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While the Oxford study paints a pretty bleak picture, I’ve yet to see a realistic analysis of the energy demands of a robot economy. While the cost of the technology is decreasing, we can only expect the cost of energy to increase over time – as high extraction costs drive up the cost of fossil fuels. Most energy analysts predict that the high cost of renewable energy will greatly reduce the number of personal vehicles in use. The notion that society can afford a bunch of robots powered by solar and wind energy – once they can no longer afford to run personal vehicles – seems pretty unrealistic to me.
Source – pcmag.com, By Evan Dashevsky
– Economists of the past century have, for the most part, rejected the notion that technological advancement destroys the need for human labor. Or, if there was to be any effect on the labor force, they’ve claimed it would only be beneficial.
Back in the 1930s, for example, the eminent economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that technological advancements would slice the work week down to 15 hours and society would be forced to contend with an overabundance of leisure time. (Heh.)
Meanwhile, the pessimists who warned of impending “technological unemployment” were dismissed as reactive Luddites. And, as it turns out, this intra-academic derision has been mostly validated by history. Time and time again, the industrial era has demonstrated that technology only evolves the workforce, it doesn’t replace it.
While many jobs have indeed been rendered obsolete over the decades (wherest thou, o’…
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The Most Revolutionary Act 
Robots are not consumers. Who will buy the products they make?
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Absolutely. Bye-bye consumer economy.
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Google humanoid robotics and a web search engine company that has been acquiring, on average, more than one company per week since 2010 and today Toyota announces to invests $1 billion in artificial intelligence in US .ttp://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/toyota-invests-dollar1-billion-in-artificial-intelligence-in-us/ar-CC1yOy?ocid=spartandhp
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Interesting link, gerry. Clearly (as Rosaliene points out) this signals the end of the consumer economy. Makes you wonder what will replace it.
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The commoditization of air water blood and health, your well being and children’s future.
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Oh joy. I can’t wait.
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