that. Instead of creating a better work life balance for all, we have a few who reap all the benefits, the majority trying to find that balance and usually failing against the system, and a sizeable minority cast to the wayside.