I was talking to a fellow I know the other day and we got around to, of course, artificial intelligence.\u00a0 And he mentioned a book, which is probably very popular, that stated that because of the capability of AI replacing almost all human work, the government will have to pay us for just sitting around.\u00a0 And I revolted at that idea.<\/p>\n
Sure, maybe it\u2019s cost effective and in line with how automation is replacing humans.\u00a0 But I saw it as an awful idea.\u00a0 Paying people to do nothing is truly a frightening fate.\u00a0 It brings to my mind the fictional Eloi from H.G. Well\u2019s, \u201cThe Time Machine.\u201d\u00a0 Useless people sitting around doing nothing while the real work is done by monsters (of whatever kind) is dystopian to an extent that I cannot believe sane people would accept.<\/p>\n
Now, I don\u2019t have all the answers.\u00a0 Obviously technical progress will occur.\u00a0 It\u2019s inevitable.\u00a0 But progress cannot earn that name if it entails the destruction of human happiness.\u00a0 And living like some kind of lab animal with nothing useful to do all day cannot be called happiness.\u00a0 And so, I think we\u2019ve reached a place in human technological ability where we have to start justifying what we create not just by how it increases productivity but also how it maximizes human happiness.\u00a0 And I don\u2019t mean the kind of happiness associated with someone playing a video game.\u00a0 Human beings need to accomplish tasks.\u00a0 This goes for both work and personal activities.\u00a0 We like to work with our hands and our minds and we\u2019re good at it (to greater and lesser extents depending on the individual).\u00a0 But you might say it would be impossible to both efficiently produce the goods and services that our society requires and also maximize the job satisfaction of people.<\/p>\n
Well, no.\u00a0 After all the very machines that are supposedly smart enough to replace all of us are also smart enough to optimize algorithms based on human job satisfaction to design the processes and work assignments that would allow this type of job customization to exist.\u00a0 Industry can be forced to accommodate human beings into their processes.\u00a0 But in the future, it won\u2019t be a voluntary acceptance.\u00a0 We will have to use government to force corporations to utilize humans instead of automation.\u00a0 This will involve using the tax code and other manipulations to incentivize this policy.\u00a0 And it will take time to force this mindset to permeate the workplace.\u00a0 But it will be possible to do.\u00a0 Because in a democracy we have the upper hand if we know how to use it.\u00a0 And there\u2019s nothing antithetical to capitalism about this.\u00a0 As long as it\u2019s a level playing field all the companies can compete to make a human-friendly environment and still make whatever profits they want.\u00a0 They just won\u2019t be allowed to do it without human employees.<\/p>\n
And what will happen is the companies who provide the most job satisfaction to their employees will preferentially get and retain the highest quality employees.\u00a0 What more could Hal-9000 want from his crew?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I was talking to a fellow I know the other day and we got around to, of course, artificial intelligence.\u00a0 And he mentioned a book,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,3545],"tags":[3773,4726,462,2494,5061],"class_list":["post-35058","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-science","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-automation","tag-h-g-wells","tag-the-eloi-and-the-morlocks","tag-the-time-machine"],"yoast_head":"\n