What would people do when robots produce everything?

What will happen to humankind?

  • Things won't change much.

    Votes: 4 13.8%
  • Fabric of society will disintegrate and civilization will end.

    Votes: 7 24.1%
  • World will live in plenty, pleasure and peace forever.

    Votes: 4 13.8%
  • Nobody could possibly predict.

    Votes: 14 48.3%

  • Total voters
    29
It is not a good idea if it will be no money. We will lose our freedom and all our life will be manipulated more than now. Robots shout be our property, work for us and we decide then what we want purchase with money or/and equivalent (IBAN transfer).
Obviously lack of money creates some problems, perhaps loss of freedom of choice of selection, saving for big items, donating money to a cause, etc. It is hard to predict if we are ever going to get rid of money. The point was that technically we can, and still receive products.

Yes, our parents will be also replaced by robots. In the future humans do not need parents. Robots can reproduce kids in test tubes and look after them. We must pay attention what politicians and current business world decide for us.
Not really. As long as people want to raise a child there will be no need for such thing. And we are very good in it. Also, a child needs emotional bond with parents to grow up to be a normal person. Machines might never have feelings therefore never be good parents.



That is not a good idea for freedom. It is better, my robot will give me the money, because he works for me and not a government.
You are really tied to the money idea, aren't you. ;)

In the case that a goverment will be „my rich grandfather“ then only should it be a goverment with direct democracy (like Switzerland) which people themselves decide how their life should be in the future. Swiss People also can change decisions at any time if they are wrong.
No problem with this.

The only problem of direct democracy is that a country should be small. EU or even Germany is too big for it. Regions and direct democracy with basic EU rights and our personal robots which work for us could be a good way.
I believe that in the future the whole world will be decentralized. Local communities will have strongest powers and big entities like countries will disintegrate with time.:
http://www.eupedia.com/forum/thread...the-world-mix-creating-one-race-in-the-future


I think, we have to give them something for paying resources like metals, wood etc.[/QUOTE]Money or not, you place an order with mining, lumber and transportation robots and they will deliver.
 
I agree. No emotions and free will for robots or we will get huge problems.
Yep, the Skynet and Terminator. :)
 
Wendy's is replacing its lowest-paid workers with robots

Tech Insider said:
...
Citing concerns about the rising cost of labor, Wendy's President Todd Penegor told Investor's Business Daily (IBD) about plans to automate the ordering process in company restaurants. Employees who once took orders from customers will be replaced by self-service kiosks. Mobile ordering and payment apps will also cut down on employee hours.
...
According to IBD, Penegor says the move is a response to the rising cost of labor for the company. He says it's partly a result of rising minimum wages,
...
Wendy's is not alone in the fast food world in deciding to cut the costs and difficulties of human beings out of its ordering process. McDonald's has been testing similar kiosks on a smaller scale....

A good example for how the risen minimum wage forces companies to replace human labor with more innovative robot labor. As the basic income with proportionally reduced work time may have a cost-raising effect too (because there is no cheaper labor available), it can likewise accelerate innovation and rationalization rather than slowing it down, just with less numerous and less threatening layoffs, because everyone works less and gets proportionally less loan from the employer. In case of layoff there is at least protection by the basic income.
 
So as expected, the Swiss people voted against basic income with 78%. This idea needs a lot of new thinking, which is especially difficult for conservative people like the Swiss. Yet the initiators are celebrating their 22%, because they expected only 15%.
Mind that in Switzerland even women had no right to vote until 1971 because the Swiss always voted against, incl. most women.
 
Wendy's is replacing its lowest-paid workers with robots



A good example for how the risen minimum wage forces companies to replace human labor with more innovative robot labor. As the basic income with proportionally reduced work time may have a cost-raising effect too (because there is no cheaper labor available), it can likewise accelerate innovation and rationalization rather than slowing it down, just with less numerous and less threatening layoffs, because everyone works less and gets proportionally less loan from the employer. In case of layoff there is at least protection by the basic income.
I know you are really set on limiting working hours to cut production and consumption. In some case of personal consumption you are right, but there is so much more of good products and services we should get. What about more recreational building infrastructure like more recreational facilities. More efficient roads, tunnels and bridge. Desalination plants in places with water shortages. Water treatment plants from storm water runoffs from our cities. We treat sewer but not run off with road oils and all city street pollution. World wide battery recycling program (these are most toxic items we bury in the ground these days). Traffic control for drone delivery system. Just few examples off the top of my head. There are so many opportunities for work in new products/infrastructure and services. All we need is entrepreneurial spirit and smart politicians. The latter is much harder to come up with, I guess. I don't think we pay enough politicians to get the best and smartest talents.
 
So as expected, the Swiss people voted against basic income with 78%. This idea needs a lot of new thinking, which is especially difficult for conservative people like the Swiss. Yet the initiators are celebrating their 22%, because they expected only 15%.
Mind that in Switzerland even women had no right to vote until 1971 because the Swiss always voted against, incl. most women.
I was shocked to learn this few years ago, lol.
Swiss are very interesting nation. On one hand they are very conservative, on the other they are way more progressive than most other nations. At least they don't shy away from radical ideas and have a lot of initiative. I think it will go through next time when more folks get used to the idea.
I was hoping they will vote yes. Not that I'm sure this is the right way, I have no idea about details of this plan, but it would be nice if someone experiments with it. Otherwise how we will know if it works or not?
 
I know you are really set on limiting working hours to cut production and consumption.

I don't want to cut consumption, only production. The goal is to keep scarcity always slightly above zero (likewise saturation below 100%). Without scarcity there is no economy.

In some case of personal consumption you are right, but there is so much more of good products and services we should get. What about more recreational building infrastructure like more recreational facilities. More efficient roads, tunnels and bridge. Desalination plants in places with water shortages. Water treatment plants from storm water runoffs from our cities. We treat sewer but not run off with road oils and all city street pollution. World wide battery recycling program (these are most toxic items we bury in the ground these days). Traffic control for drone delivery system. Just few examples off the top of my head. There are so many opportunities for work in new products/infrastructure and services. All we need is entrepreneurial spirit and smart politicians. The latter is much harder to come up with, I guess. I don't think we pay enough politicians to get the best and smartest talents.

Well, I have the gut feeling that many of the politicians themselves are already members of the bullshit-job sector. I agree in so far that compared to the wages of managers in the free market the wages of politicians are laughable, which makes them susceptible for corruption. The situation in Japan is a bit different though, as manager wages are ten times lower on average than in the US.

Your examples are mostly from infrastructure, and you are right. In the US the infrastructure is often in a critical age (crumbling bridges). But also in Germany the roads are full of holes, university buildings and schools are often still made in 1970. The question is why does private economy not target these demands, and where are the entrepreneurs? Take the german train system and british water supply for example, it started to decay since it was privatized. One would expect the opposite, but no. What is the reason? I think entrepreneurs/private companies always make calculation and today they find out that it is more profitable to retreat and liquidate, or just receive the government payments and do nothing because they are monopolists. It is no coincidence that infrastructure is the traditional sector of government consumption, which means the government is the main customer of the industry. That is because private consumers do not consume infrastructure directly. This sector is even further increasing due to saturated private consumption.
Again Japan is ahead and they use "Abenomics", a mostly Keynesian attempt to fight deflation. The big problem of such approaches is that they happen when government debt is already critically high, especially in Japan. But nevertheless they try it, hoping for higher tax returns, but so far without success. Mysteriously they also increased consumption tax, which is very stupid. Sometimes the japanese government hires one company to dig a hole and later hires another one to close the same hole (another bullshit-job). Japan also removed pacifism from it's constitution in order to gain economic growth in the arms industry, which is another traditional sector of fiscal stimulus (government consumption). Keynesianism is very close to Mussolini's definition of fascism.

It is a mystery to me why the Fukushima desaster is not a major subject of fiscal stimulus. This is a real scarcity (scarcity of a problem solution). Probably the Fukushima problems are still too abstract and unnoticable for individual people, politicians and entrepreneurs in order to take action. Nobody feels personally responsible enough and there is not enough monetary reward for this good deed.

Governments must revive the private economy and the only way I see is by cutting production. Once the private sector is up again, then there will be also more credit for sustaining government investment in public infrastructure.
 
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I was shocked to learn this few years ago, lol.
Swiss are very interesting nation. On one hand they are very conservative, on the other they are way more progressive than most other nations. At least they don't shy away from radical ideas and have a lot of initiative. I think it will go through next time when more folks get used to the idea.

I think that's because Switzerland has direct democracy. I don't know of any other country that has such privileges. One downside is that people's votes are always very conservative in such wealthy countries like Switzerland. They don't want to change a running system, understandably. Also, Switzerland is not the country where a basic income is especially urgent. Other countries need it much more.

Interestingly, already Richard Nixon proposed a basic income for all US citizens.

99.9% of normal people always believe that money is too scarce, but they don't see that the social spending is a microscopic fraction compared to the billions spent for fiscal stimuli and bank bail-outs.
They also think that an Unconditional Basic Income (UBI) will be an incentive to be lazy and drug addicted. But there is a strong counter argument: In Germany there already was a very generous social help for unemployed until 2004, since many decades. Since only the unemployed received it, it was essentially an incentive for not going to work, and indeed there was always a minority of people living on social welfare only. I think it is inevitable to have such a parasitic minority if we don't want to ruin the honestly working people. It never was a problem for Germany.
But it was also unfair, because social welfare was only for the jobless. It effectively was penalizing the working ones. Now compare this to an Unconditional Basic Income where also the working ones would receive the same welfare. From this perspective the UBI would be even an incentive to find a job!

I was hoping they will vote yes. Not that I'm sure this is the right way, I have no idea about details of this plan, but it would be nice if someone experiments with it. Otherwise how we will know if it works or not?

Exactly. Economic models need continuous improvement, and discouraging experiences should not be taken too negatively, there always will be some trial-and-error.
 
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Coming back to the main question of the thread: what would people do if robots much of their work?
They could do more sports, not only physical but also mental sports. Basically all abilities that have been required so far on the job market could be exercised as a competitive game, with fun and without fear.
I think it partially already happened: the life-threatening hunting and gathering has been replaced by olympic games, soccer, bull-fighting and many other, depending on tribe and culture. Probably even the arts of war has been replaced by these traditional sports, including chess, go and alike. Today, there are competition challenges in war-like computer games (some people are still skeptic) and paintball. Obviously, future sport challenges should become more intellectual (knowledge, "jeopardy", programming, playing musical instruments, arguing, ...). Humans can be very enthusiastic for sports and game-like competition. This could be a way to avoid many sorts of degenerations if there is no work.
 
If anyone is an amazon.com prime member, there's a series on there called "Humans". It's about what might happen if robots did take on human jobs. The humans in the creators' imagination don't much like it. Things get worse when they're actually programmed to have human "consciousness", including "free will", and "feelings".

It's quite well done, I think. It was originally on AMC. I don't know where else it might be available.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humans_(TV_series)

In looking for the trailer on youtube I found the full episodes are available on there. I think they're worth looking at...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FJQpK6EVTk
 
Coming back to the main question of the thread: what would people do if robots much of their work?
They could do more sports, not only physical but also mental sports. Basically all abilities that have been required so far on the job market could be exercised as a competitive game, with fun and without fear.
I think it partially already happened: the life-threatening hunting and gathering has been replaced by olympic games, soccer, bull-fighting and many other, depending on tribe and culture. Probably even the arts of war has been replaced by these traditional sports, including chess, go and alike. Today, there are competition challenges in war-like computer games (some people are still skeptic) and paintball. Obviously, future sport challenges should become more intellectual (knowledge, "jeopardy", programming, playing musical instruments, arguing, ...). Humans can be very enthusiastic for sports and game-like competition. This could be a way to avoid many sorts of degenerations if there is no work.
That's right, we already substituted many hunter gatherer or farmer's activities with modern facsimiles. Sports are the best platform to substitute tribal battles to intercity or international games, soccer being the best example. Battlefield duel are substituted by boxing or ultimate fighting. War of many kinds and shooting and killing with computer games sims.
Anyway without going to work, we would do exactly the same stuff we do now, jut more of it. Putting things in perspective, usually working time is about 40 hours a week, compared to total 152 hours in a week. We sleep more than work for money. :)

1. We will stay longer in schools, till age of 30 or even 40. There is more and more knowledge being discovered and created with every year to learn. Though I'm not sure how many years of schooling will be mandatory, because knowledge will not be needed to get a job anymore. Many people will learn and attend classes for life to keep up with knowledge or to kill boredom, or just to be around other people.
2. People will still work but not from financial need. All the creative hobbies like sculpting, painting or music will be done by people. Some wannabe engineers will print 3D things for others to enjoy. Designer and architects will still design homes and furniture. There will be many volunteering jobs. All of it, because people will want to do something and not because they have to do something.
3. People will enjoy more light physical activities, trips, holidays, sports, games, social functions, etc.
4. Things like vacation and retirement will lose their true meaning.
5. People will be very mobile changing places to live. A year in Paris, two in New York, few months in a house in deep Canadian forest to escape all the busy life, etc.
 
In a Robot dominated world, I think that the few who will be able to control command the Robots will be the Masters of the game. The others could be in big trouble, their life could be very dependant to these new Rulers. Just a guess.
 
In a Robot dominated world, I think that the few who will be able to control command the Robots will be the Masters of the game. The others could be in big trouble, their life could be very dependant to these new Rulers. Just a guess.
We could draw the parallel with today's world saying, that who controls military controls the country. It is very true in poorer countries where generales rule all population, but not much in the West where political bodies rule military, like a political party who won election. In proper democracies army serves people not vice versa. Same will be with robots. Make sure a country is well run and all be fine.
 
In a Robot dominated world, I think that the few who will be able to control command the Robots will be the Masters of the game.

And this gives us a hint of future robot development. Although there will be also byproducts for the civil consumer markets.
 
And this gives us a hint of future robot development. Although there will be also byproducts for the civil consumer markets.
Why would you use robots as soldiers to attack other country, if all these robots could produce anything you dreamed of? There will be no longer a reason for a war. No reason to attack to bring home spoils of war or enslave other society to work for you.
 
Why would you use robots as soldiers to attack other country, if all these robots could produce anything you dreamed of? There will be no longer a reason for a war. No reason to attack to bring home spoils of war or enslave other society to work for you.

As we explained above, productivity from robots will not improve the situation. It will rather drastically worsen it in multiple ways such that (uncontrolled) destruction of overproduction becomes inevitable. Also the masses of unnecessary people need to be controlled (with the help of robots + high tech) because they will not stay calm (look at France). You are right only if measures like UBI (1) and work time reduction (2) are introduced.
 
That's right, we already substituted many hunter gatherer or farmer's activities with modern facsimiles. Sports are the best platform to substitute tribal battles to intercity or international games, soccer being the best example. Battlefield duel are substituted by boxing or ultimate fighting. War of many kinds and shooting and killing with computer games sims.
Anyway without going to work, we would do exactly the same stuff we do now, jut more of it. Putting things in perspective, usually working time is about 40 hours a week, compared to total 152 hours in a week. We sleep more than work for money. :)

1. We will stay longer in schools, till age of 30 or even 40. There is more and more knowledge being discovered and created with every year to learn. Though I'm not sure how many years of schooling will be mandatory, because knowledge will not be needed to get a job anymore. Many people will learn and attend classes for life to keep up with knowledge or to kill boredom, or just to be around other people.
2. People will still work but not from financial need. All the creative hobbies like sculpting, painting or music will be done by people. Some wannabe engineers will print 3D things for others to enjoy. Designer and architects will still design homes and furniture. There will be many volunteering jobs. All of it, because people will want to do something and not because they have to do something.
3. People will enjoy more light physical activities, trips, holidays, sports, games, social functions, etc.
4. Things like vacation and retirement will lose their true meaning.
5. People will be very mobile changing places to live. A year in Paris, two in New York, few months in a house in deep Canadian forest to escape all the busy life, etc.

Right, it looks like humans would be not less active. Their activities would be of higher quality instead (voluntarily, optional, no fear, no pressure, more flexible, ...). But again, these excess human activities must remain unproductive, else we get into economic trouble (I know how crazy that sounds). But would these activities be also useless? I now think that such activities would be useful on a new meta level, because they build up skills for doing complex work. For instance if robots fail or riot, humans remain capable to go back to work if necessary in order to solve problems caused by robots. Looks good, because humans would not become totally dependent and incompetent.

Could we say that real work gets replaced by potential work? Or actual work gets replaced by improving skills for actual work? Perhaps not completely, but mostly.

I see some problems with voluntary productive work like printing 3D things for others for free. This is clearly excess productivity which requires compensation of some form, for instance by further reduced work time overall.
 
As we explained above, productivity from robots will not improve the situation. It will rather drastically worsen it in multiple ways such that (uncontrolled) destruction of overproduction becomes inevitable
.Who would overproduce if people place purchase orders and robot produce exactly that amount?

Also the masses of unnecessary people need to be controlled (with the help of robots + high tech) because they will not stay calm (look at France).
Lol, these protests are organized by unions and workers. They won't exist in the future!

You are right only if measures like UBI (1) and work time reduction (2) are introduced.
I thought we were talking about post-work-job times, when people don't need to work or they don't work for money anymore.
 
.Who would overproduce if people place purchase orders and robot produce exactly that amount?

Lol, these protests are organized by unions and workers. They won't exist in the future!

I thought we were talking about post-work-job times, when people don't need to work or they don't work for money anymore.

I thought we were talking not only about the post-work-job times, but also about the near future with intermediate stages.
You are talking now about a much later future where all economy is gone and unnecessary. This later future that you describe is far from certain. Voyager's comment shows an alternative future.
 
Right, it looks like humans would be not less active. Their activities would be of higher quality instead (voluntarily, optional, no fear, no pressure, more flexible, ...). But again, these excess human activities must remain unproductive, else we get into economic trouble (I know how crazy that sounds). But would these activities be also useless?
you can always argument that all activity is good. If you do gardening around the house for few hours a day, you can claim food production and beautifying your house, plus dose of physical activity. If you love cooking, you could invite your neighbors for home cooked meals. If you love sports, you can claim exercise and health improvement. If you watch TV, you can claim education in social skills and general knowledge. All good. :), of course in moderation.

I now think that such activities would be useful on a new meta level, because they build up skills for doing complex work. For instance if robots fail or riot, humans remain capable to go back to work if necessary in order to solve problems caused by robots. Looks good, because humans would not become totally dependent and incompetent.
I think it is an overkill, like preparing for life without electricity. 150 years of electricity and the blackout didn't happen for longer than few hours at a time. We might as well teach our kids how to make stone tools in case our civilization collapses.

Could we say that real work gets replaced by potential work? Or actual work gets replaced by improving skills for actual work? Perhaps not completely, but mostly.
You could do actual production job, like growing your food, or fixing your tools, but don't expect any money for it.

I see some problems with voluntary productive work like printing 3D things for others for free. This is clearly excess productivity which requires compensation of some form, for instance by further reduced work time overall.
Think of it as a retirement. Do retired people sit all day doing nothing? Well, some of them really do, but most is active all day long. They don't make money anymore, they receive money from government every month, regardless if they are active or not, productive or not, lazy or not.
 

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