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Silicon Valley celebrates artificial intelligence and robotics as fields that have the power to improve people's lives, through inventions like driverless cars and robot carers for the elderly.
That message isn't getting through to the rest of the country, where more than 70% of Americans express wariness or concern about a world where machines perform many of the tasks done by humans, according to Pew Research.
The findings have wide-reaching implications for technology companies working in these fields and indicates the need for greater public hand-holding.
"Ordinary Americans are very wary and concerned about the growing trend in automation and place a lot of value in human decision-making," said Aaron Smith, the author of the research, which surveyed more than 4,000 US adults. "They are not incredibly excited about machines taking over those responsibilities."
Once robots are perfected the 99% can be eliminated so they stop bumming the 1% out.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Friday October 06 2017, @04:25AM (3 children)
There. FTFY.
And therein lies the rub, friend.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday October 06 2017, @04:58PM (2 children)
Your assertion needs proof. It has been asserted that MOST humans are decent at creating music, if taught and inspired to do so. The fact that a only a few are "needed" at any one time given technological reproduction of their works is not evidence against this argument. And quite clearly some of the most popular musicians owe most of their success to backers.
The evidence is less clear in the other arts, but I see no real reason to doubt its truth. Consider that there are sudden eruptions from small populations of many highly talented artists of one variety or another, and that the next generation typically cannot continue. This is indication that these eruptions of genius are spurred by external factors. It's not proof, but it's the best evidence we should expect to find in the historic records.
How general this phenomenon is is not easily determinable. Clearly the eruption of programming skills was not causally connected with the sudden access to computers.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Friday October 06 2017, @07:11PM (1 child)
It's been my experience (and I've had over half a century of it) that many people (mostly, kind, decent and good ones too) do not have (for whatever reasons) intellectual curiosity, spontaneous creativity and/or artistic talent.
Those that do have those traits are, again in my experience, a relatively small subset of humanity.
No. I haven't done broad sociological research with a slew of peer-reviewed papers. It's merely an observation based on my own personal experience.
I'm not trying to elevate creative/artistic folks over anyone else. In fact, I agree that many people are not encouraged or supported in creative endeavors. Which is sad, not just because that limits the people who either aren't encouraged or are actively discouraged from those types of activities, but also because it reduces the overall creative output and value created by humans.
In the U.S. (although, I imagine I'm going to get flamed as an apologist for the lazy and a hater of capitalism, even though that's far from the truth), a much more generous safety net would go a long way, IMHO, to encourage creativity, entrepreneurial endeavors and a willingness to try new things and re-invent oneself. Mostly because if you are less concerned about having a roof over your head or where your next meal might come from, you're more likely to take risks and try new things.
But given the current circumstance, it's not surprising that people are *extremely* nervous about their jobs being supplanted with robots (or foreign workers), when most people are less than a couple paychecks away from living on the street and dumpster diving for dinner.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 2) by HiThere on Friday October 06 2017, @10:17PM
For the assertion I was repeating to be correct the people need to grow up with the appropriate social support systems in place. I will definitely grant that by the time most children are in kindergarden, it's already past the appropriate time to start conditioning.
My wife taught music quite effectively, and with a VERY low failure rate, but she believed in beginning before the child was born. Whether the conditioning is of the child or of the mother cannot be determined from the available evidence, but it does indicate that given proper support most children can learn to be better than adequate musicians. Of course, this isn't the source of my original assertion, which was an assertion that if all the musicians in Ireland disappeared in one day, they would be replaced within the same generation. That probably isn't a true statement anymore, because the social conditions have changed so much with the prevalence of radio, etc. And it *MAY* not have been true when stated. But considering, e.g., the sudden flowering of what is now called classical music within one small city, it's also not improbable.
Javascript is what you use to allow unknown third parties to run software you have no idea about on your computer.