Going to the robots: a shift of workforce

     People sometimes say that we are "going to the dogs" -- well, I would say that we are really "going to the robots". Robots were named in 1920 by the Czech playwright, Karel Čapek, within his hit play "R.U.R" -- or Rossums UniversalRobots. The word robota initially was used to indicate servitude or forced labor. So, in accordance with the original usage, there are quite a few humans who would qualify. Within the play, the manufactured robots were described as soulless humans -- manufactured biological creatures without access to feelings or independent thoughts.
     Current usage applies to non-living mechanisms (with in-betweens of Cyborg and Android). In the past, it has been primarily used for non-living mechanisms which retain the general shape and capabilities of living humans. It has now expanded to mechanical reproduction of actions previously only possible by humans -- "robot arms", ATMs (replace bank tellers), self-check counters (replace cashiers), "humanoid" (adjuncts to healthcare, services -- huge future potential), and so forth. Robots are classified in various ways -- methods of movement, category of use, versatility (programmed for one use, capable of multiple uses, or adaptive (AI)), and others.
     Leaving out definitions of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and potential challenges therein, there are many consequences of a shift of labor to robots. By definition, a robot capable of performing a human duty, or action, displaces the human -- the human is no longer needed for this duty. However, the robot needs to be designed, built, programmed, and maintained. One can put together formulas of sorts. (#Robots * useful lifetime) replace workers (net negative of workers). (#people needed for design, building, programming, and maintenance * time needed) required by robots (net positive of workers). Design, building, and programming takes a finite (limited -- it stops at some point) amount of time and the efforts during that time may create a large number of robots. Maintenance is ongoing but one person might take care of dozens, or even hundreds, or robots.
     The final effect is that robots replace workers but require more highly skilled people for a smaller amount of time. This means that, as robotization of society occurs, people will need more and more education and technical and focused training. And, for each specific number of robots put into the workplace, fewer people are needed for support activities. The more robots, the fewer (but more highly educated and trained) people needed.
     This type of shift of workers occurred in the "Industrial Revolution" (mid 1700s to mid 1800s). Very early robots such as automated looms displaced traditional weavers from their professions. In response, there were riots which were stopped with considerable violence. Eventually, workers learned new trades and shifted up in education to take new roles which developed.
     This same shift will be needed for the new "robotic revolution". Greater amounts of education and training for people but, since fewer people will be needed to attain the same results, fewer hours of work per person. This could conceivably iterate (the process continues with additional, more highly educated, workers displaced) until one has a similar situation as posed by Isaac Asimov in The Naked Sun, where there are plantations of robots with isolated humans having few required tasks.
     I am not ready to anticipate robot plantations as of yet. But, we may very well be entering into a period where active labor is done by fewer and fewer people with higher levels of education and training. If so, there will be a strong need of greater emphasis (and availability and affordability) on continued education, more deliberate labor policy oriented at reducing the number of work hours per worker, and methods of distributing savings and benefits across the entire labor pool.

Controlled falling: how to teach a robot to walk

     Every part of growing up is a miracle in its own way. However, if you happen to be an engineer or a computer scientist, you may find yourself looking at your child in a somewhat different way than most parents. Every act is a matter of "how did they do that?" Or, a matter of "I didn't know they couldn't do that originally".
     Learning to walk is a gradual process. The first part is a matter of figuring out just how to control those wonderful muscles on purpose. For fortunate babies, they have a working nervous system and all of the appropriate muscles are there but that doesn't mean that they pop out into the world ready to do a 100-yard dash. Think of a control room with hundreds, or thousands, of unlabelled switches -- each of which cause a muscle to respond in some way. How do we use an electrical switch box which has lots of unlabelled switches? Try them out and see what they do. (And then, perhaps, label them after we notice their effects.) For a robot, this is a bit simpler as there is a specific control register (or bit within a register) that causes a specific servo-motor to work.
     Now that the child knows what muscle connects to each impulse (and I am not going to try to pretend that I know just how this really takes effect), she (or he) has to practice. This may entail kicking dad in the face a few times and laughing or hitting brother in the nose. Strength is developed as the muscles are exercised. And a special sense (not always fully present in autistic children and others) called "proprioception" starts to be better known. Proprioception is also sometimes known as "body sense" or "kinesthetic awareness". No matter what you want to call it -- it allows us to know just where our body parts are. Is my finger extended? Is my leg bent? This is important if we want to apply the right muscle at the right time.
     For a robot, this has to be done in different ways (although, once again, I do not claim to know just how body sense works within a human). One dominant method is to keep track of relative position. This works like the cursor on a screen -- when the system is powered on, a specific point is considered "home" position and the cursor is moved relative to that position. The same can be done with any servo-mechanism between the limits of its movement. However, it must start at a known location and there cannot be any exterior limit on the movement (which would cause a need for recalibration). Other methods are possible but require more active sensors (and, thus, are more expensive).
     Two more requirements exist for easy movement. These are the ability to know how hard a muscle is pushing against something (the floor, for example) and how fast it is moving. The human nervous system makes use of tactile feedback to determine how hard the muscle is straining and the body sense to know how fast it is going. With a robot, a feedback loop using torque measurement may allow the robotic arm to hold an egg -- or to crush it. Speed is determined by the rate of change of movement -- how fast position changes versus and internal clock.
     With these four aspects -- ability to move, knowing where the parts are, knowledge of amount of force, and knowledge of speed -- coordinated movement is possible. Early programming of robots tried to imitate the specific movements of human muscles within their ranges of motion. It is possible to do it this way provided that there is complete control of the environment. Nothing in the wrong place, no unexpected alterations in the footing or the locations of other relevant objects. Consider a factory line with fully repetitious movement and behaviors (until a part sticks or parts run out or a dog runs into the factory ... or) and one can relatively easily see a robot taking over the factory job. In fact, many of the jobs taken over so far have been of this nature. 100% replacement is not possible because of the many exceptions that can take place and which requires more flexibility to handle -- but a considerable reduction in human staff is possible.
     But we were talking about walking weren't we? Could we use the same methodical programming to teach a robot to walk? Barely possible but, once again, only within a highly controlled environment.
     Imagine that child learning to walk. They stretch. They pull. They start becoming caterpillars on the carpet while they both strengthen and practice their muscles. Finally, they pull themselves up. And fall down. And go up. And fall down. Then they are able to stay standing up -- but hanging on. Then they let go. And fall down. And so on.
     This is a type of programming -- but not "linear" programming. This is not "do A, followed by B and then C". It isn't even exception-handling programming "do A, followed by B, then D if condition C else do E". This is neural programming. Sequences are attempted and then, based on results, discarded or modified or increased. A goal has been set and if enough sequences are tried then, at some point, success will be reached.
     Note that a new item has now been added -- a goal. In order to have a goal there must be a way to determine if you have reached that goal. For a child that is emulating other people who are walking. For a robot, it is necessary to have goals that can be specifically quantified -- expressed as numbers -- against precise targets. For walking that might be obtaining a certain height, directional velocity, and stability. Note that balance, for a human, is obtained by the feedback from the inner ear. Tools, such as gyroscopes, are available to both help maintain, and recognize loss of, stability. Laser positioning devices can be used to indicate height. Global Positioning System (GPS) information can be used for large-scale movement for direction and a combination of position and speed tracking can be used for shorter distance velocity calculations. I am sure that other tools also exist.
     For a child, they see others walk -- and those others encourage them (and protect and guide) -- and they go through a seemingly never-ended process of trial and error. They train parts of their brain and nervous system such that the thought "walk" indicates a complex series of changes, movements, and activities. I shudder to think of trying to program that linearly.
     A robot can learn in the same manner but they have to have ALL of the correct tools -- servo-motors, proper range of motion, torque feedback, auto-recognition, or storage (with its likelihood of losing calibration), of movement, and so forth. As long as they have a goal against they can match their efforts, they can keep trying combinations until they succeed. However, there is a "secondary" aspect of this type of learning -- to keep the "winning" processes and discard the "losing" processes. Humans do this (in some way that I cannot explain) but robots have to do it also. In many ways this is even more difficult because it is unlikely that the next attempt will be EXACTLY like the one in which they previously "won".
     As a note, other types of activities can be approached in the same manner -- trial and error measured against a goal. But the less physical the more difficult the definition of the goal.
     #robotics,#AI,#NeuralProgramming

The Interconnectivity of Things : work

    A popular topic nowadays is the Internet of Things (IoT). This talks about tangible devices that are interconnected via the Internet. I might discuss that someday. However, IoT is really a subset of the interconnectivity of Things (InOT). And that interconnectivity applies at many levels. Today, in continuation of my recent blogs on economics, I thought I would talk about how work/jobs interconnect.

    One way to examine this is to put forth a possible change to the economy -- a shift from private transportation to public transportation (to save space later, let's call this "the Shift"). How would this affect the economy and how would it affect jobs and work?

    The first thing that can be done is to list the things that are associated with private transportation.

1. Roads
2. Parking Lots (including driveways and garages)
3. Gasoline (assume have not migrated to electric cars)
4. Consumable parts (tires, windshield fluid, batteries, etc.)
5. Car distribution (including sales and transport)
6. Car manufacturing
7. Car repair
8. Car maintenance (including washing, upgrades, and so forth)
9. Car disposal

    I am certain that this is not an exhaustive list and, as we will see, each item can be broken down into many sub-items. The Shift is also not a truly radical shift as most things associated with private transportation also exist associated with public transportation. Thus, it is a shift for reduction rather than elimination and creation.

    Let's look at the first item on the list -- roads. First thing is that roads occupy space -- lots and lots of space. The Shift would not eliminate the need for roads but probably no roads would need to be more than 2 lanes (one each direction). In fact, many low usage roads could probably be a single lane with pull-over areas (similar to low-traffic roads in Europe). As a conservative estimate, let's say that, with the Shift, we could reclaim 80% of the land currently used for roads. (Skipping to item two, we can also probably reclaim 95% of the space needed for driveways and garages.) It also reduces the size needed for bridges and tunnels. What can this space be used for? Parks, farmland, recreation, pasture -- whatever space is presently used for.

    One website indicates about 18,000 square miles (about 0.6% of the land area) are used for roads in the US. That site argues that that isn't very much but I would note that there are 9 states in the US that are each less than 18,000 square miles and it would be the same square miles as Rhode Island, Delaware, Connecticut, and New Jersey combined. The Shift would reclaim about 15,000 square miles or a little more than the size of Maryland.

    Space was the first part of the first item. Roads also includes heavy construction equipment, labor (about 140,000 workers in the U.S.), concrete and asphalt manufacture and transportation, bridge and tunnel design, and so forth. Let's say that there are 200,000 jobs associated with roads and the Shift would eliminate the need for 50,000 of them. This means that 150,000 people in the US would need to find different jobs.

    And this is just the very first item associated with the Shift. Every item above involves jobs, land use, energy use, and so forth. As a conservative guess, the Shift would cause the need for a million people to find new jobs.

    So, yes -- many reasonable people would like to see the Shift, but resistance to the Shift is not just an automatic resistance to change. It is also based on the economic turmoil to families and economic infrastructure.

    Once upon a time, I suggested a tool that would make analysis of such changes as listed above much easier. In my next blog, I will go into more detail of the design of such.

    In the meantime, what effects do you see would come out of the Shift and would it be worth it?