thanks  Andy Millar Arran Cameron Chris Pearson  Jon Steward mapj1 Simon Barker  for taking time to share your thoughts regarding employment, education and even state revenue around Automation and robotics.

Some references that I thought were good on the future of education and macroeconomics were from Jeremy Rifkin.

I found some good references regarding employment from Eric Brynjolfsson, His book "The second machine age" was particularly good.

I still think the best apps for Robotics and Automation are the 3D's, those which are; dull, dark or dangerous.

I think as Engineers we do have a responsibility to society to ensure what we create is of benefit.

I found good guidance in the IET Strategy 2030 and the Engineers without borders.

The question is ... Should we take an  engineering or Hipocractic oath?

#Robotics

Alan Rossney said:

Should we take a for of engineering or Hipocractic oath?

Tricky for those working in some areas of defence where the end product is designed to cause destruction,  I think ;-)   Less flippantly, even though I do not do that, certainly for me some of that exampler would be unacceptable.

'Engineering' is too broad a catch-all to be considered a single discipline, and the rules of the game are far from universal between different areas..

Mike

Alan Rossney said:

The question is ... Should we take an  engineering or Hipocractic oath?

Also tricky for engineers who have created machines that put people out of a job including:

1. Transport ticket printing machines - goodbye bus conductors and train station ticket counter workers.

2. Telephone exchanges - electromechanical exchanges put operators out of a job, electronic exchanges put maintenance technicians out of a job. In both case the new jobs created were fewer in number.

3. Voltage regulators. Power stations once had a person employed full time to twiddle a knob from left to right to ensure the output voltage remained constant with a varying load.

It's notable that trade unions have delayed, but ultimated failed to prevent, the adoption of new technology that kills jobs. ITV companies were still using film for news gathering and production well into the 1980s, even though it was obsolete, because of demands made by trade unions that many jobs would be lost if the companies replaced it by videotape. Digital technologies subsequently replaced videotape.

Arran Cameron said:

Also tricky for engineers who have created machines that put people out of a job

I fear that the next thing to go may be Royal Mail as we know it. I have a fair quantity of stamps which I shall have to exchange for newer ones soon. I just don't send letters any more and I shall probably never use up my stamps.

The recent postal workers strikes cannot be helping, but the more they do it, the less viable the business will be.

Inside information is that Royal Mail is potentially highly viable as it's a major package carrier for eBay. What is loss making are post boxes in the streets. It's now common to find completely empty boxes half the time they are opened for collection. In an increasing number of places they are emptied by the postmen who make deliveries in the morning rather than after 5pm.

It's possible that in the future there will be a lower priced stamp for items taken to a post office or posted in town centre post boxes, and a higher priced stamp for items posted in suburban post boxes in order to cover the cost of collection. There might also be distance charging for parcels over a certain weight.

Royal Mail currently has no plans to remove underutilised post boxes.

That's interesting. If you buy postage through eBay, it is a lot cheaper than at the counter. I was thinking of letters. There are, of course, plenty of other couriers.

The nearest pillar box from here is a small one on a post. For the past few years, it has had only one collection per day and that is by the delivery postman. There are two more within 5 minutes or so, but I was surprised to find that one is smaller than another so a bundle of A4 papers does not fit. Then a little further away is the one with most collections, which is in front of the Post Office, which is at the back of the Co-op. I can well believe that some are barely used.

That's interesting. If you buy postage through eBay, it is a lot cheaper than at the counter. I was thinking of letters. There are, of course, plenty of other couriers.

The nearest pillar box from here is a small one on a post. For the past few years, it has had only one collection per day and that is by the delivery postman. There are two more within 5 minutes or so, but I was surprised to find that one is smaller than another so a bundle of A4 papers does not fit. Then a little further away is the one with most collections, which is in front of the Post Office, which is at the back of the Co-op. I can well believe that some are barely used.