PGC – In China, the fact that they are still the primary source of manufacturing in the world means they continue to have a high-volume need for lucrative labor (lucrative to the party bosses mostly). As some of that party boss money trickled down, well, the Chinese began to expect more (and rightly so). This has led to labor shortages but no shortage of orders. Enter Artificial Intelligence, Drones, Robots, etc, the digital people’s workers’ army fast replacing the army that no longer wished to work under those conditions (and rightly so).
Now, China might very well, through its urgently felt need, become the leading developer of integrating ai and manufacturing, and thus sustaining, China hopes, its primary place as the world’s manufacturing hub. But, I’m afraid for China that such hopes might be futile as 3D Printing becomes more and more accessible to small scale operators at higher levels of quality and durability. Hegemony within your own lands may yet come into play as more and more humans figure out how to exist without you.
Still, Americans, really, everyone, should take note, and consider how to integrate a workforce of AI into a sustainable land of thriving and prospering for the significantly vast majority of humans that occupy these lands. Machines can free us up from risky, physically life-destroying labor. It can create opportunities for more and more humans to build vocations on the pursuit of understanding alone, a privilege throughout the ages that was kept from all but the very minuscule few.
Now, we live with technological circumanstances that could enable more of us to live lives of understanding through which we produce a vast array of products and services we can’t imagine beginning to understand will emerge under such conditions. What China might wish to use to control, we in the rest of the world can use to liberate more and more people from the necessity of physically disappearing to keep a roof over your head and food on the table.
How China Is Using AI to Fuel the Next Industrial Revolution
From feedproxy.google.com
2021-08-12 05:52:56
Kai-Fu Lee
Excerpt:
It’s not just startups; established market leaders are also leaning into AI. EP Equipment, a manufacturer of lithium-powered warehouse forklifts founded in Hangzhou 28 years ago, has with Sinovation Ventures’ backing launched autonomous models that are able to maneuver themselves in factories and on warehouse floors. Additionally Yutong Group, a leading bus manufacturer with over 50 years’ history, already has a driverless Mini Robobus on the streets of three cities in partnership with autonomous vehicle unicorn WeRide.
Where is all this headed? I can foresee a time when robots and AI will take over the manufacturing, design, delivery and even marketing of most goods—potentially reducing costs to a small increment over the cost of materials. Robots will become self-replicating, self-repairing and even partially self-designing. Houses and apartment buildings will be designed by AI and use prefabricated modules that robots put together like toy blocks. And just-in-time autonomous public transportation, from robo-buses to robo-scooters, will take us anywhere we want to go.
