DailyDirt: Robot Slaves Co-workers

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Robots are getting better and cheaper all the time. Sure, they're not perfect, but then neither are humans (and we, initially, design and build the robots). Some day, though, robots might start improving upon themselves at a rate that outpaces our human capacity. It could be a huge benefit to civilization to be able to replace all dangerous labor with robotic slaves, but some folks are worried about what the world will look like when robots are really that advanced. Here are just a few links on the scenarios of a robot-dominated age of technology.

• The rise of "capital-biased technological change" could start with robots taking more and more jobs away from humans. Is this really a problem? Some think it could be, and the possibility of a robot-led economic disaster is at least worth some thought. [url]
• The US is a country with high growth in robot employment. South Korea's robot employment rate, though, is even higher. [url]
• In 1814, about 70% of all American workers lived on a farm -- that number is more like 1% now. Automation could make about 70% of today's occupations obsolete, but will new robot jobs (that we haven't even imagined yet) spur a new wave of economic growth? [url]

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Filed Under: ai, artificial intelligence, automation, capital-biased technological change, luddites, robot age, robot employment, robots, unemployment