Must-read: Martin Ford: “How Unprepared We Are for the Robot Revolution”
: How Unprepared We Are for the Robot Revolution: “Machines are rapidly taking on ever more challenging cognitive tasks…
…encroaching on the fundamental capability that sets humans apart as a species: our ability to make complex decisions, to solve problems — and, most importantly, to learn…. In the coming decades, machine learning is likely to be the primary driving force behind a Cambrian explosion of applications…. The near-term future is likely to be transformed not by general purpose robots or AI systems but rather a nearly limitless number of specialised applications… ultimately consuming nearly any kind of work that is on some level routine and predictable….
Low-wage service sector jobs in areas such as fast food and retail… are certain to be heavily affected. Even more important will be all the white-collar occupations that involve relatively routine information analysis and manipulation. As these ‘good’ jobs, often held by university graduates, begin to evaporate, faith in evermore education and training as the common solution to technological disruption of the job market seems likely to also erode. All of this portends a social, economic and political disruption for which we are completely unprepared…. If we fail to have a meaningful public conversation about what robotics and artificial intelligence mean for the future, and develop workable ways in which to adapt our economy and society, then far greater, and more frightening, volatility is sure to soon arrive.