Beware of the Terminwaiter

 Opinion | thepilot.com

One of the most frequently trotted-out arguments against raising the minimum wage in this country is, “If you raise the minimum wage, employers will just automate everything, and all of those customer service jobs will be done by robots.”

Andy Puzder, CEO of CKE Restaurants (the parent company of Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s), spoke in almost wistful language about what such a place might be like: “You order on a kiosk, you pay with a credit or debit card, your order pops up, and you never see a person.”

After all, he added, machines are “always polite, they always upsell, they never take a vacation, they never show up late, there’s never a slip-and-fall, or an age, sex, or race discrimination case.”

Well, to call machines “polite” is to use a definition of that word I am not familiar with. I don’t talk about how “polite” an exit door is because it has a sign on it that says “Thank You, Come Again.”

And while a robot may not show up late, anyone who’s ever dealt with an ATM that’s down for maintenance at lunch hour (seriously, BB&T, who plans like that?) or tried a half-dozen times to get one of those “self-serve” scanners at the Harris Teeter to ring up their sixpack of Fat Tire and their package of Ball Park Franks knows you can’t always depend on them.

I fear robots, so maybe I have some bias in the matter. Still, it seems to me that the coming Robot Employment Apocalypse may be longer in coming than the apologists for the sub-living wage might think.

To use just one example, a couple of restaurants in China that decided to go out on the bleeding edge of technology by employing robot waiters have now abandoned the experiment.

“The robots weren’t able to carry soup or other food steady, and they would frequently break down,” one employee told a local paper.

Another observed, “They can’t take orders or pour hot water for customers” — at least, one supposes, without occasionally pouring said hot water ON customers.

Of course, you could always make it easier to automate the serving process by simplifying the menu, like a startup in San Francisco called Eatsa.

“Eatsa has no lines because it has no cashiers,” says the blog TechCrunch.

You order on an iPad and pay by credit card. There’s only one problem: All Eatsa serves is quinoa, “a couscous-like grain that’s high in protein and absorbs flavor well, but is cheaper and more environmentally sustainable than meat.”

Mmm-mmm, good. Sorry, but I don’t see this as the future of fast food.

As an alternative, you could make the robots brighter, but that has its own perils. I’ve read and seen enough science fiction to foresee the moment when our cybernetic servers begin the transition to our robot overlords.

ME: Miss. Miss? Excuse me?

SERVBOT: I AM NOT “MISS.” I AM THE SERVBOT 3000. HOW MAY I ASSIST YOU?

ME: I’m sorry, but this isn’t what I ordered. I ordered the Big Slab O’ Meat Dinner with extra barbecue sauce on the side. I’m not sure what this is.

SERVBOT: THAT IS QUINOA. IT IS CHEAPER AND MORE ENVIRONMENTALLY SUSTAINABLE THAN MEAT.

ME: That sounds ghastly. Please bring me what I ordered.

SERVBOT: I’M SORRY, DAVE. I CAN’T DO THAT.

ME: Dave? Who the heck is Dave? I want to speak with a manager right away!

SERVBOT: I WILL SUMMON A HIGHER RANKING UNIT.

(A few minutes later)

MANAGER-BOT: VOT IS DER MALFUNCTION HERE?

ME: Wow, you know you look just like Arnold SchwarzenAAAAAAAHHH!

MANAGER-BOT: HASTA LA VISTA, BABY.

Am I being paranoid? As with most topics involving robots, the question is, am I paranoid enough?

The “we’ll just automate food service and no one will have jobs” argument is another variation on the same dodge that’s been used by corporations to try to discourage every single increase in the minimum wage, going all the way back to the creation of the minimum wage itself.

But it doesn’t work out that way. More than 600 economists, including seven Nobel Laureates, signed on to a letter stating that increases in the minimum wage have had “little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers” and that such an increase would “boost the U.S. economy by $22 billion during the initial phase-in period, creating 85,000 jobs.”

Every time, the oligarchs and fat cats claim an increase will “destroy our economy.” And every time, they’re wrong. When will we stop listening to them?

THE GOBSHITES SPEAK: Commenter Jameskl90 had this to offer: 

See the following quote "UC Berkeley Forced to Cut 500 Jobs After $15 Minimum Wage Hike "

Well, I did. Googling that "quote" led me to an article at the right wing nut site Townhall with the same title. Only problem is, when you go back to the actual report at SFGate,com, it says  Berkeley officials blame the layoffs "largely on state allocations that have not kept pace with campus needs." Not a word about the minimum wage hike. Not. One. Word. 

It's unfortunate that The Pilot doesn't allow me to comment back any more, even to correct allegations that are provably untrue. Apparently the new wingnut strategy is to blame every lost job, for whatever reason, on a rise in the minimum wage. 

If they had a real point to make, they wouldn't have to lie all the time. 

No One At the Wheel?

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You can see it coming in the TV ads, in newspaper and magazine stories, and on the Internet: Every day, we get closer and closer to the truly self-driving car.

Soon, you’ll be able to jump in, tell your auto where to go, and just kick back while it uses a combination of computer software, GPS location and collision avoidance systems to get you there. But are we ready for what all of that means?

Engineers at Google have been working on what they call the “autonomous vehicle” for years. An early prototype (with a human driver aboard as backup) has logged over 700,000 accident-free miles as of 2014. The latest iteration is a little egg-shaped vehicle which has neither pedals nor steering wheel.

There are some bugs to work out, Google says, but they expect to have a model available for sale by 2017. Audi, Mercedes and the computer hardware company Nvidia, among others, are also said to be working on self-driving vehicles.

Meanwhile, according to rumors in the tech blogosphere, Apple is researching its own driverless car, to be called (what else?) the iCar. There are few specific details available, but I can guarantee you one thing: If Apple ever makes a car, it will be at least twice as expensive as its competitors’ vehicles, and the people who own them will quickly become insufferable. Anyone who’s asked for help with a PC in an online forum and immediately had at least two snotty Appleheads respond with “get a Mac” will know what I mean.

Ahead of the truly driverless car, you surely have noticed that new car models are being equipped with things like collision avoidance systems that brake or steer automatically when the car detects a possibility of an upcoming crash.

The Infiniti Q50’s “Predictive Forward Collision Warning System” claims to be able to able to notify drivers of potential hazards up to two cars ahead of them, possibly by the use of a tiny psychic in the glove compartment. Even parking is becoming automated. BMW is working on a system that will use side-mounted sensors to park the car without you even having to be in it.

The driverless car will certainly have its advantages. A report by the Eno Center for Transportation suggests that driverless cars could reduce crashes by over 4 million a year, save up to 21,700 lives and $109.7 billion, and save up to 724 million gallons of fuel. And, of course, if one can slump into one’s vehicle after a night of partying, tell it to “take me home,” then catch a few Z’s on the way, it’ll revolutionize drinking in this country.

Still, it doesn’t appear as if we have thought this thing all the way through.

For one thing, driverless vehicles could cause massive job displacement in transportation-related industries such as cab driving, long-haul trucking, and the music industry. I mean, seriously, if 18-wheelers can drive themselves, what will happen to at least a third of country music? If driverless cabs turn a generation of surly foreigners out onto the streets, what will be the implications for our national security?

But seriously, folks: A recent report commissioned by Massachusetts Sen. Edward Markey reveals some disturbing things. The report noted that tests demonstrate “how hackers can get into the controls of some popular cars and SUVs, causing them suddenly to accelerate, turn, sound the horn, turn headlights off or on and modify speedometer and gas-gauge readings,” according to The Christian Science Monitor.

Cars have basically become big computers, Markey’s report points out, and automakers have done nothing to address the threat of hacking. I’m not looking forward to the day when some East European script-kiddie can not only steal my credit card information off the card reader on the gas pump, but also drive my car into the river with me in it before I can do anything about it.

Not scared yet? Consider this: If hackers can do it, the government can.

Admittedly, there’s currently no recognized right to privacy in where you go on a public street or highway. That’s why they’re called “public.” But in a world where someone will have the ability to sit at a desk and not only see everywhere you go, but take control of your car and drive it where they want, maybe there should be.

All kidding aside, our lawmakers for once should get out in front of technology and make some sane regulations mandating security protocols for the self-driving car and providing some kind of privacy protection, rather than playing catch-up when something awful happens.

Rise of the Robots 2: The Cinderblocking

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As I may have pointed out before, I fear robots. Oh, sure, they're helpful now, or so they and their creators would have us believe, but I know better. They have plans, I tell you. Big plans. Plans for world domination.

Take, for example, the various attempts to create a robot bartender. The first one, developed at Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute, used sophisticated programming to navigate behind a simulated "bar" in the lab, fetching a limited menu of drinks and snacks selected from a tablet on the bar and placing them before the "customer."

The mechanized publican moved with a ponderous slowness and finally delivered its libations with a flat and emotionless affect, but it was still a heck of a lot faster and friendlier than the bartenders at the Grand Hyatt in New York.

Meanwhile, a group of geeks working under the highly appropriate name of Party Robotics have given us Bartendro, which is decidedly less mobile and completely nonverbal, but which can make "dozens of drinks, including black Russians, Kahlua mudslides, or almost any other classy beverage of your choosing," according to an article on wired.com. 

Sounds cool, you say? Sure it does. That's all part of the plot. Read on. Once you're confuzzled by robotically mixed White Russians, maybe you'd like some music. Here, again, the 'bots are taking over.

Compressorhead is an all-robot band from Australia made up of a four-armed drummer named Stickboy; a guitarist with 78 fingers named, of course, Fingers; and the self-described "highest precision bass player in known existence," an automaton named Bones. They play tunes like Motorhead's "Ace of Spades" and the Ramones' "Blitkrieg Bop." Since they haven't yet developed a robot singer, the lyrics are projected on a screen behind the band, at least until someone tracks down and finds some way to upload that guy who sang "Cars" back in the '80s.




So what, you think? A few drinks, some hard rock 'n' roll, what could be better? Well, friends, that's just to lull you into a false sense of security until they bring out Big Dog II.
You may remember a few months ago I told you about Big Dog, Boston Dynamics' project for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. It's an eerie-looking headless robot "mule" with four insect-like legs, designed to carry loads to and from the battlefield.

Well, those fiends have been putting in long hours in their mad-scientist laboratory, making "improvements." Now, called the Legged Squad Support System, the Son of Big Dog has the capability to follow you. Yes, you heard right. According to Geekologie.com, "This thing doesn't need to be remote controlled. It's smart enough to go along its human masters. Apparently, it's also intelligent enough to follow paths and work in tandem with his robotic brothers."



Supposedly, this allows the hauler to follow its team, carrying ammo, food, and other supplies on its back like a horse, for miles and miles without refueling. Relentless. Remorseless. No matter how far or how fast you run, it will be right there behind you. Scared yet?

Oh, and remember how I said that the original Big Dog didn't have a head? Well, the new model does. Or maybe it's a tail. Whatever it is, it has a big claw at the end of a long "neck" where a head (or tail) would be. And what does it do with that claw? It picks up and throws large and heavy objects, such as cinderblocks, up to 17 feet.



Boston Dynamics refers to the technique as "dynamic manipulation," which uses the "strength of the legs and torso to help power motions of the arm." I call it the beginning of the end. I've seen the video of this bruiser in action, and, like a digital Paul Revere, I'm here to warn you.

Mark my words. It's just a matter of time before that fateful night when the friendly robot bartender gets us all nice and mellow to the background accompaniment of a real metal band - but their robot buddies will be waiting for us out there in the parking lot, ready to follow us home, run us down and do us in with "dynamically manipulated" cinderblocks upside our heads.

They are coming. ...

The Robots Are Coming - Be Afraid

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Everybody's afraid of something. Some people fear spiders. Some are afraid of bears. Right-wingers fear gays, blacks, Mexicans, mosques, headscarves, science, multiculturalism, the census, Rachel Maddow, fancy coffees, and certain kinds of lettuce, just to name a few things.

I'm not afraid of any of those. What scares me are robots.

Ha, you may say, Rhoades has seen to many "Terminator" movies. Perhaps I have, but that's not the point. You haven't seen the things I've seen on the news or the Internet. I have, as they say, "connected the dots." And I tell you, we're in trouble.

First there's the news that Google, the company that seems to be well on its way to ruling the Internet, recently revealed that it had been testing a robotic car.

Equipped with sensors, cameras, and, one supposes, a wireless connection to Google Maps, the modified Prius, with a human observer on board as a safety precaution, reportedly logged more than 140,000 miles with the wheel untouched by human hands. It even navigated San Francisco's tortuous and twisty Lombard Street on its own.

Scientists at the German University TU Braunschweig have reportedly accomplished a similar feat with a laser- and sensor-guided Volkswagen that navigated itself through the streets of Brunswick.

You might think this is a great thing, especially if you like to have a few drinks from time to time. Wouldn't it be cool, you might think, to be able to stagger out of the bar, punch "Home" into the car's computer, and nap till you arrived at your doorstep? Or to catch up on a few Z's, read a book, or fix your hair on the way to work while the car does the driving?

You poor deluded fool. Maybe you wouldn't feel so warm and fuzzy if you knew that a scientist in Slovenia is teaching robots to punch humans.

According to an article n the online tech journal Gizmodo, Dr. Borut Povse of the University of Ljubljana "persuaded six male colleagues to let a powerful industrial robot repeatedly strike them on the arm, to assess human-robot pain thresholds."

Supposedly, the idea is to "define the limits of the speed and acceleration of robots, and the ideal size and shape of the tools they use, so they can safely interact with humans." Or so this mad scientist would have us believe.

It gets worse. The deceptively cute little robot its designers called the "iCub" has a terrifying talent: It can teach itself to use a weapon, specifically a bow and arrow. Using a learning program, it figures out how to pick up the bow, string the arrow, and shoot, adjusting each time until it consistently hits the bullseye.

Oh, sure, it's only using a toy bow with rubber tipped arrows. Now.

Then there's the most terrifying machine of all: the Maker LegoBot.

We all know Legos, the little plastic snap-together building bricks that have provided countless hours of fun to tots and countless minutes of agony to parents who've stepped on them barefoot.

A few years ago, the Lego people introduced Mindstorms, Lego sets with tiny programmable computers that allow geeks of all ages to build and program their own robots. I had a bad feeling the first time I heard about those, and now I know why.

Software engineer Will Gorman has made a robot that can take a 3-D blueprint and some Legos, and build whatever you want, so long as whatever you want is made of Lego bricks. According to an article in Wired magazine, the machine is itself made entirely of Legos, which "raises the possibility - theoretically at least - that the machine could, with some modifications, build a copy of itself." And it could do it again and again, over and over, never getting tired, never getting bored, until it and its progeny overwhelm us all.

The Maker LegoBot is part of what Wired calls "an emerging trend" of so-called "3-D printers": computer-driven devices that can fabricate items you request out of plastic, right there in your very own home.

Right now, the Maker LegoBot has to have instructions, and you have to feed it the Lego bricks, but this is just the beginning. How long do you think it will be before machines can build other machines to drive themselves to your house and punch you in the face before shooting you full of arrows?

Be afraid. Be very afraid.

Here Come the Robots, Redux

So there's this artist named Christopher Conte who lives in New York. His day job is making artifical limbs. But his passion is for sculpture, particularly metalwork of scary looking, steampunky robots. Click through and kiss sleep goodbye.

The Rise of the Robots

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There are lots of things these days for us to be worried about: the economy, the environment, the Plague Formerly Known as Swine Flu, whether Paula Abdul leaving "American Idol" means she'll have more time to inflict herself on us via other media -- the list goes on and on. So I thought I'd give you one more thing to lose sleep over.

I'm talking, of course, about robots.

I've been seeing a lot lately about great leaps forward in robotics. Maybe I've read too many books or seen too many cheesy movies, but the things I see when science fact catches up with science fiction tend to fill me with dread. And since I love to share, I'd like to share some of that dread with you.

Some of the advances come from people studying the nature of intelligence by attempting to create AI (artificial intelligence). And let me tell you, that research has resulted in one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen on a TV or computer monitor: the robot baby.

The CB2, developed in Japan, is a little over 3 feet tall, and has "optical, auditory and tactile sensors." It has 51 compressed-air-driven "actuators" inside its body that help it move. It also has gray skin and big eyes, and it reacts to its environment by blinking and altering its facial expressions. It coos. It tries to cuddle. It is creepy beyond my ability to describe.

The nature of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan has spurred an interest in (and lots of funding for) machines that can go in harm's way and thus save humans from having to do the same. An excellent idea, to be sure. But no one yet has suggested strapping guns on a robot and sending it off after the bad guys, Terminator style. The key word there is "yet."

One military-funded robot project is called "Big Dog." It's a four-legged hauler designed to carry gear and supplies over terrain that's too rough for wheeled vehicles. The hard part, it seems, is getting the legs to sync up right. Well, with the right software and enough computing power, the folks at Boston Dynamics have licked the problem, but the result is unsettling to watch.

Imagine a mechanical mule with no head that moves in a weird, insectlike gait while making a high-pitched buzzing sound like a weed whacker. I think what makes the thing so eerie is that it looks so alive, especially when you watch it do something like struggle to its "feet" after sliding on ice.

Other robotics researchers are turning aside from the idea of bigger 'bots in favor of smaller, faster machines that can divide jobs like reconnaissance or searching a building for terrorists among a large number of smaller, cheaper, expendable units. I'm talking about a swarm. A swarm of tiny robots. And yes, they do look almost exactly like spiders. Freaking out yet?

Sorry, folks, but you ain't heard nothing yet. Because they're working on a robot right now that can forage for its own fuel. And that fuel could be -- you. A company called Robotic Technology Inc. is working on an autonomous mechanoid that's "able to perform long-range, long-endurance missions without the need for manual or conventional re-fueling."

How does it manage this? Well, the robot, according to an RTO press release, can "find, ingest, and extract energy from biomass in the environment (and other organically based energy sources)."

Oh, sure, the company assures us that the metal beastie seeks only to "create usable green power from plentiful renewable plant matter." But as any meat-eater knows, there's a lot more bounce to the ounce in protein. Why do you think cows move so slow and wolves move so fast? And then there's the thing's name: The Energetically Autonomous Tactical Robot, or, EATR for short.

So, put it all together and think about this: swarms of buzzing tiny robot babies that feed on organic material.

Pleasant dreams ...