There is a lot of hype right now about the mechanization of the workplace and the extent to which human jobs will be replaced by machines. At the extreme end of the spectrum is Artificial Intelligence, and machines that (even if not self-aware) will be intelligent and insightful enough to make decisions and take initiative rather than relying on programmers to give them precise instructions.
It may reflect the professional-class bias of our news media that there seems to be a lot more attention and concern over this issue now that white-collar jobs, in addition to blue-collar jobs, are potentially threatened by new technology. LegalZoom has created anxiety among lawyers that mass-online lawyering operations will put small firms and solo practitioners out of business. Mass-produced online lectures threaten teachers and professors in academia.
Now a provocative article by Michael Linhorst in Politico reveals that some tech-utopians believe that even the most high-profile white-collar executive position in the world, the United States President, could be replaced and improved by computer technology. Linhorst describes the proponents’ ideal as a superhuman supercomputer: “The president would more likely be a computer in a closet somewhere, chugging away at solving our country’s toughest problems. Unlike a human, a robot could take into account vast amounts of data about the possible outcomes of a particular policy. It could foresee pitfalls that would escape a human mind and weigh the options more reliably than any person could—without individual impulses or biases coming into play. We could wind up with an executive branch that works harder, is more efficient and responds better to our needs than any we’ve ever seen.”
Continue reading Should Next US President be a Supercomputer?