tag:theconversation.com,2011:/global/topics/luddite-23681/articlesLuddite – The Conversation2023-05-12T12:21:51Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2036532023-05-12T12:21:51Z2023-05-12T12:21:51ZWhat’s a Luddite? An expert on technology and society explains<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525491/original/file-20230510-25-btjznr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=349%2C298%2C1982%2C1453&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Some Luddites simply want to press 'pause' on the uninhibited march of technological progress.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/illustration/digital-rain-2-royalty-free-illustration/1326774318?phrase=luddites&adppopup=true">Stan Eales/iStock via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The term “Luddite” emerged in <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-the-luddites-really-fought-against-264412/">early 1800s England</a>. At the time there was a thriving textile industry that depended on manual knitting frames and a skilled workforce to create cloth and garments out of cotton and wool. But as <a href="https://www.bl.uk/georgian-britain/articles/the-industrial-revolution">the Industrial Revolution</a> gathered momentum, steam-powered mills threatened the livelihood of thousands of artisanal textile workers.</p>
<p>Faced with an industrialized future that threatened their jobs and their professional identity, a growing number of textile workers turned to direct action. Galvanized by their leader, Ned Ludd, they began to smash the machines that they saw as robbing them of their source of income.</p>
<p>It’s not clear whether <a href="https://www.history.com/news/who-were-the-luddites">Ned Ludd was a real person</a>, or simply a figment of folklore invented during a period of upheaval. But his name became synonymous with rejecting disruptive new technologies – an association that lasts to this day. </p>
<h2>Questioning doesn’t mean rejecting</h2>
<p>Contrary to popular belief, the <a href="https://theconversation.com/im-a-luddite-you-should-be-one-too-163172">original Luddites were not anti-technology</a>, nor were they <a href="https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-the-luddites-really-fought-against-264412/">technologically incompetent</a>. Rather, they were skilled adopters and users of the artisanal textile technologies of the time. Their argument was not with technology, per se, but with the ways that wealthy industrialists were robbing them of their way of life.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Engraving of a mob of men breaking into a factory." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=677&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525490/original/file-20230510-25-vvlwmh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=851&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">A wood engraving from 1844 depicts Luddites destroying power looms.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/austro-hungaria-social-history-bohemian-weaver-mutiny-news-photo/549548257?adppopup=true">Archiv Gerstenberg/Getty Images</a></span>
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<p>Today, this distinction is sometimes lost.</p>
<p>Being called a Luddite often indicates technological incompetence – as in, “I can’t figure out how to send emojis; I’m such a Luddite.” Or it describes an ignorant rejection of technology: “He’s such a Luddite for refusing to use Venmo.”</p>
<p>In December 2015, Stephen Hawking, Elon Musk and Bill Gates were jointly nominated for a <a href="https://theconversation.com/if-elon-musk-is-a-luddite-count-me-in-52630">“Luddite Award”</a>. Their sin? Raising concerns over the potential dangers of artificial intelligence. </p>
<p>The irony of three prominent scientists and entrepreneurs being labeled as Luddites underlines the disconnect between the term’s original meaning and its more modern use as an epithet for anyone who doesn’t wholeheartedly and unquestioningly embrace technological progress. </p>
<p>Yet technologists like Musk and Gates aren’t rejecting technology or innovation. Instead, they’re rejecting a worldview that all technological advances are ultimately good for society. This worldview optimistically assumes that the faster humans innovate, the better the future will be.</p>
<p>This “<a href="https://www.masterclass.com/articles/move-fast-and-break-things">move fast and break things</a>” approach toward technological innovation has come under increasing scrutiny in recent years – especially with growing awareness that <a href="https://theconversation.com/sci-fi-movies-are-the-secret-weapon-that-could-help-silicon-valley-grow-up-105714">unfettered innovation can lead to deeply harmful consequences</a> that a degree of responsibility and forethought could help avoid.</p>
<h2>Why Luddism matters</h2>
<p>In an age of <a href="https://www.wired.com/story/chatgpt-pause-ai-experiments-open-letter/">ChatGPT</a>, gene editing and other transformative technologies, perhaps we all need to channel the spirit of Ned Ludd as we grapple with how to ensure that future technologies do more good than harm.</p>
<p>In fact, “<a href="https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/kirkpatrick-sale-crow-s-nest-distribution-neo-luddites-and-lessons-from-the-luddites">Neo-Luddites</a>” or “New Luddites” is a term that emerged at the end of the 20th century.</p>
<p>In 1990, the psychologist Chellis Glendinning published an essay titled “<a href="https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/chellis-glendinning-notes-toward-a-neo-luddite-manifesto">Notes toward a Neo-Luddite Manifesto</a>.” </p>
<p>In it, she recognized the nature of the early Luddite movement and related it to a growing disconnect between societal values and technological innovation in the late 20th century. As Glendinning writes, “Like the early Luddites, we too are a desperate people seeking to protect the livelihoods, communities, and families we love, which lie on the verge of destruction.”</p>
<p>On one hand, entrepreneurs and others who advocate for a more measured approach to technology innovation lest we stumble into avoidable – and potentially catastrophic risks – are frequently labeled “Neo-Luddites.” </p>
<p>These individuals represent experts who believe in the power of technology to positively change the future, but are also aware of the societal, environmental and economic dangers of blinkered innovation.</p>
<p>Then there are the Neo-Luddites who actively reject modern technologies, fearing that they are damaging to society. New York City’s <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/15/style/teens-social-media.html">Luddite Club</a> falls into this camp. Formed by a group of tech-disillusioned Gen-Zers, the club advocates the use of flip phones, crafting, hanging out in parks and reading hardcover or paperback books. Screens are an anathema to the group, which sees them as a drain on mental health.</p>
<p>I’m not sure how many of today’s Neo-Luddites – whether they’re thoughtful technologists, technology-rejecting teens or simply people who are uneasy about technological disruption – have read Glendinning’s manifesto. And to be sure, parts of it are rather contentious. Yet there is a common thread here: the idea that technology can lead to personal and societal harm if it is not developed responsibly. </p>
<p>And maybe that approach isn’t such a bad thing.</p>
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<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Maynard does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Despite the association of ‘Luddite’ with a naïve rejection of technology, the term and its origins are far richer and more complex than you might think.Andrew Maynard, Professor of Advanced Technology Transitions, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/565372016-04-06T09:47:17Z2016-04-06T09:47:17ZAre robots taking our jobs?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/116996/original/image-20160331-28436-popfkm.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Is this a vision of the future?</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Robot worker image via shutterstock.com</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>If you put water on the stove and heat it up, it will at first just get hotter and hotter. You may then conclude that heating water results only in hotter water. But at some point everything changes – the water starts to boil, turning from hot liquid into steam. Physicists call this a “phase transition.”</p>
<p>Automation, driven by technological progress, has been increasing inexorably for the past several decades. Two schools of economic thinking have for many years been engaged in a debate about the potential effects of automation on jobs, employment and human activity: will new technology spawn mass unemployment, as the robots take jobs away from humans? Or will the jobs robots take over release or unveil – or even create – demand for new human jobs? </p>
<p>The debate has flared up again recently because of technological achievements such as <em>deep learning</em>, which recently enabled a Google software program called AlphaGo to <a href="https://theconversation.com/evolving-our-way-to-artificial-intelligence-54100">beat Go world champion</a> Lee Sedol, a task considered even harder than beating the world’s chess champions.</p>
<p>Ultimately the question boils down to this: are today’s modern technological innovations like those of the past, which made obsolete the job of buggy maker, but created the job of automobile manufacturer? Or is there something about today that is markedly different?</p>
<p>Malcolm Gladwell’s 2006 book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000OT8GD0/"><em>The Tipping Point</em></a> highlighted what he called “that magic moment when an idea, trend, or social behavior crosses a threshold, tips, and spreads like wildfire.” Can we really be confident that we are not approaching a tipping point, a phase transition – that we are not mistaking the <em>trend</em> of technology both destroying and creating jobs for a <em>law</em> that it will always continue this way?</p>
<h2>Old worries about new tech</h2>
<p>This is not a new concern. Dating back at least as far as the Luddites of early 19th-century Britain, <a href="https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/technology-unemployment-jobs-internet-by-kenneth-rogoff?barrier=true">new technologies cause fear</a> about the inevitable changes they bring.</p>
<p>It may seem easy to dismiss today’s concerns as unfounded in reality. But economists Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University and Laurence Kotlikoff of Boston University <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w18629.pdf">argue</a>, “What if machines are getting so smart, thanks to their microprocessor brains, that they no longer need unskilled labor to operate?” After all, they write:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Smart machines now collect our highway tolls, check us out at stores, take our blood pressure, massage our backs, give us directions, answer our phones, print our documents, transmit our messages, rock our babies, read our books, turn on our lights, shine our shoes, guard our homes, fly our planes, write our wills, teach our children, kill our enemies, and the list goes on.</p>
</blockquote>
<h2>Looking at the economic data</h2>
<p>There is considerable evidence that this concern may be justified. Eric Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee of MIT recently <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/12/opinion/global/jobs-productivity-and-the-great-decoupling.html">wrote</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>For several decades after World War II the economic statistics we care most about all rose together here in America as if they were tightly coupled. GDP grew, and so did productivity — our ability to get more output from each worker. At the same time, we created millions of jobs, and many of these were the kinds of jobs that allowed the average American worker, who didn’t (and still doesn’t) have a college degree, to enjoy a high and rising standard of living. But … productivity growth and employment growth started to become decoupled from each other.</p>
</blockquote>
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<span class="caption">Lots more productivity; not much more earning.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AUS_productivity_and_real_wages.jpg">U.S. Department of Labor Statistics</a></span>
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<p>As the <a href="https://hbr.org/2015/06/the-great-decoupling">decoupling data</a> show, the U.S. economy has been performing quite poorly for the bottom 90 percent of Americans for the past 40 years. Technology is driving productivity improvements, which grow the economy. But the rising tide is not lifting all boats, and most people are not seeing any benefit from this growth. While the U.S. economy is still creating jobs, it is not creating enough of them. The labor force participation rate, which measures the active portion of the labor force, has been dropping since the late 1990s.</p>
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<p>While manufacturing output is at an all-time high, manufacturing employment is <a href="https://www.aei.org/publication/october-2-is-manufacturing-day-so-lets-recognize-americas-world-class-manufacturing-sector-and-factory-workers/">today lower</a> than it was in the later 1940s. Wages for private nonsupervisory employees have <a href="http://www.advisorperspectives.com/dshort/charts/employment/Real-Wage-Production-and-Nonsupervisory.html?production-nonsupervisory-hourly-earnings-CPI-adjusted.gif">stagnated</a> since the late 1960s, and the wages-to-GDP ratio has been <a href="http://illusionofprosperity.blogspot.com/2012/09/wages-vs-gdp.html">declining since 1970</a>. Long-term unemployment is <a href="http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/07/02/bleak-outlook-for-long-term-unemployed/">trending upwards</a>, and inequality has become a global discussion topic, following the publication of Thomas Piketty’s 2014 book, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00I2WNYJW/"><em>Capital in the Twenty-First Century</em></a>.</p>
<h2>A widening danger?</h2>
<p>Most shockingly, economists Angus Deaton, winner of the 2015 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science, and Anne Case <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/03/health/death-rates-rising-for-middle-aged-white-americans-study-finds.html">found</a> that mortality for white middle-age Americans has been increasing over the past 25 years, due to an epidemic of suicides and afflictions stemming from substance abuse. </p>
<p>Is automation, driven by progress in technology, in general, and artificial intelligence and robotics, in particular, the main cause for the economic decline of working Americans? </p>
<p>In economics, it is easier to agree on the data than to agree on causality. Many other factors can be in play, such as globalization, deregulation, decline of unions and the like. Yet in a <a href="http://www.igmchicago.org/igm-economic-experts-panel/poll-results?SurveyID=SV_eKbRnXZWx3jSRBb">2014 poll of leading academic economists</a> conducted by the Chicago Initiative on Global Markets, regarding the impact of technology on employment and earnings, 43 percent of those polled agreed with the statement that “information technology and automation are a central reason why median wages have been stagnant in the U.S. over the decade, despite rising productivity,” while only 28 percent disagreed. Similarly, a <a href="https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/sdn/2015/sdn1513.pdf">2015 study</a> by the International Monetary Fund concluded that technological progress is a major factor in the increase of inequality over the past decades.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that while automation is eliminating many jobs in the economy that were once done by people, there is no sign that the introduction of technologies in recent years is creating an equal number of well-paying jobs to compensate for those losses. A 2014 Oxford <a href="https://www.fhi.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/Industrial-Renewal-in-the-21st-Century-Evidence-from-US-Cities.pdf">study</a> found that the number of U.S. workers shifting into new industries has been strikingly small: in 2010, only 0.5 percent of the labor force was employed in industries that did not exist in 2000.</p>
<p>The discussion about humans, machines and work tends to be a discussion about some undetermined point in the far future. But it is time to face reality. The future is now.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/56537/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Moshe Y. Vardi is member of the Association for Computing Machinery, the Institute for Electronic and Electrical Engineering, the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, the American Mathematical Society, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.</span></em></p>In the past, technology both destroyed and created jobs. Is that trend ending?Moshe Y. Vardi, Professor of Computer Science, Rice UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/541432016-02-12T11:10:24Z2016-02-12T11:10:24ZYes, robots will steal our jobs, but don’t worry, we’ll get new ones<p>The U.S. economy added 2.7 million jobs in 2015, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/09/business/economy/jobs-report-hiring-unemployment-december.html">capping the best two-year stretch</a> of employment growth since the late ‘90’s, pushing the unemployment rate down to five percent. </p>
<p>But to listen to the <a href="http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/careersandeducation/8-jobs-that-will-go-extinct-by-2030/ss-BBlImkg">doomsayers</a>, it’s just a matter of time before the rapid advance of technology makes most of today’s workers obsolete – with ever-smarter machines replacing teachers, drivers, travel agents, interpreters and a slew of other occupations. </p>
<p>Almost half of those currently employed in the U.S. are at risk of being put out of work by automation in the next decade or two, according to a <a href="http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/downloads/academic/The_Future_of_Employment.pdf">2013 University of Oxford study</a>, which identified transportation, logistics and administrative occupations as most vulnerable.</p>
<p>Does that mean that these formerly employed workers will have nowhere to go? Is the recent job growth a last gasp before machines take over, or can robots and workers coexist? </p>
<p>Research as well as recent history suggest that these concerns are overblown and that we are neither headed toward a rise of the machine world nor a utopia where no one works anymore. Humans will still be necessary in the economy of the future, even if we can’t predict what we will be doing. </p>
<h2>Rise of the Luddites</h2>
<p>Today’s apprehension about technology’s effect on the labor force is nothing new. </p>
<p>The anxiety began in the early 1800s when textile workers, who later became known as Luddites, destroyed machinery that reduced the need for their labor. The fact that calling someone a Luddite today is considered an insult is proof that those worries were largely unfounded. In fact, labor benefited right alongside productivity throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.</p>
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<p>Some worry that this dynamic has changed. Larry Summers, formerly the president of Harvard and director of the White House’s National Economic Council, for example, <a href="http://www.nber.org/reporter/2013number4/2013no4.pdf">recently changed his tune</a> about the unalloyed benefits of technology. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Until a few years ago, I didn’t think this was a very complicated subject; the Luddites were wrong and the believers in technology and technological progress were right. I’m not so completely certain now. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Derek Thomson, a senior editor at The Atlantic, sums up the arguments for why this time automation will replace labor permanently in an article titled <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/07/world-without-work/395294/">A World Without Work</a>. </p>
<p>First, the share of economic output that is paid to labor has been declining. Second, machines are no longer merely augmenting human work; they are rapidly encroaching on work that today is capable of being done only by humans. Finally, the hollowing out of prime-age men (25-54 years old) in the workforce indicates a more permanent end to work. </p>
<h2>Crying wolf</h2>
<p>My own look at the data suggests that just as the critics of the past were crying “wolf,” so are the pessimists of today.</p>
<p>Yes, it’s true that from 1980 to 2014, workers’ share of output fell from nearly 58 percent to just over 52 percent – evidence that Thompson believes shows that labor’s importance is in a slow decline. </p>
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<p>However, <a href="http://bea.gov/papers/pdf/laborshare1410.pdf">recent work</a> by Benjamin Bridgman, an economist at the Bureau of Economic Analysis, has demonstrated that once depreciation and production taxes are taken into account, the story for U.S. workers doesn’t seem as pessimistic. While the most recent data show that the U.S. net labor share has fallen over time, as recently as 2008, the share was the same as in 1975. </p>
<p>Because of the rapid pace of technological improvements, <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2015/03/26/thomas-piketty-says-labors-share-of-income-is-declining-but-is-it/">capital depreciates at a faster rate</a>. Companies, or owners of capital, must therefore spend a larger share of profits to repair technology or replace obsolete technology. As a result, labor’s declining share of output is directly correlated to the increasing share of output spent on technology. Since 1970, the share of our nation’s output spent on technology replacement has increased from just under 13 percent to more than 15 percent.</p>
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<p>In addition, whenever there are changes in production taxes (e.g., property, excise and sales taxes) the share of output paid to labor will decrease. As a result, while the gross labor share of income has declined, much of it can be explained by technological improvements and changes in government policy. </p>
<h2>Replace or complement?</h2>
<p>Machines are indeed replacing humans – and replicating what we thought were uniquely human skills – at a faster rate than many of us thought possible until recently. </p>
<p>For example, at the beginning of the 21st century, few people would have imagined that a computer could beat the best human in the world at Jeopardy. And yet, in 2011, IBM’s supercomputer Watson did exactly that by beating two former Jeopardy superstars, Ken Jennings and Brad Rutter. </p>
<p>But a focus on technology’s substitutionary (or replacement) role fails to appreciate how it can also be complementary. Job loss in some occupations will certainly continue, but they will be accompanied by gains in different fields, just as in the past. </p>
<p>Watson is a case in point. In 2012, a year after Watson’s Jeopardy victory, IBM formed a <a href="http://www.research.ibm.com/cognitive-computing/watson/watsonpaths.shtml#fbid=8z8YB5R7t_6">partnership</a> with the Cleveland Clinic to assist physicians and improve the speed and accuracy of medical diagnosis and treatments. In this case, Watson augments the skills of physicians, creating more demand for doctors with access to the supercomputer. </p>
<p>The biggest risk is that this will polarize the labor market as the demand for workers grows on both the high and low ends in terms of education. It’s a trend that economist David Autor <a href="https://www.aeaweb.org/articles.php?doi=10.1257/jep.29.3.3">has been documenting</a> since 1979. Highly skilled individuals in managerial, professional and technical occupations have all seen improvements, as have service jobs that require little education (in part because it’s difficult to automate the work of hairstylists or janitors). </p>
<p>While this polarization of jobs can have negative short-term effects in the middle of the distribution, it is a mistake to overstate the long-term consequences.</p>
<h2>What’s really happening to all the men</h2>
<p>Finally, it is true that since 1967, the share of men aged 25–54 without work has more than tripled, from five percent to 16 percent.</p>
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<p>But the reasons they’re not working have less to do with the rise of the machines than we’re being led to believe. According to a <a href="http://kff.org/other/poll-finding/kaiser-family-foundationnew-york-timescbs-news-non-employed-poll/">New York Times/CBS News/Kaiser Family Foundation poll</a> of Americans without jobs, 44 percent of <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/12/upshot/unemployment-the-vanishing-male-worker-how-america-fell-behind.html">men surveyed</a> said there were jobs in their area they think they could obtain but weren’t willing to take them. In addition, around a third of those surveyed (including women) indicated that a spouse, food stamps or disability benefits provided another source of income. </p>
<p>An unwillingness to relocate geographically may also help explain the decline in labor force participation. In a <a href="https://www.expresspros.com/Newsroom/America-Employed/Survey-Of-The-Unemployed-Shows-47--Say-They-Have-Completely-Given-Up-Looking-For-A-Job.aspx?&referrer=http://www.expresspros.com/Newsroom/America-Employed-News-List.aspx?PageNumber=4">2014 survey</a> of unemployed individuals, 60 percent said that they were “not at all willing” to move to another state. </p>
<p>These findings suggest that while the U.S. boasts the <a href="http://www.bls.gov/jlt/">most job openings</a> since the government began tracking them nationwide (5.6 million), many of those without work don’t want to apply for one reason or another. </p>
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<h2>It’s not man versus machine yet</h2>
<p>These figures and polls paint a very different picture of the actual problem. In addition to geography constraints along with spousal and government income supports contributing to fewer people wanting to work, we also have a skills gap. Fortunately, this is a problem that we can overcome with better education and training, rather than resigning ourselves to an irreversible decline in the share of jobs that require a human.</p>
<p>During the most recent recession, there was a decline in construction and manufacturing jobs, which typically required lower levels of education, and an increase in health care and professional service jobs, which often require advanced degrees. </p>
<p>Instead of wringing our hands and blaming technology, we should be rolling up our sleeves to ensure that people who lose their jobs to technology are being retrained. This also requires patience – recognizing that it will take time for these workers to be reemployed in higher-skilled jobs. </p>
<p>Until the number of job openings declines and remains persistently low, one should be careful about pitting man versus machine.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/54143/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Michael Jones formerly worked as the Director of Research at the University of Cincinnati Economics Center, which provides economic consulting services to a wide range of clients, including governments, nonprofits, and the private sector. He has been an Emerging Education Policy Scholar with the Thomas B. Fordham Institute and the American Enterprise Institute (AEI). He has received funding from the Mellon Foundation to organize a seminar series on the Political Economy of K-12 Education Reform. He is currently on the Board of Directors for the Association of Universities for Business and Economics Research (AUBER).</span></em></p>Some suggest half of current jobs will be lost to automation over the next decade or two. But it’s far too early to pit man versus machine.Michael Jones, Assistant Professor, Educator in Economics, University of Cincinnati Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/526302015-12-23T15:01:08Z2015-12-23T15:01:08ZIf Elon Musk is a Luddite, count me in!<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106951/original/image-20151223-27863-vzhtx9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Voicing concerns isn't the same as smashing the latest technology.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:FrameBreaking-1812.jpg">Unknown</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>On December 21, the company SpaceX made history by successfully launching a rocket <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/22/science/spacex-rocket-landing.html">and returning it to a safe landing on Earth</a>. It’s also the day that SpaceX founder Elon Musk was nominated for a <a href="https://itif.org/publications/2015/12/21/2015-itif-luddite-award-nominees-worst-year%E2%80%99s-worst-in**novation-killers">Luddite Award</a>.</p>
<p>The nomination came as part of a campaign by the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a leading science and technology policy think tank, to call out the “<a href="http://www2.itif.org/2015-itif-luddite-award.pdf">worst of the year’s worst innovation killers</a>.”</p>
<p>It’s an odd juxtaposition, to say the least.</p>
<p>The Luddite Awards – named after an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ned_Ludd">18th-century English worker</a> who inspired a backlash against the Industrial Revolution – highlight what ITIF refers to as “egregious cases of neo-Luddism in action.”</p>
<p>Musk, of course, is hardly a shrinking violet when it comes to promoting technology innovation. Whether it’s <a href="http://www2.itif.org/2015-itif-luddite-award.pdf">self-driving cars</a>, <a href="http://www.spacex.com/falcon9">reusable commercial rockets</a> or the futuristic <a href="http://www.spacex.com/hyperloop">“hyperloop,”</a> he’s not known for being a tech party pooper.</p>
<p>So what’s the deal?</p>
<p>ITIF, as it turns out, took exception to Musk’s concerns over the <a href="https://theconversation.com/elon-musk-is-right-we-need-to-talk-about-artificial-intelligence-33577">potential dangers of artificial intelligence</a> (AI) – along with those other well-known “neo-Luddites,” Stephen Hawking and Bill Gates.</p>
<p>ITIF is right to highlight the importance of technology innovation as an engine for growth and prosperity. But what it misses by a mile is the importance of innovating responsibly.</p>
<h2>Being cautious ≠ smashing the technology</h2>
<p>Back in 2002, the European Environment Agency (EEA) published its report <a href="http://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/environmental_issue_report_2001_22">Late Lessons from Early Warnings</a>. The report – and its <a href="http://www.eea.europa.eu/publications/late-lessons-2">2013 follow-on publication</a> – catalogs innovations, from PCBs to the use of asbestos, that damaged lives and environments because early warnings of possible harm were either ignored or overlooked.</p>
<p>This is a picture that is all too familiar these days as we grapple with the consequences of unfettered innovation – whether it’s climate change, environmental pollution or the health impacts of industrial chemicals.</p>
<p>Things get even more complex, though, with emerging technologies like AI, robotics and the “internet of things.” With these and other innovations, it’s increasingly unclear what future risks and benefits lie over the horizon – especially when they begin to converge together. </p>
<p>This confluence – the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” as it’s being called by some – is generating remarkable opportunities for economic growth. But it’s also raising concerns. Klaus Schwab, Founder of the World Economic Forum and an advocate of the new “revolution,” <a href="https://agenda.weforum.org/2015/12/the-fourth-industrial-revolution-what-it-means-and-how-to-respond/">writes</a> “the [fourth industrial] revolution could yield greater inequality, particularly in its potential to disrupt labor markets. As automation substitutes for labor across the entire economy, the net displacement of workers by machines might exacerbate the gap between returns to capital and returns to labor.”</p>
<p>Schwab is, by any accounting, a technology optimist. Yet he recognizes the social and economic complexities of innovation, and the need to act responsibly if we are to see a societal return on our techno-investment.</p>
<p>Of course every generation has had to grapple with the consequences of innovation. And it’s easy to argue that past inventions have led to a better present – especially if you’re privileged and well-off. Yet our generation faces unprecedented technology innovation challenges that simply cannot be brushed off by assuming business as normal.</p>
<p>For the first time in human history, for instance, we can design and engineer the stuff around us at the level of the very atoms it’s made of. We can redesign and reprogram the DNA at the core of every living organism. We can aspire to creating artificial systems that are a match for human intelligence. And we can connect ideas, people and devices together faster and with more complexity than ever before.</p>
<h2>Innovating responsibly</h2>
<p>This explosion of technological capabilities offers unparalleled opportunities for fighting disease, improving well-being and eradicating inequalities. But it’s also fraught with dangers. And like any complex system, it’s likely to look great… right up to the moment it fails.</p>
<p>Because of this, an increasing number of people and organizations are exploring how we as a society can avoid future disasters by innovating responsibly. It’s part of the reasoning behind why Arizona State University launched the new <a href="http://sfis.asu.edu">School for the Future of Innovation in Society</a> earlier this year, where I teach. And it’s the motivation behind Europe’s commitment to <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/en/h2020-section/responsible-research-innovation">Responsible Research and Innovation</a>.</p>
<p>Far from being a neo-Luddite movement, people the world over are starting to ask <em>how</em> we can proactively innovate to improve lives, and not simply innovate in the hope that things will work out OK in the end.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=600&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/106953/original/image-20151223-27854-1ffusth.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=754&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">It takes wisdom to weigh whether we should do something we have the technological capacity to do.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-310049015/stock-photo-genome-medical-research-and-genetic-technology-discoveries-with-a-group-of-doctors-or-scientists.html">DNA image via www.shutterstock.com.</a></span>
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<p>This includes some of the world’s most august scientific bodies. In December, for instance, the US National Academy of Sciences, the Chinese Academy of Sciences and the UK’s Royal Society jointly convened a <a href="http://www.nationalacademies.org/gene-editing/Gene-Edit-Summit/index.htm">global summit on human gene editing</a>. At stake was the responsible development and use of techniques that enable the human genome to be redesigned and passed on to future generations.</p>
<p>In a joint statement, the summit organizers recommended “It would be irresponsible to proceed with any clinical use of germline editing unless and until (i) the relevant safety and efficacy issues have been resolved, based on appropriate understanding and balancing of risks, potential benefits, and alternatives, and (ii) there is broad societal consensus about the appropriateness of the proposed application.”</p>
<p>Neo-Luddites? Or simply responsible scientists? I’d go for the latter.</p>
<p>If innovation is to serve society’s needs, we need to ask tough questions about what the consequences might be, and how we might do things differently to avoid mistakes. And rather than deserving the label “neo-Luddite,” Musk and others should be applauded for asking what could go wrong with technology innovation, and thinking about how to avoid it.</p>
<p>That said, if anything, they sometimes don’t go far enough. Musk’s answer to his AI fears, for instance, was to launch an <a href="https://openai.com/blog/introducing-openai/">open AI initiative</a> – in effect accelerating the development of AI in the hopes that the more people are involved, the more responsible it’ll be.</p>
<p>It’s certainly a novel approach – and one that seriously calls into question ITIF’s Luddite label. But it still adheres to the belief that the answer to technology innovation is… more technology innovation.</p>
<p>The bottom line is that innovation that improves the lives and livelihoods of all – not just the privileged – demands a willingness to ask questions, challenge assumptions and work across boundaries to build a better society. </p>
<p>If that’s what it means to be a Luddite, count me in!</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/52630/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<h4 class="border">Disclosure</h4><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Maynard is a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Councils</span></em></p>We’ve missed plenty of early warnings about past scientific breakthroughs. Is it neo-Luddite to proceed with caution as an innovator?Andrew Maynard, Director, Risk Innovation Lab, Arizona State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.