Most of this book makes a pretty convincing case that automation is going to replace most jobs in the next 50 years, maybe less. I think I buy that, aMost of this book makes a pretty convincing case that automation is going to replace most jobs in the next 50 years, maybe less. I think I buy that, and thus I am personally worried, since a good portion of my job as a software engineer is probably automatable (in large part the actual coding I do involves writing boilerplate and figuring out how to integrate third party software, which, in theory, a machine could do quite well, with far less angst; in short, I am already a blue-collar coder, and that's not a good thing). But the main thrust of the book is that we should all be worried, even if our jobs aren't automatable, b/c if most of us can't earn, then we can't buy things like food and shelter, which makes us do horrible things like a) elect pseudo-fascist populist plutocratic rulers to replace the existing elitist plutocratic rulers, and b) eventually eat each other.
Actually Ford doesn't go quite so far as cannibalism, nor did he predict Trump, but the point is things could get bad fast if society doesn't institute some major changes. Which leads me to my list of critiques:
1) The only major change proposed is Universal Basic Income. While I was surprised Brynjolfsson and McAfee didn't support UBI as a way to address rampant joblessness due to automation, I was disappointed it was the *only* arrow Ford seemed to draw from his quiver. UBI is really intriguing, but it also seems really hard, and Ford admits it's not feasible in our current political climate. His feasible near-term suggestions are sort of unsatisfying though, not only because changes like bumping up the Earned Income Tax Credit or infrastructure investment don't seem like they'll do enough for long enough, but because they seem just as impossible in today's political climate as something ludicrous like UBI, no matter what the Cheetoh says about bridges and airports. Aren't there any other big, inspiring ideas we can consider, even if they also don't seem possible?
2) Always Look on the Bright Side of Life! On the one hand, this book's doom and gloom totally affirmed my glass-completely-empty view on life, but on the other hand, something to hope for between treading water on basic income and Mad Max might be nice. Not that I think it's happening, but what would a post-capitalist society look like? If production without consumption is possible, what other kinds of economies and forms of government are possible? Does machine capital have to be owned?
3) NEVER CUT OFF A CHART AXIS! EVER! This might seem minor, but I'm not sure there's a single line chart in this book where the origin represents 0,0. That's like the *first* thing you do when you want to lie with a chart. I get that Ford is generally trying to show trends and scaling an axis can accentuate a trend, but a) if you can't see it with things scaled properly, is it really a trend? b) error bars, people, and c) you just look like a liar, whether or not you're lying. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/PR... shows one of the charts he uses, and is, if anything, even more frustrating for its mystifying use of units. Why would 2009 represent 100? What units are the actual underlying data in?! If it's a share, express it as a value between 0 and 1 like a sane person!
4) Speaking of Trump, isn't it kind of weird that Ford doesn't address the political upheaval that comes with joblessness? He hints at dystopian welfare state scenarios, but doesn't articulate the signs that we would expect if we were on that path, like, say, electing a populist egomaniac, or accentuated culture wars as a form of bikeshedding.
On the other hand, Goodreads just gave me this fairly nonsensical recommendation, so maybe the machines aren't quite ready for prime time just yet:
I guess a lot of people made a big deal out of this when it came out a few years ago? That's cool, I guess. Here are some things I found interesting:
II guess a lot of people made a big deal out of this when it came out a few years ago? That's cool, I guess. Here are some things I found interesting:
Income inequality is a natural outcome of mechanical advantage and technological innovation: the more technology replaces labor, the more wealth accrues to those who control technology, and the less to former human laborers
This is basic Marxism, right? I am not an economist (clearly) so I have no idea how true that is, and I'm not convinced they really proved it in the book, but it's an interesting counterargument to the usual "rich people are assholes" line of reasoning, which, of course, is not a mutually exclusive hypothesis.
Universal basic income is not going to work
I think I actually found out about this book while reading an article about UBI, everyone's favorite idea of late. UBI is kind of an awesome fantasy, but I think I side with the authors (and Matthew B. Crawford, and Wendell Berry) in thinking that the non-monetary value of work is too high to dispose of, as well as the corollary notion that most people will not create value for society or the world (or themselves) based purely on self- or social motivation. I was frankly kind of amazed how down they were on the idea! I felt like the entire book was leading up to a painfully predictable UBI finale. Got me!
Stop complaining about free trade because globalized job displacement won't last. When machines replace workers, *all* those jobs will be gone, not displaced
What is the populist counterargument to this? Smash the looms? Here's one: the human labor rarely really goes away, it just gets hidden and compensated less. If we could keep manual labor within national boundaries and subject to equitable labor standards, at least they'd be good jobs instead if Mechanical Turk-like jobs.
There were also some *fairly* problematic bits, starting at the beginning with their godawful "most of history was boring" bit, where the boring parts were when humans weren't pillaging the environment, reproducing like bacteria, or killing each other on ever grander scales. Peace, balance, satisfaction: totally boring. No reason to read Ian Morris, apparently.
They also laud the sharing economy as a wonderful new source of jobs, where jobs are basically ways to keep people busy, glossing over the whole issue of reduced income and more importantly reduced security (gigs are unreliable, no gig platform gives you insurance). The thrust of the book as a whole is to temper the techno-optimism (income inequality is real and will kill us if we don't address it, no matter how fancy our tech), but this seemed like a pretty glaring oversight for 2014.
Their long-term recommendations for surviving our robotic future are... kind of dumb. The first third of the book is all about how machines are starting to do the things we thought were uniquely human, so if that's true, why turn around and recommend that we'll all be ok focusing on what remains in the human domain? In the short term, sure, learn to complement machine powers with your meaty wit and discretion, but what about 100 years out when our phones will, in fact, be both funnier and wiser than we are?
And while this is mostly a book about technology and the economy, it seemed myopic that they failed to address the many "externalities" that could torpedo all of their analyses. What about climate change? What about reactionary political movements? What about the real physical limits of our planet like potable water and the gravity well?
On the whole, while I was often pleasantly provoked while reading, and I really did appreciate the middle bits where they picked apart the strong technological optimism of their peers, the authors' dogged commitment to a sunny outlook probably hamstrung their efforts to make predictions. I mean, no one can make real predictions about the future, but it would have been nice to hear more about the downsides of these "brilliant" technologies. Inspiration is great, but so are contingency plans.
If you've suffered through this entire "review," allow me to recommend these two others, both infinitely more cogent and insightful than anything I've written here:
My brother picked this up on a whim as a birthday gift, but man, he couldn't have chosen better: comics, landscape, work, idealism, expertise, all in My brother picked this up on a whim as a birthday gift, but man, he couldn't have chosen better: comics, landscape, work, idealism, expertise, all in one book! For those of you too lazy to read the blurb, the book concerns the author Étienne, and his friend, Richard, as they explore each others professions, comics author and wine maker, respectively. Shock, the two disciplines have more in common than you might think, but the pleasure's in the particulars: the way that Richard makes wine is intimate and personal. He seems to perform most of the labor himself, and keeps his production small. He refuses organic labeling and appellation designation because he values the particularity of his product, the way his own direct experience and the unique character of the land evidence themselves in the bottle. Étienne has a similar approach to comics: he slaves over them, continually concerned with conveying the particularity of his subject, while balancing his own presence in his work, and understanding that complete control is impossible, and ultimately undesirable. I suppose these traits apply to any personal creative endeavor, but it's great watching the two of them stumble over the operational details (pruning? printing?) to arrive at these larger commonalities.
Visually I don't think the book could be better. There are plenty of talking heads, as you would expect in a comic that's largely about two dudes talking, but Davodeau adorns those heads with evocative expressions. Like a lot of Europeans (and unlike most American comics authors) he's also a master of light: his layered washes and shadows are wonderful, particularly in the vineyard and larger landscapes. Definitely not a formalist (6 panel pages throughout) but the approach works perfectly for the subject matter. In many ways this is what I wish Feynman had been: a non-fiction comic in which the subjects under discussion get as much visual attention as the characters discussing them.
The book suffers somewhat from the imbalanced attention Davodeau pays to Richard. We learn a great deal more about making wine than making comics. To be sure, they visit a publisher, chat with other creators, talk at length about appreciation and criticism, but Richard never tries making a comic, nor are we privy to Étienne's drawing and writing habits. In one sense it's refreshingly un-autobiographical in a medium that's over-saturated with neurotic navel-gazers, and, as they point out, wine-making and wine-drinking are more communal than drawing, writing, and reading, which are almost exclusively private (I find public comics "readings" particularly excruciating), but after the detailed look we get into Richard's work life, it left me wondering what Étienne's desk was like, how he chose equipment, to what extent he incorporates computers into his work, etc.
The book is also unflaggingly positive and dream-like in its depiction of work for these two guys, which casts at least a small shadow of doubt upon its realism. Even in the rarified worlds of boutique wine and indy comics there must be frustrations, setbacks, drudgery, self-doubt (hell, that's a staple of autobiographical minicomics!). Surely they're not *always* sipping chenin blanc and debating the merits of Trondheim! One friend of theirs brings this up, but Davodeau apparently wasn't interested in exploring those aspects of work (nor was he interested in how non-work influences work: the two only interact in the context of their project, friends and family outside of the biz are mentioned only in passing).
It's hard to quibble with a book this elegant and joyful, though. Bonus: it's got a list of all the wines they drank and all the comics they read in the back. Done and done. Would love to read more by this author, but I'm not sure anything else has been translated. Do I really have to scrape the rust off my completely neglected high school French?!...more
I enjoyed this book because I enjoyed meeting Anne Lamott. This is a collection of personal essays on writing, and they are personal not just because I enjoyed this book because I enjoyed meeting Anne Lamott. This is a collection of personal essays on writing, and they are personal not just because they encapsulate an individual's unique perspective, but because that individual is very much present, going on tangents, confessing neuroses, and detailing techniques for lambasting real people in fiction without invoking libel (the key seems to be depiction of inadequately sized genitalia). She's hilarious, she's opinionated, and I just found myself enjoying her company more and more as the book went on.
I'm not sure this is a book for people who want to start writing. I think she has a lot of practical advice, but it all felt generally applicable to any creative endeavor, perhaps any form of meaningful work. I think most software engineers understand the importance of shitty first drafts, working on problems of manageable size, and identifying conditions that abet focused work. On the other hand, I don't think of writing as work (by work I don't mean compelled drudgery but rewarding impelled labor), so maybe the lesson is to take these notions I think I understand about work and apply them to another interest.
I guess part of what made this book satisfying for me was the way it depicted writing as work and not necessarily as a kind of ecstatic revelation or a path to self-actualization. Much like Matt Crawford in Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work, work for Anne Lamott is sitting down every day and changing the world. He unbreaks broken motorcycles, she arranges letters and meanings into novel patterns, but both change the world in ways that can be independently verified, and for both it is a daily battle of inches. Work is hard but I can do it. Revelation is wonderful and you should be attuned to signs of its presence, but the improbability of finding it by seeking it wearies me. Like so many things in adulthood, perhaps this is about making time.
On an unrelated note, I was excited by Lamott's religiosity, because I would like a book to read alongside one of the New Atheists like Dawkins Richard or Daniel Dennett, and Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith might be it. I've been meaning to read them for a while but I feel like some balance so I don't end up agreeing with them too much. Any other suggestions for books on faith by authors you think I can respect?...more
I’m always wondering why I work (aside from that whole food and shelter thing), so books that try to answer that question draw my attention. While saiI’m always wondering why I work (aside from that whole food and shelter thing), so books that try to answer that question draw my attention. While said attention was utterly wasted on Alain de Botton’s The Pleasures and Sorrows of Work, it reaped rich rewards from Crawford’s Shop Class as Soulcraft, a thoughtful, synthetic, opinionated exploration of manual labor.
Crawford argues that society undervalues working with your hands, and that physically manipulating the world demands as much intellectual rigor and is as fulfilling as any other profession, if not more so. He could have ended there, with some polemic about the irrelevance of higher education (and he certainly touches on that), but luckily Crawford isn’t so provincial, and explores the implications of this assertion quite a bit.
There’s a whole lot going on in this book, but here are the three ideas that I found most compelling:
1) Tacit knowledge is as important as explicit (encodable) knowledge.
Tacit knowledge is what you know but can’t communicate, succinctly summed up by the phrase, “you had to be there.” (I learned about this in grad school while reading an excellent essay on the destruction of knowledge related to nuclear weapons in Knowing Machines: Essays on Technical Change) Crawford argues repeatedly that such knowledge is ignored or misunderstood as something that can be replicated by procedure or machines, and I absolutely agree. I see this kind of knowledge in a coworker’s uncanny ability to debug something I’ve struggled with for hours given only a handful of symptoms. I also see it in an experienced naturalist’s ability to identify a weird bug “by gestalt,” or see things in nature that I can’t, even when we’re looking at exactly the same scene. It's also the kind of thing that's difficult to ascertain in a job interview, but is potentially more important than the explicit forms of knowledge that are easily discernible.
2) Some forms of cognition are only possible through physical manipulation.
Actually, I think Crawford goes further and claims cognition that isn’t directly related to the physical world is misguided. He rags on theory quite a bit. I sympathize with his tirade against a society that aspires to be a bunch of disembodied heads in jars, but I think he goes too far in equating all theorists to the absent-minded professors he derides. However, I totally agree with the underlying notion that doing is a form of thinking. When I’m on the squash court (let’s imagine I still play squash), my mind is alive with angles, velocities, and probabilities that are categorically different than their mathematical equivalents (it is also filled with rage. Don't get me started...). I imagine the same is true of musical performance. Thought is far more than simply getting lost in your own mind.
3) Work demonstrates the existence of reality by forcing us to engage objects and forces outside our control (i.e. real things). It also demonstrates our own reality when we alter this external world in ways that can be verified by others.
Crawford rails against corporate cultures that enshrine relativistic values like “being a team player,” “positive thinking,” or “creativity.” Manual labor, by contrast, provides a more nuanced understanding of your own capabilities and ultimately more self respect, because it forces you to engage with things outside of your control, like the physical world, or the idiosyncrasies of Japanese motorcycle engineers. “Good” to a motorcycle repairman means the bike is running. There’s no way to redefine that value, and its truth can be proven by anyone.
I disagree that this kind of engagement is exclusive to working with your hands, but I think the point is excellent: work that touches the world is the cure for solipsism. It provides an invaluable sense of reality that the self-conscious mind needs (well, mine does). If you’re evaluated based on subjective traits, you never know where you stand, and what you’ve accomplished can always be taken away from you by redefinition. Furthermore, your work demonstrates your reality even more when you're connected to the people who it affects. A customer waiting for his bike to be fixed generates far more poignancy than some distant consumer who may or may not drink the soda produced by the machines your underling's underling's underling's underling oversaw.
So, given all that, what would Crawford think of my job, or my life? I generally am not “the master of my own stuff,” and predominantly live in my own head. My primary engagements with the physical world are through cooking, which I assiduously avoid doing in objective (i.e. social) contexts where my food could attain maximum reality, and nature study, which is occasionally tactile, but largely mitigated by a camera lens (and somewhat motivated by a Web-based attentionmarket).
However, though he might not recognize it as such, my profession of software engineering is far more akin to motorcycle repair than the kind of subjective perception management he sees in most white collar work. I do make things that real people use, and I am connected to those people. It’s just that the things I make and the connections to the people I make them for are not physical (Howard Rheingold made an important point that "virtual" communities are not virtual in that they aren't real, they're just not physical, though I can't remember if I read that or if he said it in a class). I don’t have the advantage of tactile experience with my subject matter, but I am constantly struggling against systems I did not design and over which I have no control (like Internet Explorer). I operate within constraints, and my work is never perfect, but improves iteratively, and experience grants me both tacit and explicit understanding of successful practices and patterns. Our company culture is a lot more like the shop crew Crawford lauds than the corporate team he despises, perhaps due to the same ability to point to objective reality as the ultimate proof of value. My coworker might, say, have a disturbing obsession with cats, but man, that comment plugin he wrote is seamless, and we never have to fix it.
The book isn’t perfect by any means. Crawford occasionally resorts to some distasteful rhetorical techniques, like pushing conservative buttons (“With its reverence for neutral process, liberalism is, by design, a politics of irresponsibility” (p. 45)), or choosing a single example of his opposition then spending pages lambasting it (I’m thinking particularly of his critique of Richard Florida’s The Rise of the Creative Class a few pages later on p. 47; maybe it was a bad day). Most of his historical segments also seem to rely heavily on a few, secondary sources (Harry Braverman, T.J. Jackson Lears, Robert Jackall), a practice that doesn’t fill me with confidence.
Overall, though, this was exactly the kind of considered, informed analysis I wanted, and while I didn’t always agree with Crawford on every point, those points were excellent provocation to further consideration, and I admire him for stating his opinions openly....more
I picked this up because I heard the author speak on a couple public radio shows and he seemed interesting. I've also always struggled with the ideas I picked this up because I heard the author speak on a couple public radio shows and he seemed interesting. I've also always struggled with the ideas of "work" and "vocation" (i.e. I imagine that if I had the latter, the former wouldn't be so frustrating), so I was actually very excited to read an examination of "the pleasures and sorrows of work." Unfortunately, this book is less an examination and more a set of witty but disorganized notes from a handful of trips to different workplaces. He doesn't even begin to state the purpose of the book until about 70 pages in, when you learn he's somewhat concerned about the dilution of meaning in a specialized workforce. Up until then, it's mostly just ruminations on the magnitude of the shipping industry or the absurdity of cookie marketing, and this continues throughout, seasoned with amusing turns of phrase, notes on his personal travails, and the occasional absurd and completely unexplored assertion, like "It is the high-minded [i.e. idealistic, un-capitalist:] countries that have let their members starve." Funny stuff, occasionally intriuging, but unfulfilling. Where's the history? Where's the hypothesizing on root causes? Who's actually happy at work and why?
I think the most telling fault is the near complete lack of anyone's voice but the author's. Almost no sign of workers speaking for themselves, in their own words, despite the obvious fact that he talked to many, many people. Botton seems much more interested in his own disjointed mental peregrinations than in how his "research" subjects actually think and feel about work, and about the role of work in the overall scope of human affairs....more
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