Who likes to do always the same tasks? After some hours or days, it becomes boring and does not contribute to developing our skills. Nobody wishes this for its sons. The robots are coming to do those repetitive works and maybe more, and that will save our time to do more refined tasks.
Ten years ago, I visited Chuquicamata, the biggest mine in the world. At that time they were testing autonomous trucks, with no human intervention. The trucks transport material from inside the mine to the processing plant. I talked with the people and they told that some trucks were lost at that time, but nowadays, 10 years after, the scenario is completely different, autonomous trucks are a reality.
All these things are happing now, see the example in Japan: [1]. In South Korea, for instance, there are 478 robots per 10,000 workers; in Japan, the figure is 315; in Germany, 292; in the United States it is 164. The industry is investing heavily on AI and robots because these technologies will promote a new revolution in human life. As I posted in 2015 [2], not only the industry but the governments believe that robotics is a strategic area. The US is injecting money on research and, on March 16, Chinese government officials approved the latest Five-Year Plan for China’s economy, which is reported to include an initiative that will make billions of yuan available for manufacturers to upgrade to technologies including advanced machinery and robots [3,4].
The robots will produce faster and cheaper than us, especially in developed countries where human workforce cost every day more. This movement in the industry and governments is pushing the necessity of specialized people and new abilities to work on a new market. The countries of future will be those that invest on robots and AI and prepare their citizens to work in this new environment.
[4]https://www.technologyreview.com/s/544201/china-wants-to-replace-millions-of-workers-with-robots/
