Of course industrial robots have always existed, but technology is much better now, and we have AI to power them now. These aren’t your grandpappy’s robots.

The combination of automation and AI is going to lead to the elimination of entire human powered industries. The technology currently exists to automate EVERY fast food outlet in the country, and every one of those companies already has a system ready to roll out. The only reason they haven’t is because nobody wants to deal with the backlash when it happens. But once it does, the rest are going to follow, quickly. A lot of these jobs are first jobs, second household incomes, retirement supplements, etc. The loss of those jobs will be felt deeply.

How many people are supplementing their income with driving a ride share? How many older workers are doing that after losing their jobs? Both Uber and Lyft make it very clear on their website that they intend to replace their ENTIRE fleets with autonomous vehicles, which are nothing more than AI powered robots. These are people who aren’t on the unemployment rolls because they have managed to scrape together driving to work. Without this, they go right back to being on the unemployment rolls.

I just saw a report on autonomous trucks, predicting 170,000 on the roads with a few years. That’s 170,000 lost truck driving jobs. What are those professional drivers going to pivot to?

AI/ Automation won’t replace every job, but we will eventually have to live with a permanent unemployment rate over 50%, and if they could figure out to replace EVERY job, they would, enthusiastically.

The overall problem with humanity is that we think we’re as smart as humans can be, so we are at the pinnacle of human achievement.

I just saw a video about the first synthesizer. It was built in 1897, and it took up the basement of a building the size of an entire city block. They had the technology to do it, but not to do it well. But they didn’t see it that way. To them, it was the pinnacle of technology. But 75 years later, and we can put that same instrument in a suitcase.

Data Centers may be something that will be useful in the future, but our tech isn’t good enough yet. Right now it takes an enormous building, and mind-boggling amounts of resources, and does incredible damage to the environment, as well as the damage to the economy and the job market.

It’s like realizing that you can talk with two tin cans and a string, and then running out and installing a giant international system of tin cans & string, instead of waiting for the tech to advance to a point where we can do it properly.

Maybe in 50 years, the tech, regulations, and policy will be caught up to the ambition, but right now, we aren’t ready for it at this level of technology.

Nobody has said that AI will replace everyone, except rhetorically. But it will replace MANY people, on an increasing basis, as each new iteration gets more powerful.

It won’t take long before we have a PERMANENT double digit unemployment rate, and the government will gaslight us all into accepting that as normal, even as it rises to the 50% or more.

100%. I paid for this space, and now you want to drop back into it, and make it difficult to use my tray table? Gimme $50.

Don’t bother me with facts, my mind’s made up!

I used to work for the largest record company in America at the time, and saw a LOT of concerts of all kinds. My favorites:

• Ella Fitzgerald with the Count Basie Orchestra: Two genuine legends, at the top of their game.

• kd lang: A private performance at a convention, and it was a PERFECT performance. It’s hard to describe what I mean, but I’ve never seen an audience react like that. A few weeks later, I saw her interviewed on 60 Minutes, and she mentioned that every now and then she does a perfect performance, and I knew she was thinking about that night.

• Debbie Harry/ Tom Tom Club: Tom Tom Club (Talking Heads without David Byrne) opened with a blistering set, and then backed up Debbie Harry, who also had her guitarist Chris Stein with her. Just an incredible show.

• Beethoven: Symphony #9: the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, conducted by Nikolaus Harnoncourt, with Thomas Hampson and Dawn Upshaw, at Carnegie Hall. Harnoncourt was one of my favorite conductors, very influential on my musical education, and seeing him conduct the greatest music ever composed was one of the most memorable musical moments of my life.

• Prince - Saw him twice, and he was unbelievable both times. Frankly, I don’t think those performances were anything special for him, I think he was just that good, all the time.

• Lindsey Buckingham - Private performance in a conference room with about 20 people. He played acoustic guitar, and sang three Fleetwood Mac songs. He sings so intensely, he turns bright red, and he looks like his head will explode. I met him after, and got a photo with him that I still have.

Wow, you pulled those out, impressive! I really mean it!

I’m a big Mark Twain fan, and all it proves is that our idols can be wrong, LOL. I’m dying on this hill.

Well, sure, I’d want to see the exact context of the use. It would be one thing if Twain was using it that way himself, it would be another if he was putting it into a character’s mouth, which would add a slight nuance.

A modern example would be the guy in Parks & Rec who used “Lit’rally” often, and with emphasis, in situations that were clearly NOT Literal. I wouldn’t assume that the writer endorses the concept.

We gotta stick together against the Vocabulary Philistines.

That’s not what I was doing. I was illustrating that this controversy about Literally is particularly IRONIC, another grammar word that is often used incorrectly.

And you didn’t understand that, so your assignment for tomorrow is a 1000 word essay on whether your misunderstanding of my post constitutes irony itself, or if it is another example of false irony, such as the Alanis Morissette song.

I used to use a lot more commas, to make my writing sound more like speaking, but it interrupts the flow of the thought. I’ve found that it’s often better to just keep on flowing, and only use commas for major clauses, or for side thoughts that are still relevant enough to not use parentheses. Also to separate thoughts so they don’t get mixed together.

When I end up with a paragraph like this, I’ll start editing our commas, and perhaps rearrange my thoughts.

That’s the dopey example that they always use - Shakespeare made up all sorts of words - except it’s clearly wrong, and you aren’t Shakespeare, dummy.

Many words have immutable definitions, and they cannot be changed, period. UP cannot never mean DOWN no matter how many stupid people use it incorrectly. A DOG isn’t a CAT, no matter how many stupid people can’t tell the difference. The sky is Blue, even if you determine that you think it’s Pink, and now Pink refers to all things Blue.

If people use an immutable word wrong, we shouldn’t change the definition, we should tell the people using it wrong that they are wrong, and to stop being stupid.

We don’t just agree to be as stupid as they are. That’s what’s wrong with the world. It’s easier to go along with the stupid people, than expect them to get smarter. Or just tell them to shut the fuck up.

Literally?

There was a time when Literally was the word we used to eliminate ambiguity. Using it to mean the opposite of its originally intended, and accepted, definition injects ambiguity, the very thing the word is supposed to prevent.

That’s literally an example of IRONY (another often wrongly used word).

“He spent the day literally watching paint dry,” explains that he was watching the paint dry, and not just using a common idiomatic expression for laziness or boredom.

We had a perfectly good word, which people with decent vocabulary used properly, and then people with bad vocabulary ruined it.

Why should those who had a decent vocabulary in the first place improve theirs, instead of the people with the poor vocabulary who ruin the accepted definitions of words improve theirs?

I agree, the bastardization of Literally is one of my vocabulary pet peeves, along with Crescendo.

Countries need to sit down and figure out how to make it work because as it stands, jobs have turned into a form of slavery by design.

Yeah, they already did that, and “slavery by design” is what they came up with.

The next time, we don’t consult our country, we force them to do what WE want.

When they come up with it on their own, and push it relentlessly despite obvious and enormous resistance from the citizens, you know they been paid off handsomely.

Disney, Iran, GW Bush, etc. Somehow MAGA manages to consistently be worse than the worst people on Earth.