Worried about being replaced by a robot? Become a physicist An online index of nearly a thousand jobs may useful in cluing in folks to the automation risk their field of employment faces. At the bottom of the list – meaning they're the most likely to be replaced – are meat packers and slaughterhouse workers, while the least likely to see their jobs automated are physicists. In general …
"The lowest scores can be found among... the legal profession. "
I stopped there and realized how these "scientists" came to this:
- Funding low, "scientists" worried about joblessness.
- Automation company buys a report from "scientists"
- Paper is amended at the legal stage, lawyers are added
The word scientist is becoming synonymous with the word lawyer.
More than half of the work actually undertaken by the legal profession needs to be automated, and trivially could be.
A huge amount of the things solicitors do and that paralegals do for cases is already automated in other circumstances - eg almost all of the work that's actually done for conveyancing and remortgaging is already automated by other industries, yet solicitors do it by writing emails.
Actual Court work never can be, but a lot of the stuff that happens before court could be, giving barristers and paralegals more time on the rest.
That said - a lot of the jobs listed are the entry route into the "high skill" roles. If those roles did vanish, there wouldn't be any way for new starters to git gud. That causes really nasty issues a couple of decades later...
So, Computer Systems Analyst is 57% at risk of being automated ?
Bullshit.
There is no computer that is going to be able to sift through the contradictory declarations, backhanded dealings and outright boordroom dominance battles to produce an application that is in any way going to be able to be accepted and paid for (let's not mention work).
So, physicists create a list of jobs and their automation risk, and find that their profession cannot be automated ?
Color me surprised.
It is not 57%. It's a scale with the value 0.57 on it. The numbers can be used to compare how automatable the job is, but not to set odds on when, how, or whether the job will be automated. If this makes it easier, I've rescaled their numbers from 1 (unlikely to be automated) to 36 (likely but not guaranteed to be automated). On this basis, system administrators are estimated at 15.
This doesn't mean their calculations are correct, and we can argue about each one if you want, but at least let's argue about the numbers as they were intended.
There model completely ignores economics. Sure, a robot may be able to do a particular job, but how much would a suitable robot cost compared to the humans who do it now?
On that basis the least at risk jobs are for which humans are poorly paid and a robot would have to be very complicated. Pizza delivery driver, say, or care assistant. The most at risk are those for which humans earn shedloads for relatively simple tasks. Futures trading or train driving, for example.
A different slant on the economics.
Slaughterhouse worker? Yeah, a robot could spin that carcass around picking off pieces. But part of the hell of that work is management wanting you to get everything that could be called 'meat'. Every possible bit.
A robot is not going to be able to do that at anywhere near the rate management wants without being *very* expensive indeed. And if it doesn't get it right, the 'product' is going to be low quality. There's a fast-food franchise I haven't gone to for <many> years because they thought all hamburgers must come with bone chips.
The question is not whether a robot could do the job. The question is whether it can do so at *parity* with a human.
"Robots will improve more and more"
That seems to be a common trope, but is it at all true?? Of course "improve" depends on the task at hand, but anything requiring any sort of original or complex thinking (ie general intelligence) won't ever be meaningfully automated in the next century or so at least. Many jobs, including 'manual' and menial labour, involve a surprising amount of thought and independent action to perform efficiently.
What I think will happen is that for many jobs, tools/robots will be developed that can automate part of the job, leaving the human to be able to focus more on the other parts of their job. So the slaughterhouse might need 10 operators instead of 20, but it will be a much longer timescale before that gets down to zero.
As someone else mentioned as well, you have to factor in the cost, not only of capital expenditure but running. It is often assumed that robots will take over because their one-time cost will, over a long enough time, always be less than the recurring expenditure of paying humans a salary. But robots/computers DO have recurring expenditure, which is electricity, and "pseudo-AI" (more correctly, ML models) in their current form use tons of power. Current record-holder GPT-3 for example, was trained on 10,000 300W GPUs, which is 3MW. That's just the GPUs, so if you had to include the power consumption of all the CPUs, memory, storage, network, + all the data center cooling costs, you're looking at far more, say 4-5MW. (https://blog.scaleway.com/doing-ai-without-breaking-the-bank-yours-or-the-planets/)
nVidia also estimate that training is actually a small part of consumption and actual usage of the model (inference) will account for 80-90% of power consumption (https://www.forbes.com/sites/robtoews/2020/06/17/deep-learnings-climate-change-problem/). So running the model could be consuming anything up to 20MW
It's difficult to put a good 'average' estimate of electricity costs, but E0.15/kWh seems about right. That's E150/MWh, or E3000/h for 20 MW. A lot of knowledge workers don't get paid E3000/month, never mind meatpackers and slaughterhouse workers. You would need to have an advanced AI taking over the jobs of hundreds of workers just to break even on running costs, assuming that 1 AI can even handle multiple different jobs simultaneously, as opposed to doing the same job hundreds of times.
While it's to be expected that power efficiency will improve, there are hard physical limits on how much that is possible. And the more complex the models get (ie the better they get at 'thinking'), the bigger they become and the more they consume, which will offset any efficiency gains.
A human brain, in contrast, has a power consumption of about 20W.
There are far more meat packers than physicists, but competition for jobs in academic physics (also any of the hard sciences like chemistry, biology, medicine and mathematics) is great, so it is not like you can go from refuse collection officer to professor at MIT just because you want to.
I thought exactly this when I read the article. Their ranking of how automatable a job could be could well be accurate, and at least a few of their rankings I think are correct, but their suggestion system for changing jobs is completely useless. Not only do they not factor in the economics of whether the not-automated jobs want to hire someone, they put very little effort checking what skills are needed for them.
The less active thought that is required to do a job, the more possible it is to be replaced (though possible doesn't mean it will happen, it has to be cheaper than alternatives)
Any job that's pretty rote that your brain does for you pretty much on autopilot once you're trained like assembly line jobs or long haul trucking or cooking fast food orders is ripe for automation. The more creativity (like a physicist) or thought to resolve conflicting information (think software developers who have specs with missing data in some places and tell you to do it three different ways in others) the less likely automation is.
Another factor is where the work is done. It has to be in a fairly controlled space - like how self driving cars will become routine on the expressway long before they are trusted in NYC or London traffic. A robot might be able to cook a meal in a fast food restaurant where say McDonalds can specify the layout of the cooking space in every restaurant, but it wouldn't work in your neighborhood restaurant where things are in a different location and you have that one trick burner that needs to be jiggled just so to get it to stay at a setting between simmer and "hot enough to boil lead".
Some jobs could be partially automated but never completely - the job a plumber does running pipe in new construction could be automated, but everything that happens after especially repair work that involves troubleshooting and climbing into cramped spaces under your kitchen sink cannot until we have AGI.
On a new-build, I'd say it's eminently possible for robots to do everything up to first-fix, and possibly even including some of first-fix in many cases.
Second fix... nope. Not a chance!
Bricklaying is already "done", for example. However, the robots are expensive and currently fairly slow compared to a good brickie, so not economically viable. That could change.
So they have a delivery driver down at 71%. If they mean they can get the goods delivered 71% of the way then they are way under what should be currently possible. However the difficult bit that I don't see automation being able to handle in the foreseeable future is moving the goods that last 1% of the way over rough ground, between badly parked vehicles, through stiff lobby doors, up tight twisty stairs to the customer's door. Not happening.
In...
human and automation lab.
https://www.theregister.com/2014/10/20/former_us_navy_pilot_missy_cummings_on_uavs_smartcars/
...when it comes to programming what their perfect spec and flawless outline describes.They always include every special case, and never change or add a features during implementation. And they never give in into political changes about their projects, even a government commission never fails these important steps.
Truth, that. I automatically become Pissed Off Customer when I juet have to deal with an IVR. If I had to deal with a robot in person I think my first impulse will be to push it over and put a heavy brick on top. Either that or open a panel and turn a hose on it.
In supermarket carparks, I always leave my trolley in a creative (yet safe) place, in order to do my bit to keep the jobs of the trolley returners safe...
Beacuse I care...
Not everyone can or wants to retrain, sometimes, returning trolleys is a good fit for their career options...
If we automate unskilled jobs out of existence, what will unskillable people do?
"If we automate unskilled jobs out of existence, what will unskillable people do?"
That's always been and will always be a problem, but lots of jobs have been automated without causing massive problems and providing benefits to society, including those who had to switch jobs. We should definitely do what we can to ease the process, but it shouldn't stop us from improving our tech. If we truly eliminate all the things that unskilled people can do, we'll have created a drastically different world. In that case, it should be pretty easy to let those people do what they want instead of artificially keeping around jobs for wasting their time.
If we truly eliminate all the things that unskilled people can do, we'll have created a drastically different world. In that case, it should be pretty easy to let those people do what they want instead of artificially keeping around jobs for wasting their time. ...... doublelayer
Seconded, doublelayer ...... and as you may read elsewhere both here and further afield, a Diabolical Skunkworks in Heavenly Progress or Heavenly Skunkworks in Diabolical Progress, if such is the much better and more comfortable comforting fit, and one of those Extremely Strange and Surreal Spooky Quantum Entanglements with Persistent Advanced Cyber Threat/Treat Actors Currently Running with Virtually Immaculate Drives in IT and AI.
I Kid U Not ..... Who Dares Win Wins and Never Ever Loses.
Whenever you can Guarantee that Program Result with IT and AI and Command and Control it would be both virtually and practically impossible to plausibly deny any charges that one be doing God's work. although that is not to suggest that it would be wise to claim it whenever doing Gods’ Works in Works for Global Operating Devices.
I'm sure those unskilled people will want to eat and have a place to live. If they can't get a job because everything they are capable of doing has been automated away, how do you propose they eat? I certainly don't want the government taxing me so they get fed, any more than I want automation making me dependent upon the government.
What I propose is that they switch to a different job that fits their skills or consider getting new skills, both approaches having worked well before. For the intervening time, we have systems to make it easier for them to do those things so they don't suffer while making the change. We already have some methods to encourage people to gain some in-demand skills and for protecting people whose jobs have just been lost, so in most cases, we can rely on those. Depending on the specific situation, we may need to expand one of these.
If you're referring to my last statement, that was only what would happen if we eliminated all unskilled work. I'm not sure that's feasible, but if we somehow managed it, our society would be very different. If we can eliminate the need for all unskilled work, we will also have eliminated a lot of skilled work and a lot of necessities would have decreased in cost. A basic income would, at those costs, be significantly easier to pay. Please don't misunderstand this statement; I am not proposing this for our current world. Only under a relatively utopian circumstance which I've already stated I don't think will happen do I think this solution would be needed.
To keep people happy then we should go back to harvesting wheat with a hand sickle. so many thousands of people will be needed but the cost of food will increase massively. So you might not be paying extra tax to feed those people but you will be paying far more to keep them in work.
Automate me out of work? I absolutely love the idea. Bring it on, there are many things I could be doing with my time that I will enjoy much more.
To keep people happy then we should go back to harvesting wheat with a hand sickle. so many thousands of people will be needed but the cost of food will increase massively. So you might not be paying extra tax to feed those people but you will be paying far more to keep them in work.
That's more or less what therapeutic communities like Camphill do, though the food stays at only "rather expensive" levels because someone is paying to keep the residents in work.
This is exactly what I was saying. The benefits to society of the new tech are usually greater than the costs to the person who was automated, so even if society has to fully pay for one of them, it's better to help the workers than artificially keep automatable jobs around. In addition, the automated worker can decide to do something they like to do more, which means even more reason to go with that option.
Automate me out of work? I absolutely love the idea. Bring it on, there are many things I could be doing with my time that I will enjoy much more.
Unless one of them is "Converting my Surbiton garden into a smallholding" you may find a problem with that. And if you wouldn't, why the hell are you still working?
If we automate unskilled jobs out of existence, what will unskillable people do? ...... Lucy in the Sky (with Diamonds)
A growing persistent permanent dilemma, Lucy in the Sky (with Diamonds), presently being woefully unaddressed which permits it to linger and fester and poison both the sociable and social workspace.
The current course of action would appear to be to create the likes of non-jobs not unlike Pontificating Parliamentary Politician or Boycotting Legislative Assembly Member being afforded and even further enabled to be able to afford themselves extravagant job seekers allowances and state funded benefits with a vast array of extra expenses able to be paid for by others than themselves and their cronies and/or family members.
The fact that that program is so obviously constantly proving itself such an abject failure and yet still exists to blight and bleed nations dry of dignity and treasure, power and pleasure tells one all anyone/anything would need to know about the fragile febrile state of the human condition and what needs to be addressed ... or destroyed .... in order to fix it.
And although that be a right proper devil of a job, suitable only for a certain chosen few already all ready, willing and able to move considerably more than just Heaven and Earth in APT ACTive Performance of Stellar COSMIC* Turns, if needs must dictate, so be it.
Buckle Up .... IT's Gonna get Rough as the Going Get Tough and Tough Get Going in the Rough and the Raw and the Rare and Rarified Atmospheres of Live Operational Virtual Environments.
COSMIC* ...... Control Of Secret Materiel in an Internetional Command
Tennessee has a solution to that already on the books (law ones that is).
They have banned homelessness state wide.
The Homeless are to be sent to jail for years.
The stupidity of it is that it would be cheaper to build homes for them than send them to jail.
Oh wait... it is Election year. How many private prison operators have [cough][cough] donated to the GQP candidates just to get this law passed? I'm sure that the taxpayers would love to know.
If this expands then we'll see the return of the workhouse aka Prison for large parts of the population that would naturally be disqualified from ever voting again. That's one way to get to the totalitarian state that the GQP want for 'merika.
I'm sure that it won't be long before some on the far, far-right start proposing this sort of solution. Just remember what happened in the 1930's in Germany... That's where the USA is heading and where they lead, we inevitably follow.
Corroborating evidence/an other third party hyperlink or two which would support, and in so doing confirm your Tennessee jail for the homeless tale, would be more than just helpful, AC.
Does such exist if one surfs provisional and proprietary/public and private search engines for available necessary information ...... for without it is one outed as something akin to a prime deluded fool or search engines are exposed as basically biased and easily subverted for utilisation as a perverse political tool .... a politically incorrect corrupt abomination ‽ .
Considering where IT would/could be leading .....
If this expands then we'll see the return of the workhouse aka Prison for large parts of the population that would naturally be disqualified from ever voting again. That's one way to get to the totalitarian state that the GQP want for 'merika.I'm sure that it won't be long before some on the far, far-right start proposing this sort of solution. Just remember what happened in the 1930's in Germany... That's where the USA is heading and where they lead, we inevitably follow. ..... Anonymous Coward
...... it is no small thing, and certainly something everyone should always be practically insisting upon about virtually everything. Question More allows one to know anything and everything or conversely, all that someone/something else has decided you are not going to so easily learn and uncover/discover.
Ten seconds with Google would have found a reference to the law.
Here is just one link.
https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/politics/2022/04/18/tennessee-bill-penalizing-homelessness-passes-legislature-after-debate-citing-hitler/7287979001/
I have to assume that is where the OP got the link to 1930's Germany.
With the SCOTUS effectively outlawing any Abortion in the USA, the plot of the Handmaid's tale looks like becoming fact pretty soon.
I like how people conflate "skilled" with "amount of thinking required". I'd like to see some of these academics work on a production line.
Then, perhaps, they would realise that while it is rather mindless work, there is a fair degree of skill involved.
Additionally even the most gormless employee is more adaptable than a robot, as expensive robots tend to be good at doing one thing well. A minimum wage human, on the other hand, can go from making cupcakes to pizzas. Then after breaktime, to making trifle. Whatever is needed to complete the orders.
I've seen robots come and go where I work, and not a one has stayed. Because without spending eye watering amounts of money, they are nowhere near as adaptable, barely faster than much lower paid humans, and here's the best bit - when it all goes to hell the robots don't know they're making a mess of things, they just carry on their routine. Want to totally flummox a robot? Feed the tray in the wrong way around. Or have the product just a little bit too sticky. Or.... A multitude of things a human can cope with.
In high value industries such as car manufacturing, a slew of robots can be designed to replace humans and create cars quickly. In lower value industries, humans don't need to worry too much, as getting robots to replace them is simply infeasible, far too expensive and far less flexible. Sure, there will be a degree of automation, but automation that requires people. Automation more aimed at regular consistency in the finished products (and even that requires people to make sure it doesn't cock it up).
Something all turkeys will be telling themselves about Christmas and Thanksgiving, heyrick.
And this picture is apt here methinks.
Quote
"and here's the best bit - when it all goes to hell the robots don't know they're making a mess of things, they just carry on their routine. Want to totally flummox a robot? Feed the tray in the wrong way around."
I can attest to that one .... although its hardly the robot's fault if the human operator has ignored the sign on the tray saying 'this way round' because he yabbering on his phone......(picks up cattle prod and sets it to 'stun'..(mainly because the operators all instinctively duck when theres a yell of "INCOMING!" and a 3lb lump hammer coming flying across the factory floor))
But automation needs to go in at admin level, imagine the savings if we could robotically sort and stack the quality certs of our aerospace stuff instead of it having to be done manually.
Or replace a whole host of mid-level mangler jobs with robots...... but it will be hard to program those to make the insane decisions coming out of the PHBs
That would be fun: analyse popular sentiment on twitter, promise to deliver it and instead give all the money to robots built in the same factory as you.
For bonus points, get caught looking at pictures of tractors and have to resign. Although I suppose leaks would still be an issue, you'd just need an oily rag for those.
This post has been deleted by its author
In the case of the Tories/The Conservative and Unionist Party, it would be pictures of Earth Movers from the JCB company. Boris likes nothing better than to get behind the wheel of a JCB (with an official photographer in tow).
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=boris+jcb&t=h_&iax=images&ia=images
icon --> The JCB Company Helicopter
So, as one of the few resident physicists in my outfit, why is everyone and his dog trying to set up expert systems to replace us?
The bean counters can have their way, but when stuff starts failing I'll be available at twice my previous rate, and at least some of that time will be on a smug I told you so.
HR departments are convinced the great resignation and moving job every three years are the new normal. They've given up on the possibility that skilled people might actually be needed, and want to stick around. Its enough to make you consider your position...
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
