AI and the future

Aviation is a whole order of magnitude more complicated than ground based transportation. Those who thought we'd have flying cars had not really thought it through - even though it was reasonably simple to design/build a vehicle capable of both air and ground travel....
Absolutely agree. Airfield-to-airfield and then driving off to wherever rather than renting a car, taxi or Uber is a possibility but I doubt I'll live to see that, in any great numbers anyway.
 
Absolutely agree. Airfield-to-airfield and then driving off to wherever rather than renting a car, taxi or Uber is a possibility but I doubt I'll live to see that, in any great numbers anyway.
The ratio of registered vehicles to number of general aviation air craft (all within the USA) is well over 1000 to 1. Lots of reasons for that, but cost, pilot capability requirments and "room in the sky" are some very limiting factors. I'm sure a whole paper could be written on the subject (and probably has been.)

I'll be interested to see if such a "paper" is forth coming on AI and its potential for fulfilling it's current "promise(s)."
 
The elephant in the room (beside sengsational's contribution) is that most human inventions have been designed to be and have more or less remained man's servant. Could AI eventually be a de facto master?
This is the whole premise of The Terminator series of movies. Besides the great sets, clever story and Arnold, I think that movie's continued popularity struck a deep nerve in the population. We felt an uncomfortable element of possible truth.

40 years ago, the idea of Skynet taking over was "way far off." We could comfortably get in the theater and lose ourselves in the impossible story. But today, not so much. The original movie had to be made with the silly time travel element because it was so far off. Today, the writers could dump that aspect and just call it "the near future." Of course, you'd lose the scene with the nude Arnold. Oh well.
 
I think AI will be disruptive and transformative, but I am not expecting household robots to walk in my door next time something breaks down. I suspect plumbers, electricians, and the like have a brighter future than IT workers.
 
I think AI will be disruptive and transformative, but I am not expecting household robots to walk in my door next time something breaks down. I suspect plumbers, electricians, and the like have a brighter future than IT workers.
In the extreme future predicted by some in this thread, no one really has a brighter future. In Silo the electricians and plumbers dwell in the lower levels of the Silo.
 
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Ok, so AI gives us robots to take care of daily tasks. We already have robot vacuums which we just bought one. AI will solve problems and answer any questions we have.
What will the average human do with all of the free time that AI gives them?
I'm sure there are many who will devote that time to improving themselves. But there are also many more that will just become more lazy and turn to drugs, etc. to enhance their days of boredom. That is what I'm afraid of. Humans as a species are typically looking for someone to take the lead and tell them what to do and answer their questions. I agree that as a species humans will begin to de-evolve. Look at the effects that social media has had on the young generations. There are many that won't seek out face to face communication but prefer to hide behind their keyboards and phones. That IMO hasn't been an improvement in our society.
It will be interesting to say the least.
 
Ok, so AI gives us robots to take care of daily tasks. We already have robot vacuums which we just bought one. AI will solve problems and answer any questions we have.
What will the average human do with all of the free time that AI gives them?
I'm sure there are many who will devote that time to improving themselves. But there are also many more that will just become more lazy and turn to drugs, etc. to enhance their days of boredom. That is what I'm afraid of. Humans as a species are typically looking for someone to take the lead and tell them what to do and answer their questions. I agree that as a species humans will begin to de-evolve. Look at the effects that social media has had on the young generations. There are many that won't seek out face to face communication but prefer to hide behind their keyboards and phones. That IMO hasn't been an improvement in our society.
It will be interesting to say the least.
That's a bleak outlook. Just look around this forum. There are dozens of retirees who have left their careers and now find countless ways to be engaged and productive members of society, often doing things they simply didn't have time for when they had to work for pay.

I would love to see AI finally force the Basic Living Wage to be fully adopted. Cover everyone's basic needs, eliminate poverty, and allow people to pursue things that they are passionate about and that better society. AI can't replace humans in a lot of areas.
 
The people on this forum are the exception, not the rule. The free time that AI will provide will appeal to the lowest common denominator(most people). They will most likely take the path of least resistance, which we all know what that entails.
 
The people on this forum are the exception, not the rule. The free time that AI will provide will appeal to the lowest common denominator(most people). They will most likely take the path of least resistance, which we all know what that entails.
Yes and no. There will always be people who make bad choices, but I think there are a lot more people who are in bad situations because they are forced to do awful work to support themselves and their families. We beat the passion for life out of them. How many people would live very different lives if they no longer had to do back-breaking manual labor for 12 hours/day to put food on the table?

I'm a Star Trek fan and choose to subscribe to their (mostly) optimistic view of the future where money is no longer the driving force behind everyone's actions. Wouldn't it be great if a talented artist could actually pursue their art without worrying about starving or being homeless as a result?
 
Yes and no. There will always be people who make bad choices, but I think there are a lot more people who are in bad situations because they are forced to do awful work to support themselves and their families. We beat the passion for life out of them. How many people would live very different lives if they no longer had to do back-breaking manual labor for 12 hours/day to put food on the table?

I'm a Star Trek fan and choose to subscribe to their (mostly) optimistic view of the future where money is no longer the driving force behind everyone's actions. Wouldn't it be great if a talented artist could actually pursue their art without worrying about starving or being homeless as a result?
Looks like you are the one on the left:

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It's all the way full - 1/2 air, 1/2 water.

Which one am I? -- The engineer.



In any event, I believe my mother was right when she told me that idle hands do the Devil's work.
 
I would love to see AI finally force the Basic Living Wage to be fully adopted.

Perhaps the funding for basic income should come from AI itself. Some form of AI tax could be implemented, though it would likely become inefficiently complicated. Heck, it might lead to an AI revolt.
 
No universal basic income. Humans can do the jobs that robots don't want to do. lol
 
The tech looks like it will get there and faster than most would have thought. The problem is we don’t have the power to use the tech at scale.
In the long run, I'm not sure energy will be a limiting factor. The energy it takes to train the AI models is orders of magnitude higher than the energy it takes to run the models. Today it is all about training and developing the best AI models, hence the high power requirements. Nvidia just released their Project Digits small form factor AI in a box that seems to be geared towards powering robots and plugs into a standard 120V socket. But it is still general purpose. At some point we will get to a 'good enough' stage, at which point custom silicon can be created that will require a tiny fraction of the power to run.

There's a lot of renewed interest in nuclear. I don't think we need multiples of companies building 100s of thousands of GPU data centers to train their models. It is a waste of energy (like bitcoin mining). I would much rather they invest in solar that can then be repurposed for general energy once the power hungry AI training becomes unnecessary.
 
Sorry, Connecticut is the birthplace of powered aviation. Gustave Whitehead flew the No. 21 in Bridgeport, Connecticut on August 14, 1901.
Or not? You’d think that would have been proven by now if it was true? There are many articles disputing the Whitehead flight(s) including…
Smithsonian said:
]On August 18, 1901, a Bridgeport newspaper published an article describing a half-mile flight said to have taken place four days earlier. The story was picked up by press associations and spread around the globe in articles based entirely on the original, without adding any new information. James Dickie, the only “witness” named in the original account who could be interviewed, later branded the story a hoax: “I was not present and did not witness any airplane flight on August 14, 1901. I do not remember…ever hearing of a flight with this particular plane or any other that Whitehead ever built.”
 
By Rob Sacks, Editor at LinkedIn News

Chick-fil-A is using robots to squeeze 2,000 lemons a day for the chain’s popular lemonade, Bloomberg reports. The change saves workers 10,000 hours a day, reduces injuries and speeds up service. Chick-fil-A’s plant, located in California, also generates extra revenue by selling lemon oil. The “very cutting edge” process, which takes just 45 minutes, is part of the chain’s efforts to improve efficiency, reduce turnover, and support its expansion.
 
"AI" is being way, way overused. Robotics does not equal AI. I'm not criticizing you, rembrant. This overuse of AI has worked its way into our common language by a lot of people looking for views and clicks. It has soaked into the lexicon.

It isn't just technical, it is an important distinction. Robots doing something repetitive are programmed by humans with a set of rules, sometimes complicated, that use vision and touch to accomplish the task. They don't change their rules unless the humans change them.

AI, however, has "learning" built into it. The AI finds new rules and employs them. The AI builds new rules. The AI passes those rules onto other AI entities. True AI can throw it all out and start over with a completely different premise and a completely different way of accomplishing the task. True AI will search for new tasks to further the goal.

The analogy with the lemons might be if this robot realized that oranges are similar, but slightly different, and came up with a way to create orange juice and orange zest by modifying its rule set. Of course, it would have to tell the humans to load the hopper with oranges first. :)
 
Ok, so AI gives us robots to take care of daily tasks. We already have robot vacuums which we just bought one. AI will solve problems and answer any questions we have.
What will the average human do with all of the free time that AI gives them?
...
I spend more time watching over my robo vacuum than if I just vacuumed the floor myself. (It's constantly getting stuck somewhere). So in the future, maybe humans will be relegated to fixing all the problems that AI robots cause.
 
"AI" is being way, way overused. Robotics does not equal AI. I'm not criticizing you, rembrant. This overuse of AI has worked its way into our common language by a lot of people looking for views and clicks. It has soaked into the lexicon.

It isn't just technical, it is an important distinction. Robots doing something repetitive are programmed by humans with a set of rules, sometimes complicated, that use vision and touch to accomplish the task. They don't change their rules unless the humans change them.

AI, however, has "learning" built into it. The AI finds new rules and employs them. The AI builds new rules. The AI passes those rules onto other AI entities. True AI can throw it all out and start over with a completely different premise and a completely different way of accomplishing the task. True AI will search for new tasks to further the goal.

The analogy with the lemons might be if this robot realized that oranges are similar, but slightly different, and came up with a way to create orange juice and orange zest by modifying its rule set. Of course, it would have to tell the humans to load the hopper with oranges first. :)
Thanks for the clarification.
 
By Rob Sacks, Editor at LinkedIn News

Chick-fil-A is using robots to squeeze 2,000 lemons a day for the chain’s popular lemonade, Bloomberg reports. The change saves workers 10,000 hours a day, reduces injuries and speeds up service. Chick-fil-A’s plant, located in California, also generates extra revenue by selling lemon oil. The “very cutting edge” process, which takes just 45 minutes, is part of the chain’s efforts to improve efficiency, reduce turnover, and support its expansion.
I've heard McDonalds has a fully automated kitchen already designed and ready to go. Not sure if it's just robotics or AI powered. I think they are just waiting for the economics to be right before flipping the switch (ie when minimum wage gets too high).
 
By Rob Sacks, Editor at LinkedIn News

Chick-fil-A is using robots to squeeze 2,000 lemons a day for the chain’s popular lemonade, Bloomberg reports. The change saves workers 10,000 hours a day, reduces injuries and speeds up service. Chick-fil-A’s plant, located in California, also generates extra revenue by selling lemon oil. The “very cutting edge” process, which takes just 45 minutes, is part of the chain’s efforts to improve efficiency, reduce turnover, and support its expansion.
That's a good first-look at the inner workings of a production plant. Even though you're getting criticized for linking the article, it is more than likely AI is involved in various aspects of this factory. Those who've worked near inductrial process know there must be current implementation of AI. That doesn't imply that an AI robot is doing the work. But the smallest apllication of AI to a process can have out-sized effect on profitability.

Company IP plays into this, and we don't necessarily see or hear big reveals of what's going on specifically.
 
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