Tradition and the Road to a "Brave New World"
I recently blogged about how technology and the rampant increase in tis capacity may lead to a long-term structural unemployment challenge. In many ways this is already happening. For all the gnashing of teeth regarding outsourcing and illegal immigration, the greatest long-term challenge to employment is the simple fact that machines and computers will, overtime, obviate the need for typical employment.
The recent numbers showing a decline in unemployment are positive but hide the fact that the labor pool itself has decreased. This is serious and could well be an indicator of the future of employment. Rather than the temporary result of an economic crisis, it might become a new structural feature of our entire economic landscape. I suspect a major reason for this, paradoxically, is technology advances.
When robots can act as waiters and baristas, you'll realize that even the service economy is no longer safe. Indeed, computer programs are already being using to do certain legal tasks and "Watson" an IBM supercomputer (the one that beat a whole bunch of human Jeopardy champions) is now being used by a major insurance company to facilitate plans of care for clinical patients.
Think about it, drones are now expected to be deployed in the US cities (not just killing terrorists overseas). These changes are happening at an ever rapid pace and while this is advantageous for many, it is not so good for those at the lower end of the socio-economic scale. To be blunt, those with lower educational attainment levels are simply going to be passed right on by.
With the contemporaneous breakdown of union and public sector jobs, traditional careers for blue collar workers simply won't be there in the same way to pick up the slack for the other areas where displacement will take place.
If this sounds increasingly dystopian, it is. It is not inconceivable that there will be a day where the iPhone and Droids will be a harbinger not of instant communication and accessibility, but will have been the pivot to where man as man is no longer really necessary.
Of course, these were the same arguments used by Luddites against the Industrial Revolution and, up to this point, it would seem the Industrial Revolution, despite its early pains, was an unambiguous success for helping humankind achieve unprecedented and even unimaginable standards of living. The question now, however, is- will history largely repeat itself, or are we at a fundamentally different point.
There are many reasons to be thankful for all of this achievement. It is a testament to human ingenuity and it has made our lives incomparably easier than it has been for any other generation. Yet, there is also plenty of reason for unease.
I have argued that tradition is the brake we apply so we can look both ways before we cross the street. It should not stop all movement, much less should it be reactionary and drive us backward to an imagined utopia of days gone by. Yet, it SHOULD stop us from hurtling headlong into the future with no real cognition of what consequences may be confronting us.
I think many who advocate for technology and progress for progress sake seek to dive into a black hole without appreciated how the gravity of a black hole may crush us on the way through. We must be careful and prudent.
So I submit tradition is the needed brake so we can catch our breath before fundamentally changing what it means to be human. The possibility of a Brave New World is real.
Posted by Greg R Lawson at 2/4/2012 5:38 PM 
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: technology unemployment history dystopia
Categories: uncategorized
Tags: technology unemployment history dystopia
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