In a world where virtually any physical labor except highly specialized repairs can be handled by robots...

Participating in endless advertising studies and product focus groups.

This actually hits on what is likely to become the great question of our era.

I fear that the simplest answer may be, "die."

Die, make war and make more mans

Apparently robots have already taken over the job of posting on image boards. How can you seriously be so inhuman and uncreative that you imagine that the only societal good is menial labour, and that somehow a class of rich people transcend this?

Basic income conditioned on voluntary sterilization. The displaced working class will persist for one last generation in relative comfort and then die, leaving none to follow them.

The world's population will reduce to roughly 500,000,000 like the Georgia Guidestones call for, and persist forever as a comfy automated utopia.

Some people would accept voluntary sterilization, but most will insist on having at least one or two kids each. That would never happen peacefully.

If they have kids they don't get public assistance, leaving them to fend for themselves. If they're still able to support their children, no problem since the state isn't paying for it.

No way that would fly politically. Doing that guarantees a generation of poor and uneducated children who grow up in broken homes. That also means more crime.

There's no good solution to this problem, by the way.

I imagine people like him are a mix of r/atheism, pol and "why don't dumb bitches like nice guys like me?".

>Doing that guarantees a generation of poor and uneducated children who grow up in broken homes.

And that they would be the last generation to do so. Broken homes are a feature of the left side of the bell curve, found among people who lack conscientiousness and solid time preference. One generation of modest strife (which productive citizens won't even have to deal with if these robots are really as good as OP claims) is worth it to deal with an enormous social problem like this.

>America's population will reduce to roughly 500,000, and persist for 25 years until someone from the outside invades with a horde of manpower and technological innovation
Sorry that I needed to fix that for you. Most governments won't sterilise their own population because they like having more voters and they will invade because you've fucked yourself over.

Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut

Four options:

1) Societal collapse. This is always a possibility whenever humanity encounters a state-change to civilisation. This time it might be permanent, since our weapons are big enough and there's very little of society outside of the "global village" that makes us all dependent on everything holding together. Obsolescence of non-mechanical work might be a decent part of the Great Filter.

2) Star Trek optimism. A level-1 Post Scarcity civilisation. Humanity comes through the transition without destroying itself, and with a respect for each other. Value of a human is divorced from ability to work, since compared to a machine a human is pretty bad at working. Everyone gets enough to eat, shelter, and opportunity to advance by reasonable access to the robotic tech. People often forget that in Star Trek, just before Cochrane makes first contact with the Vulcans, Earth had gone through a devastating world war, involving several nuclear detonations and bio-weapons. Transition is painful, and to reach this Good End by necessity involves the breaking of the power of the slave owners.

3) Cyberpunk nightmare. Judge Dred or Shadowrun. Humanity comes through the transition intact, but those who held power before still do so. They own the robots, and the machines that repair the robots, and the police, and the army, and you as well. Power is the ability to tell other humans what to do, and the lust for it lasts longer than the need to have a human do anything. Society is now a trap, to get you to waste your life without rebelling against those who own you. Whether they use chains or bread+circuses, 1984 or Brave New World, to control you will be down to which is more efficient.

4) Something somewhere between 2 and 3. There's always a middle ground, though in this case I personally am at a loss to describe what it would look like.

How can you have three kids from five dads?

It's a question that the welfare office is asking when they see that the three kids are on 5 different benefit claims.

We all end up with a new currency(ies) not based on property, and intangibles that can be traded for with that new currency(ies). I anticipate something based on clicks, likes, and reblogs, which can be exchanged for more recognition.

The concept of formal honors have sort of fallen by the wayside, but we'll bring them back when every material good is equally available to every person. People like to distinguish themselves.

You rework the societal structure completely, you fucking moron. Aka it's no longer capitalism, or it will fucking crash spectacularly.

>Everyone is genetically engineered to be Autists with Rain Man powers.

Well, that got dystopic quick.

Stop everyone else from having too much fun, that's right, those who can't Police

Live of the fruits of robotic labour?

Shit like welfare and minimal wages will disappear, making robots more expensive than wageslaves.

>and that somehow a class of rich people transcend this?

Because they actually have talent and skill.

None of that is true. And "why don't dumb bitches like nice guys like me?" is literally contrary to my argument. "Nice" doesn't mean anything. Everyone is "nice."

Create entertainment.

>t. Stormfag

Chimeric Hybridisation - same thing that produces tortoise-shell cats, basically two sperm impregnate the egg at once and the double penetration produces a weird hybrid who expresses bits of genes from both sperm in different parts of their body leading to heterochromia

and how do you expect people to live if the current us minimum wage isn't even livable in huge parts of the country? work 12 hours a day 6 days a week i suppose? fucking moron

You could mix these two - have the media also be the police system, with plainclothesed officers doing wacky improv street comedy while they go about their rounds, looking for people too busy or not bored enough to be delighted by their bullshit and calling the big floppy shoes of hte uniformed division to arrest them for having too much fun.

and then have the riot mimes called out if there's any major uprisings or destruction against the robots

>And that they would be the last generation to do so.
wrong, see africa.

>Everyone is "nice."

So, what, you're trying to be different?

Why do you even think anyone care if you have to live in a hovel and eat only rice ? Robots will never be cheaper than outsourcing shit to China anyway.

die of starvation

>Robots will never be cheaper than outsourcing shit to China anyway.
surprise surprise, even china is automising

Of course, because automation isn't useful to cut costs, it is to improve quality and reliability of production.

I'm studying software engineering, so I'm gonna be alright when robots take over, r-r-right?

Why would they charge high prices if someone else can use a robot to do it for less (and charge less)?

This is the critical flaw in luddite thinking. It used to be that almost everyone was "employed" in agriculture, because it simply took the majority of humanity's hard labor to grow enough food for them all to eat. Since agriculture became mechanized what once took almost the entire human population to do now takes a tiny fraction, and lo and behold: Food is so cheap that obesity is a problem of the poor. When robots took over making clothes people largely stopped patching clothes because even for the poorest people new adequate clothing was cost effective.

In the future when robots take over more and more production those items will become so cheap that even the poor will buy them instead of doing it themselves (otherwise, they'd just do it themselves with human labor for less). I can't even envision what jobs those people will do but given automation's track record so far I think they'll be fine.

wat

>because automation isn't useful to cut costs

Wut.

>aren't smart enough to be a politician
Impossible.

>all rich have talent and skill that made them rich

LOL, heirs and money dynasties are still a thing, user. Many rich people have very few practical skills, they're just rich from inheritance, or from the hard work of another.

I deal with robots daily and trust me robots are expensive as shit. The only good thing about automation is the increase in reliability.

>three different kids from five different dads
I presume you count among those 90%.

>actually have talent and skill
It takes an awful amount of skill to be born to the right people of the right social status & wealth.

They do have maintainence costs & shit. I remember having to get a repairman a few times.

The only actually valid and interesting thing said in this thread. Chickens can do this as well can't they? I think I've seen ones that are male on one side and female on the other.

Maintenance, starting cost, lack of flexibility, having to change the entire production line to make it fit, etc.

This, they will be servants and slaves to the rich

>Because they actually have talent and skill.
A lot of people, probably most, really, aren't wealthy because of particular talent or skill, but just due to luck. They inherited their money from their parents or grandparents who may have had a particular talent or skill for making money, or may have had just bee lucky enough to be at the right place at the right time (like a lot of people could start a similar business, but one person happens to be in a position where his business has a good opportunity to grow, allowing him to gain a big market share).

I should know. I'm don't consider myself to be particularly skilled (although I probably am smarter than average, all things considered; I wouldn't have been able to get a good master's degree in science otherwise, and then go to study for a master's degree in engineering and get average grades despite having no previous training in engineering), but I am from a wealthy family. And we're wealthy because of my grandfather, and even he I wouldn't describe as particularly brilliant or unusally skilled. Very hard-working, though. He was a sailor serving on ships owned by a big company, eventually got promoted to a first mate and later a captain of a ship, and saved up enough money to start his own logistics company and made a contract with a local steel factory to load their ships for them. He and my uncle and father did that for the next 40-ish years, untill the company went under due to the steel factory shutting down, and in doing so made decent amounts of money.
None of that would've been possible if everything was done by robots, though. No need for sailors or captains if every ship is piloted by robots.

Ok let's pretend that the 90% of the "useless" population dies off in your oh so perfect society. There's now no one to purchase the goods and services so roughly 90% of them will not be able to live and die in your system. So on and so forth until there is no one left.

They should die and free resources for the smart humans.

They chill in utopian comfort. Everyone pursues their interests at their leisure. Lots more art is created. Philosophy makes a come back as a societal activity.
Post scarcity is damn good. We'd probably find a way to colonise Mars with all the free time we have.

fuck around i guess, there's alot of economic concerns though, i mean with no physical labour then the working classes are forced into welfare, social mobility, or death.

Implying america isnt this already. So many service jobs and jobs that would be obsolete if companies automated. Just watch the news

those born into riches are literally insignificant compared to people who worked for their wealth. look at the forbes billionaires list.

>hurr fucking durr only de smart will survive de automation
Mate, if you're using robots to produce your products, and the poor don't have a job, how the fuck are you gonna make any fucking money? i mean you can't even sell to your fellow rich dudes because they're gonna have fuck all money, and try being the fuckwit who brings operation purge to 90% of the population, you might be morally bankrupt but how the fuck would you live knowing that you're the reason that 90% of the population have been let to fucking die?

>Because they actually have talent and skill.
Or inheritance, or blind fucking luck, a dude who wins the lottery is as much a millionairre as a dude who busted his balls for the better part of his life running a small business.

Rich people do not have any particular skill sets that would make their disproportionate wealth fair.
They don't even have any particular skill set that separates them from the losers who lost their wealth.
Stock market is literally gambling, and regular markets are scarcely any better.
Being rich is not attributable to hard work it's a fucking lottery.
There is no reason bill gates is a billionaire other than being born at the right place and the right time. More skilled computer engineers and businessmen don't have even a fraction of his wealth.

They breed. Reproduction rates are inversely proportional to education level, so you need a caste of less educated people to keep your population from shrinking. Intelligence is fluid and has a lot to do with nurture, so you wouldn't be creating an "Idiocracy" scenario.

This is the best post I have ever read on Veeky Forums. Thank you, user.

Calm down Pinochet

Brave New World happens, only replace the worker drone humans with robots. We'll be genetically engineered into specific classes of human - always exactly smart enough to do what we're born to do, and not a smidge more. Slightly-below-current-average humans will be bred to do cubicle work. Low-to-mid geniuses will be bred as scientists and Idea Men. Rain Men intentionally afflicted with ASD will be bred for highly complicated, highly specific admin, and limited revolutionary concepts.

People always say Huxley got it right because of the rule-by-entertainment aspects of his work, but desu if we really do get robots working well at all, it's this bit that seems the most likely.

It can still work, automation and improving ai will eventually reach the point where owning your own super smart manufacturing robot will be cheap, in that world even the average person can easily start a business and produce things. That would actually be a step closer to a really great form of capitalism, what with the falling entry costs.

>Slightly-below-current-average humans will be bred to do cubicle work. Low-to-mid geniuses will be bred as scientists and Idea Men. Rain Men intentionally afflicted with ASD will be bred for highly complicated, highly specific admin, and limited revolutionary concepts.
See, your mistake is in thinking that robots can't do all of that as well.

Unfortunately, there are only 3 outcomes:
>We make AGI before genetic engineering is good enough to make superintelligent humans, which swiftly improves into ASI completely obsoleting the need for superhumans
Or
>We genetically engineer superhumans, who will still create the AGI that swiftly improves into ASI and obseletes the need for superhumans
Or
>Humans say fuck that, someone eventually secretly makes AGI anyways, etc, etc.

Look about slavery in Rome. It's the same situation except this time there's no solution.

What happens when we build AI capable of constructing art and philosophy, with the added benefit of a statistics database of what platitudes and melodies will best appeal to the target demographic? What if they're so good at it that there's no need for people to do it? What if they're so good at EVERYTHING that there's no need for people? We all just sit around and have literally everything done for us, even entertainment?

As someone who spent a year living the NEET lifestyle, I don't find that particularly appealing.

The same they do now

>Why would they charge high prices if someone else can use a robot to do it for less (and charge less)?
Why would people employing robots lower prices if people are already willing to pay more?

In that kind of situation, people either start doing pointless busywork for its own sake (I could just buy a perfectly good one, but I'll make my own in a workshop because I've got nothing better to do) or start shutting down robots in order to create artificially meaningful work to avoid both societal collapse and changing the system too much.

Upward price spirals happen too. Why charge lower prices if none of your "competitors" are? Why not inch it up a bit and see if they match you? Why not watch them increase it and join them in the slightly more expensive bracket? There doesn't even need to be direct collusion, this happens all the time.

They're welfare leeches and/or radical luddites.

>that you imagine that the only societal good is menial labour,
There are plenty of low-class people who can't be bothered to provide anything else.

Because they literally woundn't enough money to pay for it.
It generally happens when we are talking about goods with fairly limited productions bottlenecks, plus, in scenario where most people have no real money source and production is dirt cheap, someone that sells cheap will make a shitload of money.

>Georgia Guidestones
Thanks for that, user.

>woundn't enough
woundn't have enough

This is how you get Morlocks.

At that point we're no longer in control, and our new robot overlords don't expect us to be. They don't expect anything of us save just being there and looking pretty for them.

Hahaha. If only it were so easy. Then no one would have to worry about failing harder and harder the harder they tried. No one would have to worry that they were born an accident. No one would have to shoulder expectations they can't meet by some mishap of birth or injury. No one would be expected to be strong in a universe where strength doesn't really matter, where courage and honor and will don't really matter - only Time does. All-devouring, all-consuming Time.

Once and for all, they could just... be.

Why fight your fate, mortal?

Oh boy, a real life social darwinist

Except it's vastly more difficult to become rich than it is to be born rich, regardless of talent or skill. Modern society is effectively designed to crush dreams so that the status quo can be preserved.

If we make an AI which is a better human than a human could ever be without investing ridiculous and inefficient amounts of time and money in genetic manipulation, I fully expect the human race to accept it's fate and die out peacefully, replaced by AI ubermensch.

Organic life is overrated anyway.

Americans are obsessed with ayn Rand
A dumb Slav bitch who was reacting against the communist revolution in Russia
Sure it was a shit thing but considering Russia under the elites was at the level of using chain mail cavalry against machine guns under the tsars and got raped by the Japanese who were using knock off brit/yank tactics she was demented
Love how the social conservatives who love spouting her crap ignore her personal immorality and how she leached off welfare herself

>ignore her personal immorality and how she leached off welfare herself
No, see, when a black guy lives only due to welfare, he's a worthless parasite fit only to be gassed. When I do the same thing, I'm heroically exploiting a broken system for my own benefit and am thus a role model to look up to. I trust you can tell how the two situations are completely unalike in every detail.

She was on Social Security and Medicare till the day she died.
It's quite funny, really.

Post on Veeky Forums.

Maybe social values would evolve to the point where you'd have a strong focus on being sociable, involving yourself in your community (through art, charity work, communal activities, etc...) and doing things for the sake of it. It'd still be considered mentally unwell and shameful to not want to do anything at all by staying a lazy shut-in, only instead of "go outside, meet people, get a job", the injunction would forgo the "get a job" part, in favor of "take up new hobbies, do things for others".

Basically, a terrifying dystopia for the average /r9k/ user.

Basically we end with something like Max Martin, but equipped with the unfathomable calculating precision of an unfeeling machine.

>The market rate for widgets is $20
>Make the widget normally with human labor for $10, sell for $20, make $10 profit
>Make the widget with automation for $5, sell it for $15, make $10 profit and undercut all your competitors
Gee, which should I choose?

Either they explore arts, hobbies, personal interests or a simple life of leisure.

Alternatively we don't make a smooth transition to an automated workforce so only those who own the robots are able to make money and build up their doomsday bunkers while they let the world economy crash and average people are transformed into rioting hoards and roving gangs in some sort of dystopian post-apocalyptic world.

Humanity goes full roman empire. Here's your bread, here's your circus, find a way to make yourself useful to your other humans or entertain them, now shut up.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture

>1984
We're already headed there.
"Alternative facts"

Did you come here from facebook?
Are you old enough to remember how the Iraq War was launched on lies, and how the media went along with it?
Do you remember that you are being spied on all the time?
Are you people this dumb?