"Will Smart Machines Take Our Jobs" by Dr. Jay Richards
Overview
Dr. Jay Richards gives the lecture “Will Smart Machines Take Our Jobs” and discusses the dystopian side and the utopian side of this idea. The dystopian side is that humans would get depressed, and it would be a negative thing if our jobs were taken over by smart machines because we would have nothing to do. On the other hand, in a utopian viewpoint, we would be happy to not have a thing to do and get to be lazy all day. The idea that these two both have in common is that smart machines, such as robots and artificial intelligence will replace us and our work values. Dr. Jay Richards ultimately doesn’t partake in a utopian or dystopian viewpoint, because he believes that we, as humans, shouldn’t constantly worry about our jobs being taken by robots, smart machines, or artificial intelligence. He believes there is always going to be things that technologies such as smart machines, artificial intelligence, and robots cannot do like humans. Furthermore, Dr. Jay Richards discusses how it is simple for a robot to do one task over and over again, but humans can do anything and everything. Robots will never be humans, and it’s as simple as that. With that being said, there are some jobs that cannot be done by robots, but there are some that can. Many necessary points are brought out by Dr. Jay Richards in his lecture and it is very interesting to think about and study.
My Opinion
I think that smart machines taking over our jobs is not a good thing overall. I kind of have a more dystopian viewpoint on this idea, because without work, we would not be able to provide for ourselves and our families, we wouldn’t have anything to do on a daily basis which might get very boring, and we may feel like part of our purpose isn’t here anymore. I understand everyone gets tired of work at some points in time, but ultimately I believe it’s what keeps people sane. Without jobs, people would have way too much time on their hands and I feel there may be a lot more crime in the world, as well as trouble. To some extent, I believe that technology can be helpful to aid us in our jobs and everyday life, but for smart machines to completely take over jobs will not end well. It is nice to have help from technology and such; for example, in newer cars, a lot of the time, there are lane-keeping systems to keep the car within the road lane, and it will beep or buzz if you get near or cross the line. I think this technology is very useful for all people, whether you are driving late, talking on the phone while driving, or whatever the situation may be. Furthermore, I believe that cruise control is a good addition to a vehicle and its driver, but it can be a bad thing too. Adaptive cruise control is where your car can detect when it needs to stop depending on how far away the car in front of it is. This could be a bad thing potentially because if the car doesn’t sense the distance just right, it could potentially cause a bad wreck. On the other hand, I don’t think that a self-driving car is a good thing. I would definitely not trust a car that could “drive itself”. I feel that’s a death trap waiting to happen. Yes, it may be nice to not have to drive and be able to sleep, relax, etc., but it may end up in a wreck anyways, so it’s not worth the potential bad things that could happen. Overall, if robots, artificial intelligence, or smart machines try to take our jobs of any people, they will not be able to provide for themselves or their families, which will lead to larger issues. I think that this kind of technology can help society but can also hurt us. There may be some jobs taken over by smart machines, but those must be very simple for them to be able to do them. Therefore, these people who would be out of jobs could just go get a job that wouldn’t be taken over by any types of these technologies. I do not think that these new potential technologies will be able to take over all of our jobs and make us essentially useless. Also, we as humans are the ones making, creating, and developing the technology to do this. We can control the development and use for the technology.
Image Source
“Smart Machines Will Become Mainstream in the Enterprise by 2021.” BetaNews, 20 Dec. 2016, betanews.com/2016/12/20/smart-machines-mainstream-enterprise-2021/