I see a real problem facing mankind, especially those of us who live in the more advanced civilizations. In short it's the growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Robotics. And, it isn't the reason that science fiction writers love, where advanced machines try to take over the world. It's societies ever increasing use of advanced robotics to perform tasks that was once done by people.
Think about it. Do you really need a waitress at a restaurant? Not if AI advances much more than it is right now. You can certainly place your order using some kind of interface, such as a touch screen display. Your order could be prepared by an AI controlled robot and delivered to you table by an AI controlled cart. Even the clean up will be controlled by machines.
Self driving cars are already in the pipeline and will become common pretty soon. What will follow is self driving trucks and buses. How about self piloting planes? That certainly is a technical possibility.
Warehouses, already heavy in automation will become more so with the advance of AI and robotics. Pretty soon there will be no need for humans in that profession at all.
How about medicine? It is in the foreseeable future that machines controlled by advanced AI can do diagnostics and treatment better than any human doctor because of the ability to draw on vast medical data bases, and the ability to correlate all the information it can gather about your health. Machines will perform complex operations that no human can manage because of the precision of the AI controlled movement. In the not too distant future you may never actually need to see a live doctor at all to get the best medical care. Misdiagnosis will be a thing of the past. Something that happens all to often now. I know personally about that problem. You can get all your checkups and other examinations at home, along with necessary prescriptions filled and delivered to your door within one hour by machine. If you need more extensive examinations or procedures you visit a local clinic where you check in and then let a AI controlled robot perform those tasks. No waiting.
Dental care will be performed completely by AI controlled machines. Examinations and necessary corrective procedures can and will be performed without the interaction with a dentist or dental technician.
The number of humans necessary to build a car or truck, or for that matter any product that we use, has already been reduced by the reliance on automation. With advanced AI the need for people to build anything in a factory may nearly disappear all together.
To make matters worse, with advanced AI the machines will become self repairing. So the need for humans to maintain the machines will be significantly reduced.
Farming, already highly mechanized will move further into that direction so the need for humans to grow, tend to and harvest our food will be significantly reduced.
And, the list goes on.
AI controlled automation will make all the things we use cheaper, far better made with higher reliability and more available. That's the good side.
The problem is--where are all the people, put out of work by the prolific use of automation that is sure to come, go? How do they live? It seems like the trend that is beginning to become evident even today will accelerate. There will be the highly educated, highly trained people who are very well paid and live a very good life. Then there will be all the large number others who's jobs disappear due to automation.
We have faced this type of problem many times in our history and each time the system has adjusted over a fairly short time and things have improved for everybody. Maybe that will happen in the future. That is because, in the past, the new products that displaced the old and obsoleted the old skills, demanded more people to produce the increased demand for the new product. But, in the past the new product, such as the automobile replacing the horse and buggy, was still fairly labor intensive. That will not be so in the future. New products will be produced by automation and will require little usage of manual labor.
Not every thing that could automated will be. Some tasks will be more cost effective to perform manually because of the cost of a robot to perform them.
The dilemma is, that with the increased production capability to turn out products at a prodigious rate, we need consumers. But, if automation replaces workers on a large scale, then where are the consumers? That's a good question. Frankly I have no answer. Just wondering.
