In recent years, the trend towards automation has been omnipresent: "fast" supermarket checkout, automatic teller machines on the motorways, staff cuts in stations for the benefit of machines or the Internet (in the station in my village, the traffic at been increased by 3, result, no more wicket!) etc ... etc ...
Some information that leaves you thinking:
Foxconn begins to replace its human robots with real robots
Late on his schedule, but putting his ads into action, Foxconn began equipping his robot factories to replace his workers in the simplest and most repetitive tasks. The Asian giant, which has 1,2 million employees including 400 000 dedicated to Apple products, plans to install 1 million robots in its factories within two years.
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Last year, Foxconn announced its intention to equip its factories with a million robots, to replace part of its employees in the tasks of welding, assembly, and other spraying. The announcement prompted a burst of criticism on the basis of the company's social responsibility, but on the contrary we defended the idea that it was excellent news. Indeed, history shows that even when it creates temporary unemployment, mechanization allows men (and in this case, especially women) to no longer perform excessively difficult and repetitive tasks, and improves the quality of life Workers.
There is no point in opposing robotization in the Foxconn factories if the result is that the mechanical robots are replaced by an army of human robots, who spend their day always doing the same things, in physical conditions and most importantly psychological intolerable. If robots allow painful trades to disappear, it is to be welcomed, even if it is accompanied by a temporary social crisis. Among those who mourn the loss of Foxconn workers, how many would be willing to take their place?
According to Everything Robotic, Foxconn's first 10 000 robots arrived at the Jincheng plant in China's Shanxi Province. Each of them would cost between 20 000 and 25 000 dollars each, or about 6 years of net salary (on average, a Foxconn worker is paid between 215 and 300 euros per month). But if we consider that each robot has a work rate much higher than that of a worker, that it makes no or little error and never sleeps, that it generates no payment of social contributions, ... we can imagine that the investment is profitable much faster.
However, Foxconn is going much slower than he had planned. While it had announced 300 000 robots installed by the end of the year 2012, only 30 000 will be set up this year. Either 10 times less.
Officially, and recent strike movements would have convinced him to stick to it, Foxconn's goal remains to deploy 1 000 000 robots by the end of the year 2014. This represents an investment of about 20 billion, equivalent to two or three years of profits.
http://www.numerama.com/magazine/24263-foxconn-commence-a-remplacer-ses-robots-humains-par-de-vrais-robots.html
Isolated phenomenon? Certainly not ...
Some random examples:
Pharmacies: almost a quarter of pharmacies are in financial difficulties with the development of parapharmacies of hypermarkets and net ...
A robot coupled to a software package to manage a pharmacy
Case Study: A business management software package can sometimes find a useful extension in a robotic armed arm. Illustration in a pharmacy, which must deal with the daily many and varied product references and consequent stocks.
http://www.zdnet.fr/actualites/un-robot-couple-a-un-progiciel-pour-gerer-une-pharmacie-39300121.htm
Army, the now "little mute":
Armed forces will be reduced by 2019 23.500 additional positions, plus 10.175 yet to achieve under the previous military programming law 2009-2014.
Long live the drones!
http://www.challenges.fr/economie/20131129.CHA7753/les-deputes-votent-pour-la-reduction-des-effectifs-dans-l-armee.html
Ditto for the doctors, Police (artificially inflated by the young 5ans contracts), staff of hospitals and all the sectors said tertiary.
Another example with the nourishing source of our nation: agriculture:There were almost 2 million farmers in 1970 against 650 000 nowadays!
The Raude Holstein GbR farm, located in Naumburg-Altendorf in central Germany, has doubled its quota in ten years, reaching one million liters today. When building a new building, the farmers chose to automate the feeding of their herd. Reportage at the heart of the exploitation of the Raude family.
http://www.web-agri.fr/conduite-elevage/genetique-race/article/avec-170-vl-la-ferme-raude-holstein-s-est-equipee-d-un-robot-d-alimentation-1175-92324.html
Fully robotic barn
At the invitation of equipment supplier DeLaval, Utili-Terre had the opportunity last November to visit five dairy farms in the Netherlands. These were all illustrations of the Swedish company's openings to realize [b] its large project of fully automated barns., the concept of "Smart Farming". We also captured scenes featuring other types of equipment that we present to you. Under the launch image of the video, you will have more details about the context.
I have so many examples that I can not all quote!
None, I say no domain escapes, even sex and reproduction (the decrease in human fertility is not a coincidence).
It is clear that if we project this phenomenon in time, we will soon arrive at a fully automated society.
Some say that humans are not replaceable ... is that so?
Present in science fiction, artificial intelligence could threaten science and society itself. This is the message launched on Thursday 1er May by the famous physicist Stephen Hawking, in an article published by The Independent (in English). The eminent scientist discusses the release of Transcendence in the United States, a film with Johnny Depp and Morgan Freeman that tells the rise of a computer with a conscience and able to think independently, becoming omnipotent and uncontrollable.
What if men were one day overwhelmed by the intelligence of machines? "Are we taking artificial intelligence seriously enough?" wonders Stephen Hawking. A specialist in black holes, the researcher takes the example of Google's driverless cars, Apple's digital assistant Siri or even the IBM computer that won the famous Jeopardy game.
"Succeeding in creating artificial intelligence would be the greatest event in human history. But it could also be the last," warns Stephen Hawking. "The short-term impact of artificial intelligence depends on who controls it. And, in the long term, whether it can just be controlled," writes the scientist. "We can imagine that such a technology thwarts financial markets, exceeds researchers, manipulates our leaders and develops weapons whose operation we will not be able to understand," he adds.
http://www.francetvinfo.fr/sciences/high-tech/le-physicien-stephen-hawking-met-en-garde-contre-les-risques-de-l-intelligence-articielle_592435.html
Given the huge efforts made to create an AI, it is conceivable that the human being is possibly scrapped by his own inventions in a short time!