will robots take my job?aferworn/courses/cps607/classes/class09/f… · why the shift to robots...
TRANSCRIPT
© A. Ferworn 2017
Will Robots Take My Job?
Prof. Alex Ferworn
Dept of Computer Science
Ryerson University
Technology-Human Synergy and Discord
© A. Ferworn 2017
Alex Ferworn
• Professor
– Sceptic
• Graduate Program Director
– Master of Digital Media Program
• Background
– 8 years at Bell Canada
– 14 years in the Canadian Army
• Infantry
– 2 years as an Auxiliary in the Ontario Provincial Police
• Researcher
– Director of the Network-Centric Applied Research Lab (N-
CART)
• Mostly dogs and robots
Let’s pick on robots!
© A. Ferworn 2017
Why I Pick on Robots?
• Term robot first used in “Rossumovi Univerzální Roboti” (R.U.R.)
(1920) a science fiction play by the Czech writer Karel Čapek.
– “Roboti”—compulsory laborers (slaves)
• Useful definition. Robot:
– Any artifice that
–Senses,
–Actuates,
–Exhibits Control, and
–Communicates
© A. Ferworn 2017
Is what you see in the video a robot?
• ROBOT
– Sense
– Control
– Actuate
– Communicate
© A. Ferworn 2017
• Are we being subjugated?– Subjugate: to conquer and gain the obedience of
– Observation: Things aren’t that bad
Us
ThemProblem
© A. Ferworn 2017
Technology is agnostic but how we use it falls into roughly 3 categories
The Good The Bad The Ugly
© A. Ferworn 2017
The Robots are Coming
• New technologies inevitably
– Eliminate existing jobs
– Create new types of jobs
• This has always been the case
• The existing jobs remain but humans don’t do them
– 47% of existing American jobs could be vulnerable to automation within 20
years.
• Carl Frey and Michael Osborne, “The Future of Employment…”
1851
1894
© A. Ferworn 2017
20 Year Job Trends2010 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics employment and wage data
$100-200K/yr
$50-100K/yr
$12-26K/yr
$26-50K/yr
>70%30% to 70%<30%
Other Sources: Carl Frey and Michael Osborne, “The Future of Employment…”, 2013 and Workopolis.ca
© A. Ferworn 2017
Why the shift to robots
• Machines are getting smarter
–Better algorithms (“big data”, blah, blah)
–Better computers (cheap brute force)
• Sensing and control is getting better
–Controllers: cheap, plentiful and connected
–Sensors better and with “DATA OUT” ports
• We’re expensive
© A. Ferworn 2017
Machines are Getting Smarter—Kind of
• IBM Watson
– Natural language question answering “super”
computer system
– Specifically developed to answer questions on
the quiz show Jeopardy!
• Cancer diagnostics
– Oncologists at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer
Center use Watson to provide chronic care and
cancer treatment diagnostics.
• 600,000 medical reports, 1.5 million patient
records and clinical trials, and two million
pages of text from medical journals
© A. Ferworn 2017
The Trouble with This Kind of “Intelligence”
© A. Ferworn 2017
Sensing and Control are Getting Better
• Behold Atlas!
• Behold Atlas and buddies after a night on the town?
© A. Ferworn 2017
We’re Too Expensive
© A. Ferworn 2017
What can’t robots do?
• Perception and manipulation
– Unstructured environments tend to baffle intelligent
systems.
• Creative Intelligence
– The state of computer humour (Wired Magazine 2014)
• Question: What kind of animal rides a catamaran?
• Answer: A cat.
• Question: What is the difference between leaves
and a car?
• Answer: One you brush and rake, the other you
rush and brake.
• Social Intelligence
– You judge
© A. Ferworn 2017
Network-Centric Applied Research Team (N-CART)
• Multidisciplinary research supported by
– Graduate and Undergraduate Students
– Volunteers,
– Partner and Collaborating Organizations
• Computational Public Safety (PS)
– the application of computational resources, theory and practice in support of and improvement to PS processes.
• Not a typical computer science lab
– “Dogs and Robots”
– “Best kept secret in Canada”– John Hickenlooper
» Governor - Colorado
© A. Ferworn 2017
Humanitarian Robotics
• Canine-Assisted Robot Deployment (CARD)
© A. Ferworn 2017
The Robots are Still Coming
• Take away: in 20 years time, if current trends continue, many
more jobs will be done by robots.
• Creative, imaginative, unstructured and socially intelligent jobs
need humans (for now).
• As technology changes the world, its probably best that we know
something about the technology.
© A. Ferworn 2017
Subjugation--reload
Thank you