[Ghostavo]

So I was reading a recent news article on Tom's Hardware regarding the plans of Foxconn to replace a sizable portion of their workforce with robots, AKA automation, and started seeing the comments section. Since this is mainly a site dedicated to technology/hardware I would wager most people reading this would be immensely supportive of this move.

Imagine my surprise when I found out that most posters are luddites.

The article:
One Million Robots to Take Over Jobs of Foxconn Workers


So is the average joe a luddite? 

[Nuke]

guess they will need to do what everyone in the first world is doing, make everyone into salesmen so you can sell the things that come out the loading dock of the robotic factory. or maybe they can get jobs in the robotics industry. there are just jobs that robots do better. you will never have a robotic salesman for example, would take some sophisticated ai to pull that off. but a robotic welder can make a perfect weld where a human welder with decades of experience can still make mistakes. human welder can still go places robots cant and dont require as much setup time. a human welder can also make decisions where a robot can not. but for a manufacturing perspective the robot is the better worker and you always want the best worker for the job. and for every robot in use thats probably room for someone to be a technician, or perhaps get a job selling robots.

[IceFire]

The average joe still has trouble coping with setting the clock on their VCR/PVR/TV... the fact that those systems are largely automatic is almost beside the point

Some people I know own smart phones and have no idea how to use it. They even loudly proclaim that it's too complicated for them. Not sure why they own it although some of them are working at jobs where a Blackberry is part of the dress code. Most high technology is too complicated for people. Even the vaunted iPhone gets it's best use from the people who were always good at the technology.

That all said... I don't see any examples of luddites on the Tom's Hardware site link that you gave us. I see quite a bit of tongue in cheek British style humour.

[Ghostavo]

See the second and third page of comments.

[NGTM-1R]

So is the average joe a luddite? 

Average joe worries about the possibility he will be replaced by machinery.

[Mongoose]

So is the average joe a luddite? 

Average joe worries about the possibility he will be replaced by machinery.

Yeah, this.  I think there's a big difference between being a Luddite and having a legitimate concern that automation might put you out of a job.

[Bobboau]

weren't the Luddites professional weavers who destroyed industrial looms because they thought that automated looms would put them out of business?

aren't there decidedly not very many weavers left in the world today?

weren't the Luddites right to be worried?

[Kosh]

So is the average joe a luddite? 

Average joe worries about the possibility he will be replaced by machinery.

Yeah, this.  I think there's a big difference between being a Luddite and having a legitimate concern that automation might put you out of a job.

And this is ultimately one of the biggest problems with our society, with very few exceptions it never really adjusted to the Information Age. The Industrial Age is dead, and along with it notions like pensions and job security.

[Flipside]

Well, the problem is that the mentality of most large corporations still exists in the Industrial age, that productivity = income = stability, however, this is despite the fact that the information age has made it so that productivity can be increased by reducing the number of humans in your employ.

The luddites were right to be concerned, hand-weaving is now a cottage industry and is rapidly descending into a 'hobby'. So governments still expect people to earn a living whilst at the same time corporations are slowly removing the opportunity to do so, the whole things on a pretty shaky path.

[achtung]

What's going to happen when we have really nice 3D printers?

[Nuke]

What's going to happen when we have really nice 3D printers?

we will all be $500 poorer. yes, there are fab machines that cheep, if you dont mind ordering from china. you can also get a laser cutter for less than what you would have payed for a computer back in '96.

anyway this kinda thing is nothing new. jobs go obsolete. for example if we went to electric cars, engine mechanics would find it hard to get jobs. sure there would be engines that need repair and maintenance. but the demand for that kind of service would diminish. jobs go obsolete all the time, just ask your neiborhood milkman, or the guy that brings you ice. oh wait, you cant

[Kosh]

Well, the problem is that the mentality of most large corporations still exists in the Industrial age, that productivity = income = stability, however, this is despite the fact that the information age has made it so that productivity can be increased by reducing the number of humans in your employ.

Not entirely true because while machines are well suited for monotonous repetitive tasks there are still plenty of things people can do better. People bemoan the loss of factory work probably because factory work is easy, you just do the exact same thing again and again and again through the whole day and it requires very little training or learning.

We actually didn't hear too much of this during the great stock market runs of the 90's and 00's, when people could easily increase their worth dumping money (their own or borrowed) into bubble related assets (tech stocks, finance stocks and real estate mainly), but most of these people never really learned even basic things like how to protect their investments, what things not to invest in, etc, and as a result when the market went down they lost almost everything. Should we blame mechanization for this too? How could more factory jobs have prevented this? The answer is no to both. It's a case of intellectual laziness at its finest.

The luddites were right to be concerned, hand-weaving is now a cottage industry and is rapidly descending into a 'hobby'. So governments still expect people to earn a living whilst at the same time corporations are slowly removing the opportunity to do so, the whole things on a pretty shaky path.

And yet haven't we all benefited from the luddites failure? Simple factory work is not the only kind of work there is.

[Flipside]

I'm not saying the Luddites weren't doomed to failure, or that this wasn't a positive thing from the point of view of civilisation as a whole, just as Caxton putting scribes out of work wasn't a 'bad' thing in the large picture, but the problem is still that our work ethic is from the 1800's and our work technic is far more modern, and the two are becoming less and less compatible.

[JCDNWarrior]

One problem is, what if there's no more work for people to do? We're gonna have to find new avenues for people to work in, else more and more people are dependent on government to survive. Unless all the automated systems and robots will offer services free to the public, combined with using renewable cheap energy, you're causing quite an economic crisis for everyone.

Nonetheless it's expected that almost all new aircrafts will be fully automated or operated by people like the Predator drones far away. Has it's advantages but you may be losing ethics as barriers previously there are gone.

Nonetheless, I wouldnt mind to have or even make an automated process to back up my customer service job but unless I move to another part of the company I might become obsolete.

And I doubt you can convince robots to be free with rules (I've helped perhaps a hundred customers where we didn't have to help them).

[NGTM-1R]

And yet haven't we all benefited from the luddites failure? Simple factory work is not the only kind of work there is.

But it is very good at absorbing large numbers of people in a way other kinds of work simply aren't. It takes decades for the market for creative work to expand enough to take up the losses from automation usually, absent an unnatural requirement to expend manpower like a war.

[headdie]

And yet haven't we all benefited from the luddites failure? Simple factory work is not the only kind of work there is.

But it is very good at absorbing large numbers of people in a way other kinds of work simply aren't. It takes decades for the market for creative work to expand enough to take up the losses from automation usually, absent an unnatural requirement to expend manpower like a war.

case in point large swathes ok the UK still qualify for European Union grants to assist them develop new employment opportunities after the collapse of mining and heavy industry in the country

[Nuke]

in a perfect world businesses would be made to work together to re-distribute their discarded workforces. instead its like "were laying you off because yove been replaced by a robot, heres your paycheck and your letter of recommendation now get the **** out of here".  should be something like "were modernizing and we dont need as many workers, but this upstart company needs line workers and theyre willing to take you on at your current pay rate". it always seemed kinda negligent for businesses with huge pools of resources sending unneeded workers into an uncertain job market with little more than a severance package and a letter of recommendation always seems kind of archaic to me.

[karajorma]

I don't know why they're worried. Give it a few months and after the first spate of robot suicides Foxconn will realise that humans were cheaper.

[achtung]

in a perfect world businesses would be made to work together to re-distribute their discarded workforces. instead its like "were laying you off because yove been replaced by a robot, heres your paycheck and your letter of recommendation now get the **** out of here".  should be something like "were modernizing and we dont need as many workers, but this upstart company needs line workers and theyre willing to take you on at your current pay rate". it always seemed kinda negligent for businesses with huge pools of resources sending unneeded workers into an uncertain job market with little more than a severance package and a letter of recommendation always seems kind of archaic to me.

Hey Jim! We're replacing you with a machine. We've already worked a way to slide you straight into a competing company's infrastructure, so you can use your festering hate to help them destroy us. Have fun!

[JCDNWarrior]

in a perfect world businesses would be made to work together to re-distribute their discarded workforces. instead its like "were laying you off because yove been replaced by a robot, heres your paycheck and your letter of recommendation now get the **** out of here".  should be something like "were modernizing and we dont need as many workers, but this upstart company needs line workers and theyre willing to take you on at your current pay rate". it always seemed kinda negligent for businesses with huge pools of resources sending unneeded workers into an uncertain job market with little more than a severance package and a letter of recommendation always seems kind of archaic to me.

Hey Jim! We're replacing you with a machine. We've already worked a way to slide you straight into a competing company's infrastructure, so you can use your festering hate to help them destroy us. Have fun!

You are aware they wouldn't need to transfer you to their competitors, aren't you?

Many companies have smaller sister companies or companies they bought up that would require their highly trained and skilled layed-off employees. The current state is just destroying people and the economy alike, which is why a transfer from human workers to robots should only be partial and the rest of the workforce redistributed accordingly, as Nuke mentioned.