
Social Skills Are Last Line of Defense for Humans Seeking Work - spking
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-10-19/social-skills-are-last-line-of-defense-for-humans-seeking-work
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antod
Does that automated personal assistant still need social skills when it is no
longer emailing the journalist directly, but instead talking to the
journalists own automated personal assistant?

I can't help feeling that in an increasingly automated world a few steps
further on from what the article discusses, the importance of social skills
will actually decrease rather than be a differentiator for humans any more.

Imagine how poor the social skills of a generation of kids could be that are
surrounded by robots doing nearly everything for them. Once people grow up
spending more time interacting with robots than other people, social
expectations and norms will change.

Caring about that stuff could end up being something that only old people
worry about. Like handwriting or sending letters or buggy whips etc.

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positr0n
Reminds me of the first half of this smbc[1], which I found quite insightful
considering the medium.

[1]: [http://smbc-comics.com/index.php?id=3576](http://smbc-
comics.com/index.php?id=3576)

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nickthemagicman
Hahaha. "Social Skills" is such an intangible and weird thing to measure.

Social skills are contingent on so many things, environment, status, how you
feel that day, how well you know people youre socializing with, etc.

And psychologists have been trying to get to the root of the human psyche and
language and identity for decades with little progress.

It's weird that people use this as some sort of semi-concrete-quantitative
value.

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blumkvist
Saying robots will replace humans' jobs is like saying in 1999 google will
replace teachers.

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zzalpha
I'd imagine the horses were telling themselves the same thing back when the
automobile hit the scene...

Robots have already replaced human jobs. They started with factory labour, but
today they're trading our stocks, diagnosing diseases, driving our cars...
it'll be a very long time before automation can completely replace the human
animal (today, our ability to improvise in a highly unpredictable world gives
us a strong edge, which is why those self-driving cars won't be seen on wintry
roads any time soon), but I have no doubt that humans will get automated out
of work in the fullness of time.

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runamok
Actually I think a self driving car might be better at driving on slippery
roads than most humans. Detect any wheel slip, vehicle yaw, etc. and
immediately take action. Not to mention being better at simple rules like
'when temp is below freezing lower speed by 10 mph'.

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zzalpha
Eventually, yes.

Unfortunately current vision systems don't cope well with obscured roads, or
even precipitation.

My guess is that'll take changes to infrastructure. With snow packed roads you
simply can't see lines on the road and so need some other type of telemetry.

