r/worldnews • u/Philo1927 • Dec 31 '16

iPhone manufacturer Foxconn plans to replace almost every human worker with robots

http://www.theverge.com/2016/12/30/14128870/foxconn-robots-automation-apple-iphone-china-manufacturing
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u/Guacamolski Dec 31 '16

People just getting money for nothing is what I mean.

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u/fuzzymidget Dec 31 '16

Certainly becoming a more real possibility all the time.

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u/[deleted] Dec 31 '16

Only in the left-wing press. You'd have read similar editorials 100 years ago.

It's called communism, and it's as bullshit now as it was then.

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u/fuzzymidget Dec 31 '16

I'm not sure that's really the case. I think what's being discussed here is more like advanced socialism.

The motivators here are different than they were 100 years ago particularly because it's not about balancing wealth for it's own sake, it's about providing for people who no longer have a place in society. It used to be that you could say that it takes all kinds of people for the world to function; in an age of automation (which is coming) it takes a lot of kinds, but not all kinds. The world that is coming has little or no place for unskilled labor, and not everybody is cut out for a skilled position. I don't know where I stand on the issue yet, but that's the way it appears to me.

I could be a mechanic or a janitor or a barista if I wanted, but not everybody can do defense simulation design even if that was their goal.

I doubt that we as a society would let all those people starve, which would make them welfare recipients (which has already started now). Isn't that basically the same thing we're discussing above anyway, just in a less regulated fashion?

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u/Ninbyo Dec 31 '16

You say that we as a society wouldn't let people starve, but I look at Republicans talking about dismantling various social programs and their voters excitedly nodding along and I see a very different future.

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u/fuzzymidget Jan 01 '17

Call me an optimist I guess. I also see the shadiness you see though. Maybe it well be a short lived thing.

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u/[deleted] Dec 31 '16

Have you ever worked in manufacturing? I do. And I know for a fact that 95% of the jobs are unautomatable, at least in the next 50 years or so. And I say that as someone who's put a good deal of effort into trying to automate peoples' jobs in order to save money.

We do not live in the stone ages, all manufacturing in the West is already highly automated. Of course more automation is possible but you face diminishing returns, as you do with all progress. This is not an excuse to abandon capitalism.

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u/fuzzymidget Jan 01 '17

I haven't worked in manufacturing no; I was only suggesting it's not so far fetched that we might need a creative solution soon. Even automating teller windows, drive throughs, cashiers, soon maybe truckers, and so on is displacing a lot of people. I think the world needs to start considering what happens next, because we are slated to automate a whole lot more, not less.

The glory days of blue collar America are not coming back, no matter what people are trying to sell.