Ok, that title is a bit clickbait-y, even more so considering I am not a coder but, this post is just using coding as an example. Google, Microsoft and I am sure many others are working on several different artificial intelligences and some are programmers. There are several versions of course but what some are doing is building programs using coding from other programs.
What happens is the AI runs through millions of lines of code from preexisting software to create a pool of resources. It then can build a new program that has been described by using that code. Yes, this has obvious limitations as it cannot build something new, however, that is also developing at the moment. This is an issue, isn't it?
Here is a silly diagram.
So, existing programs feed in to the AI, the AI builds a new program and then pushes it out to the users but, the users need not be tied to that particular program. It is then possible that the AI guides the user to build a tailored version for themselves. Great, now the user is not constrained by a 'one-size-fits-all' piece of software. If this is in an organisation, the AI can then aggregate the software output back into a singular form for usage.
I am sure there are many other ways to explain this but, once this AI is operational, there is no actual need for 99.9% of coders anymore as for the most part, the AI can apply hundreds of millions of lines of code that it holds at its light-speed fingertips.
How many coders can outperform it? Even though it is limited and requires new inputs, how many coders are required to create them? A handful of very good, creative human coders can feed new lines as needed. How long until they are dry and the AI outgrows them? So, coders will be out of work.
But, that is not even the biggest job killer. The AI has created programs for millions and millions of individual users and monitors how each person uses and interacts with it. It is then able to find efficiencies (and deficiencies) and commandeer, combine and lean the entire system to operate at much higher speeds, largely without people. How fast will this kind of thing happen? I am not sure but, it is something we need to prepare for as AI and automation eats into job markets.
Some people think that retraining is required but, think about that scenario above. Coders and professionals already working in professional industries. They are already highly trained and many of the jobs that will be replaced will be in these kinds of areas. If a job is systematic, a system will be able to do it.
For the most part, nearly all jobs (especially desk jobs) are highly systematic which means that they are open to being overtaken by an AI that will do it faster, cheaper and better than a human. On top of that, the errors it does make it will learn from near instantaneously and adjust accordingly without needing to be trained to do so or have a yearly development review. It will also negotiate with other AIs very fast too.
What happens to our employment when no matter the training, there is an AI that can always do it better? Would you hire a human for your business in such a competitive environment? Why go to school at all? Why have schools?
We are going to have to rethink a lot of the ways this world functions and decide whether we want a world of massive inequalities or, a world where people can flourish and discover humanness again instead of their part in the corporate machine.
The role of AI will either be the chisel that divides or the unifier that gives us the opportunity to be so much more. The funny thing is that which it is is going to come down to greed and distribution. Sound familiar?
Taraz
[ a Steemit original ]
True, AI and automation will take away tens of million jobs by next few years.... The only field that may remain safe from AI & Robots, is of "Content Creators"... So content creators, take heart. As long as you continue to use creativity, enthusiasm for what you write, and make those connections to target audience, you will always have work in this Internet world and Steemit will be the platform in future that may provide jobs to millions of Content Creators...
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Yes, I have a theory on why so many are uncreative too ;)
But, I do think that in the future places like Steemit have a chance to close some income gaps and help people explore real talents rather than corporate skillsets.
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I dunno, AI is already making art and music. What's to keep the music industry from pumping the AI music with it's marketing and not having to pay artists at all? Algorithms could even analyze my art and create art that's similar - WAY faster than I could ever paint.
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indeed so there has to be something more right?
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I've written a program to generate music in the past. These algorithms basically find patterns in music and use probability distributions to generate new patterns to mimic human-produced music. There is an inherent lack of creativity here, but it remains to be seen whether machines can compete with human artists using such a process. But human artists have the upper hand when it comes to outside the box creativity.
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Its a good concept, the death of the coder may be quite some way off though. Modularised code is quite tricky in that even the ones that are coded to the highest standards are most often inflexible and when you start combining different modules with diffferent connections and it becomes a larger whole often the unit can behave in unexpected ways.
Still, it would give testers like me just that bit more to do, so I am happy either way :O)
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Yes, I don't assume it will be next week or next year but the interesting thing might be that once it does happen, it may sweep across the board very fast. I think this is the largest risk with AI, once there, it is there.
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I completely agree there, when it happens it will be out and unstoppable!
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One thing that AI will always struggle with IMO, is innovation and creativity.
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I agree, it could have massive benefits for humanity.
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Could...
But that would require universal basic income to be in place by the time jobs are being replaced by AI and robotics on a large scale.
I'm not confident that this will happen given the corporate greed that pretty much dominates the world.
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I think the UBI is only stop-gap anyway but I think it will move pretty fast once a few countries trial it. I think it is another way to control though, I would rather not have to be one of the people who relies on it.
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so what do you suggest will be the longer term fix?
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Yeah, AI will be responsible for major layoffs in the close future (in fact it already started in some sectors, like customer support).
I never would have thought programmers would be among the targeted categories to be replaced by AI, although yes, programming languages are just simple constructs for an AI to learn. You presented of course a possibility in which AI merely works as a puzzle solver, it has a multitude of real codeworks and it assembles them together to create a nice puzzle, better than a human programmer and more customizable to fit the end user.
The problem with this evolution is it generally creates more problems which are only addressed post-factum. Never or rarely in advance. So, we will have a work force problem... Who cares? We'll see when we get there.
We, as humans, are more determined to take action on issues which are perceived as real threats now. If it's 10 years from now, nobody will move a muscle. 1 year? it will make the agenda of a boring council. Tomorrow? It will be on the headlines of all media.
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This made me laugh :)
I think many low-level programmers will be the first to go tbh, some may go into testing but with the competition of the many for much fewer jobs, the untalented will be left out.
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It is difficult so say when an AI will be capable of outdoing most programmers. It will eventually get there but it is a difficult challenge.
A world with no need to work for a living would be a paradise. It would require that everyone be entitled to the value created by AI's and not just a small group of trillionaires. Some people say that having to go to work is the only thing between most people and total deterioration. I don't believe most people would go and drink themselves to death out a lack of purpose in life. Did the leisure classes of yesteryear do that? No, they didn't. Many of the pioneers of science and philosophy of past centuries were men of means.
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I think work is something that everyone should do. Having said that, what most are doing now I wouldn't classify as work as it is mostly slavery to create the irrelevant.
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That is another way of saying roughly what I was getting at. Everyone should have the opportunity to find something meaningful to make an effort for. I'm not so pessimistic as to think that once freed from the rat race most people wouldn't be able to figure that out. It could be something as simple as helping the old lady next door or anything we currently do not have a market for.
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Fascinating, isn't it? AI is a big threat to the job market as we know it for sure, and we might have to rethink the foundation of our societies which is still very capitalistic. Soon we might not have enough jobs left to give everyone sufficient amounts of money to live off. If that happens, maybe money won't be the driving source of our society anymore. Maybe we go back 2000 years and go hunt and do agriculture again. Perhaps we go back to a more individualistic way of living, with smaller and more self-sufficient communities.
I don't know what AI will do for the future, but it's impact can be enormous. We'll see how the human race will deal with it's own creation :).
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I find it interesting and I think that the 'star trek' kind of future (minus the intergalactic battles) which is a little bit communist and has no money requires high levels of AI to come about. Best case scenario is that it creates a background support system that allows humans to 'do what they want' as in, be the best they can be. Unlikely. More interesting times though. :)
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The future is kinda tricky, we want technological advances but it will kill the work of causal men. Now the mail man is out of job because of the email... its just an example
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Yeah, it is going to affect every position and those it doesn't are going to have massive amounts of competition placed on them.
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All AI programs to this point belong to the subcategory of "narrow AI" and thus there will be certain issues that coders will be required for in order to fix as AIs are fundamentally lines of codes themselves and are very limited in their flexibility.
For such a system to work properly, the AI needs to be bug-free. Since most times this is not the case, the AI is vulnerable to producing broken and buggy problems. So some oversight is still necessary and will be necessary.
You could write an additional machine learner to uncover bugs that people can fix, but this remains a very hard problem in the space.
And as you mentioned, we'll still need coders to write new creative programs since AI mechanisms are unable to create "novel" programs even if they have the components to do so. Novel meaning a program that exists outside of its domain of programmability (as limited by its instruction set).
There also remains the problem of intentionally and semantics. AI aren't able to know what a program's purpose is while coders know this before they write a single line of code. Without knowing this intent, they could produce code that is less flexible than desired by clients of the code. Also with semantics, there could be issues with translating a clients desires into inputs the AI can easily understand.
Because of this, "good/creative" coders will be safe for a while (I would estimate 20+ years), as many coders will move from raw coding to quality assurance, idea development, and maintenance roles.
The people who are the most at risk are the non-coding non-creative types. Especially those that undertake menial tasks that require little abstract thought.
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As I commented above, I think that low-level coders will be heavily affected as they will be unable to compete in the much more competitive job market. Even tester positions will be filled by talented. The gifted generally always have a job somewhere.
Even without general intelligence, enough narrow AIs linked would achieve much of the same feats. There may still be large limitations but, look at society, we are already fairly well hamstrung by human behaviours.
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"We" have to decide? More like the owners of the AI need to decide, "we" just have to deal with whatever they choose to apply AI to. Fully conscious AI that can make it's own moral decisions I don't think is that close to being reality - but AI that can be applied by governments to create a Minority Report style reality, that I can see happening pretty quick.
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Sure, collectively you are going to run out of jobs. But that is a good thing. A world where everything is run by machines and AI is a good thing.
It means resources could be distributed equally.
And then people can pursue art to progress their wealth. I see a lot of hope in the future.
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or, one or two organisations use it to maximise themselves at the expense of others.
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