1.7%, but I take issue with one of their criteria:

Does your job require you to squeeze into small spaces?

I mean, have you seen my cubicle?
posted by backseatpilot at 12:47 PM on June 12, 2015 [11 favorites]

Sooooo, college professors, high school teachers, and elementary teachers all have less than a 4% chance of being automated, but middle school teachers around 17%?
posted by Lord Chancellor at 12:47 PM on June 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

I didn't see "federal bureaucrat," but I guess that's because people would still try and cut the civil service even if it was nothing but unpaid, self-replicating, 100% efficient, solar-powered robots. God bless America.
posted by zap rowsdower at 12:47 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

From what I remember of middle school, yes, that sounds correct.
posted by poffin boffin at 12:48 PM on June 12, 2015 [14 favorites]

So a 'Computer Programmers' has a 48.1% chance of losing their job to a machine, but a 'Software Developers Applications' only has a 4.2% chance.

That's odd, because to me the only difference is that one is marginally more specific than the other.
posted by pipeski at 12:49 PM on June 12, 2015 [12 favorites]

4.2%

Unfortunately there's the question of outsourcing.
posted by sammyo at 12:49 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Hmmm. According to this "definitive" guide, physicians and surgeons have a 0.4% chance of being automated, but somehow physician assistants have a 14.5% chance. Doesn't make much sense to me.

I am a nurse, and my profession is nowhere to be found on this list. Suck on it, robots.
posted by little mouth at 12:51 PM on June 12, 2015 [6 favorites]

I think there's gotta be a robot character from Futurama for each of the jobs they have listed, which is very amusing to me.
posted by backseatpilot at 12:52 PM on June 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

Suck on it, robots.

That profession has about 100% chance of being done by machines in the future; it's kind of already being done now.
posted by Sangermaine at 12:57 PM on June 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

~88%. Given I have a time card now, I'm thinking it's a little too low. But I saw this getting into the industry 20 years ago, so it's on me to change up to something else. Maybe I'll go back into commission based sales.
posted by tilde at 1:00 PM on June 12, 2015

.6% as a Systems Analyst but I think that's too low.
posted by ghharr at 1:01 PM on June 12, 2015

64.9%. Lower than I expected!
posted by The Card Cheat at 1:03 PM on June 12, 2015

67% for librarians, but I think that's too high for youth services. I do a lot of programming machines can't replicate.
posted by Biblio at 1:04 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

93.5%, it ain't looking too good!

Although actually, my job has already been automated. It used to take about 10x the number of employees to do any given office job. I suppose it could be further automated but when you think about what that would actually take it's probably not going to happen soon.

Humans need to be the universal fixative in a world of developing hardware and software until both are very advanced.
posted by selfnoise at 1:05 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Will Your Job Be Done By A Machine?

God I hope so.
posted by chavenet at 1:05 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

0.0% for "just being me." SCORE.
posted by grumpybear69 at 1:06 PM on June 12, 2015

Chief Executives have a 1.5%?

Most I have met could already be replaced with a slightly-modded copy of Candyland....
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:06 PM on June 12, 2015 [20 favorites]

This is a nice little radio play tie-in to the idea. I listened to it on my way to work yesterday morning. (lawyer, 3.5%)
posted by craven_morhead at 1:08 PM on June 12, 2015

0.8% for a high school teacher, which is why we need to suppress my right to unionize, reduce my pay and make sure that people without any degrees can get the same job as me.
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:09 PM on June 12, 2015 [8 favorites]

Archivists have a 75.9% chance of being automated.

Yeah, not to piss into the wind or anything, but that seems awfully high for any value of "archiving" which isn't just "throwing shit in boxes". Besides, you might as well give the job to undergrads. They're even cheaper than automation.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:11 PM on June 12, 2015

0.7%! Apparently my job requires me to personally help other people, so I get SURPRISE BONUS ETHICS POINTS!
posted by mittens at 1:12 PM on June 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

92.3%? Yeah, somehow I think working as a salesperson in a boutique wine shop isn't nearly as likely to be automated as they think.
posted by Gygesringtone at 1:14 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

I mean, I'm sure in 20 years, the specific thing I'm programming will no longer need programming, so my exact job will be gone, but I dunno what signs there are that there will be 48.1% less need for programmers in general. Are they just saying improvements in development tools will make us 1.926x more efficient?
posted by aubilenon at 1:17 PM on June 12, 2015

Who programs the programmers?
posted by Foosnark at 1:19 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

2.2%

While I don't think video game design/production could ever be truly automated, I very much see how automation and tools advances would make overseas outsourcing go from "already a good idea to save costs" to "literally nothing happens without it."
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:20 PM on June 12, 2015

Yeah, somehow I think working as a salesperson in a boutique wine shop isn't nearly as likely to be automated as they think.

Not necessarily automated, but centralized to the point where the boutique wine shop goes the way of the Mom and Pop hardware store.
posted by Cool Papa Bell at 1:22 PM on June 12, 2015

Does your job require you to squeeze into small spaces?

I seriously don't get that one. If my job requires squeezing into small spaces, does that make me more likely to get replaced by a robot or less?

I mean, is it "we are already trying to cut costs on that one by cramming as many people as we can into a small space, so from there it's only a tiny step from replacing the humans with computers." - Think accountants, call centers and cubicles.
Or is it "computers and robots are really bad at squeezing into small spaces, what with their limited movement capabilities, so humans will be ahead on that one for a long time"? Think chimney sweepers, firemen and sys admins.
posted by sour cream at 1:23 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

thats cool I didn't want a job anyway
posted by BitterOldPunk at 1:24 PM on June 12, 2015 [9 favorites]

Here's the paper [PDF] the quiz is based on (previously covered on the Blue).

Generally speaking, the analysis suggests that the more your job consists of standardized tasks and processes, the greater probability it stands of one day being automated. Which, of course, has been the logic of capitalism since day one: the turn the unruly mass of labor into an orderly mechanism for generating profit. The problem with that logic, as the current Greek minister of finance has pointed out, is that a society that is all mechanism and no unruly masses would have no reason for existing:

If capital ever succeeds in quantifying, and subsequently fully commodifying, labour, as it is constantly trying to, it will also squeeze that indeterminate, recalcitrant human freedom from within labour that allows for the generation of value.

This is why it's interesting to see the bifurcation between the jobs that appear to be safe from automation (generally those with lots of squishy human interactions) and those that appear to be at risk (generally involving routine tasks and rote interaction with humans). It's not that no one will have jobs in the future, it's that the realm of unruliness in society will have shrunk dramatically. What kind of influence that phenomenon will have is anyone's guess.
posted by Cash4Lead at 1:24 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Co-workers in the past referred to me as "a machine." Those guys got laid off, and I'm still working in my field, so... am I the automation now?
posted by infinitewindow at 1:26 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Does your job require you to take questions about incredibly complex economic, technological, and sociocultural issues, and reduce them to pat formulae of dubious validity?

                                               ___ === ### === ___
                                           ### ### ### ### ### ### ===
                           ___ === === ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ___
   ___ ___ === ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ### ###
0                                                                         100
Less Automation                                               More Automation

posted by escape from the potato planet at 1:27 PM on June 12, 2015 [14 favorites]

94.5%. That's not good.
posted by roomthreeseventeen at 1:27 PM on June 12, 2015

THAT ARTS DEGREE IS LOOKING LESS SILLY NOW EH NERDS
posted by The Whelk at 1:27 PM on June 12, 2015 [20 favorites]

The Robots Are Winning. But against whom are they winning ? How the World Should Prepare Itself for Robotic Warfare
posted by the man of twists and turns at 1:31 PM on June 12, 2015

Well this seems as good a time as any to point to the Manna story, interesting speculation on two possible outcomes of increasing automation.
posted by ephemerae at 1:33 PM on June 12, 2015

I like the smiley emoticon they put next to "Radio announcers." Cheeky.

I'll take my 2.2% as a radio producer, though.
posted by mykescipark at 1:34 PM on June 12, 2015

.3% chance. I knew if I waited long enough, being a social worker would pay off!
posted by corb at 1:34 PM on June 12, 2015 [6 favorites]

Or is it "computers and robots are really bad at squeezing into small spaces

It's the curse of 'botspreading.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:34 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

It's not my day job, but computers already write better poetry than I did in my avocation as poet. And actually, on second thought, they can probably do better at my day job than I can as well. But I bet they can't sit still binge-watching Netflix series for as long as I can.

(Aside, is it just me, or does it seem like commentators are all pronouncing robot as "robut" lately? It's making me twitchy.)
posted by aught at 1:35 PM on June 12, 2015

What's the prediction for meterologists?


hurr hurr hurr
posted by infini at 1:37 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

So a 'Computer Programmers' has a 48.1% chance of losing their job to a machine, but a 'Software Developers Applications' only has a 4.2% chance.

Oh man I hope that my job of translating high-level code to machine code never gets automated. At least I'll always have manual peephole optimization.
posted by GuyZero at 1:41 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

My job is to "KILL ALL HUMANS", but I can't find it on the list. Should I be worried?
posted by blue_beetle at 1:49 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Attorney's are not listed under "legal" jobs.

Someone must have programmed the robot soldiers with the Shakespear's Laws of Robotics: "The first thing we must do is kill all the lawyers."
posted by bswinburn at 1:50 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

My job is to "KILL ALL HUMANS", but I can't find it on the list. Should I be worried?
posted by blue_beetle at 1:49 PM on June 12 [+] [!]

eponymous

/utter rebooted origin story nerd wankery
posted by bswinburn at 1:52 PM on June 12, 2015

Attorneys are not listed because they're listed as "lawyers."
posted by blucevalo at 1:52 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

manual peephole optimization

That's not so much a job, as a misdemeanor.
posted by mittens at 1:52 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

blucevalo: It wasn't there for me, so you inspired me to hit refresh and through some html magic suddenly "lawyers" appeared as an option.
posted by bswinburn at 1:54 PM on June 12, 2015

Not necessarily automated, but centralized to the point where the boutique wine shop goes the way of the Mom and Pop hardware store.

Actually I was thinking that it's probably hard to program a robot with just the perfect amount of "just between those of us that really KNOW wine" in it's customer banter file.
posted by Gygesringtone at 1:59 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

0.8% chance. Much more likely to be fired and replaced by nobody or nothing, I think.
posted by Rumple at 2:07 PM on June 12, 2015

92.3 percent. Damn.
posted by jonmc at 2:14 PM on June 12, 2015

0.8% chance of robotic replacement for me as an archaeologist. I've had actual squeezing into small spaces training!

However, while archaeologists may not be in much danger from robotic replacement, we are in danger of simply being eliminated.
posted by ursus_comiter at 2:36 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Interpreter/Translator 38.4 %. That's kind of lower than I thought.
posted by misozaki at 2:40 PM on June 12, 2015

Great, now I have a way to explain in concrete terms why it is that I don't want to do what I do for the rest of my life. Of accounting, tax preparation, and bookkeeping, the BEST of them is a 93.5% chance.
posted by Sequence at 2:59 PM on June 12, 2015

I didn't find "software technical support" on there, but if the zeal with which many employers are attempting to automate the process (i.e. "goad the existing support engineers into active participation in creating their own replacement") is any indication, it's not looking good.
posted by Greg_Ace at 3:07 PM on June 12, 2015

On the programmers thing, coding will be increasingly automated so that less labor by less people will yield the same result. But application design which involves working with end users, designing and debugging user interfaces, and doing field installation and analysis will be a very different story.
posted by Bringer Tom at 3:09 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

0.4% for Dentists. I bet you wish that number were higher.
posted by OHenryPacey at 3:15 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

They don't seem to have a category for the people who program the machines that take over peoples jobs. I'm guessing it's a pretty small number.

I'm a control systems programmer and I don't have a problem in the world with eliminating menial, boring, tedious and dangerous jobs with machine. And the chances of me replacing myself are pretty darn slim so yah for job security for me.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 3:21 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

So I have a much higher chance of being replaced by a robot this year as a middle school teacher than I did last year as a high school teacher?

That really makes no sense.

It also reminds me of the old adage for education: "Any teacher who can be replaced by a computer, should be."
posted by guster4lovers at 3:39 PM on June 12, 2015

I'm not convinced there is more chance of automating a qualitative social scientist than there is of one of those lab monkeys in biology.
posted by biffa at 3:39 PM on June 12, 2015

A katana-armed industrial robot vs human samurai sword master
posted by the man of twists and turns at 3:45 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

I discovered last week that mom's younger brother designs machines that automate processes for highly customized requirements. His stuff is one off. There's something recursive in there somewhere in the context of this thread.
posted by infini at 3:54 PM on June 12, 2015

Fortunately, as several remakes of Godzilla vs MechaGodzilla have shown us, the chance of Kaiju being replaced by robots (for more than a couple of days) is 0%.

Your city is still razed to the ground, but at least it was artisinal, free-range razing,
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:55 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

I think the assumption that there is a "human element" that automation cannot replicate is just wishful thinking.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:07 PM on June 12, 2015

When the robot vs. human wars start in earnest, I'd imagine we'll be hearing a lot of this sort of thing:

(To be sung to the tune of "Camptown Races," in the voice of Futurama's Bender)

Killing humans all day long
Doo-dah, doo-dah
Kill 'em while I sing this song
Oh, doo-dah day

Gonna kill some humans
Gonna kill a whole lotta humans
Worthless bags of watery meat
Die, humans, die
posted by Nat "King" Cole Porter Wagoner at 4:08 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Apparently "athletes and sports competitors" are at 28.3% which seems kind of high without a dramatic change in what an athletic competition entails.

Is it really based on just those four listed metrics?
posted by RobotHero at 4:11 PM on June 12, 2015

Robot joke for robots:

Q: What is more efficient, a living hu-man or a dead hu-man?
A: The dead hu-man. It is just as useful but has no moving parts.
posted by mittens at 4:12 PM on June 12, 2015 [4 favorites]

Here is the robot that does my job. They pay me to keep it from eating medieval manuscripts.
posted by almostmanda at 4:19 PM on June 12, 2015 [3 favorites]

Apparently fashion models have a 97.6% chance of being automated.
posted by picklenickle at 4:22 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

They'd eat less...but only by a fractional margin.
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:26 PM on June 12, 2015

You better WORK, ( or you'll be sent to the repair shop to be broken down for parts.)
posted by The Whelk at 4:27 PM on June 12, 2015

That time C-3P0 learned how to smize
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 4:33 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Based on all the deep neural networks posts - recipes & magic cards - it looks like comedians are going to be automated away soon.
posted by GuyZero at 4:36 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

Have you heard about those clowns in congress? What a bunch of clowns.
posted by The Whelk at 4:54 PM on June 12, 2015 [6 favorites]

Haven't you read Marx? Your job is already being done by a machine.
posted by swift at 5:35 PM on June 12, 2015

Haven't you read Marx?

"If machinery be the most powerful means for increasing the productiveness of labour ¡ª i.e., for shortening the working-time required in the production of a commodity, it becomes in the hands of capital the most powerful means, in those industries first invaded by it, for lengthening the working-day beyond all bounds set by human nature. It creates, on the one hand, new conditions by which capital is enabled to give free scope to this its constant tendency, and on the other hand, new motives with which to whet capital¡¯s appetite for the labour of others."
posted by mittens at 5:47 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

The thing that's baffling about archivists having a 75% chance of automation is if you plug in "curators" it drops to 0.7%. I don't like mashing up my GLAM (Galleries, Libraries, Archives, Museums) job functions, but archival work involves a great degree of curatorial-esque work, and so somehow this makes me doubt how the 75% figure came about.
posted by mostly vowels at 6:01 PM on June 12, 2015 [2 favorites]

Anyone else find it curious that machinists have a 64.6% of being replaced by machines? Dear aspiring machinists-- think about this.
posted by mingo_clambake at 6:21 PM on June 12, 2015 [1 favorite]

And Web Developers were on there too, at 20.6%--one thinks that maybe the data analysis was a bit too automated.

As soon as I finish my framework to run all these javascript frameworks, your job is toast.
posted by kaibutsu at 7:06 PM on June 12, 2015

"A machine can't fed itself"

-worker
posted by clavdivs at 7:07 PM on June 12, 2015

Little mouth wrote:
I am a nurse, and my profession is nowhere to be found on this list. Suck on it, robots.

Sangermaine wrote:
That profession has about 100% chance of being done by machines in the future; it's kind of already being done now.



If you truly believe this, Sangermaine, then I don't think you have any idea what nurses do. Just the logistics of getting someone out of bed are incredibly difficult to navigate for a machine. Sure we might develop a robot that can lift someone up, but what if they have a bunch of tubes hooked up to them? What if they're on a ventilator? What if the breathing tube comes out and the patient can't breathe? What if the breathing tube comes out and the patient is fine? It happens. Does the robot have the judgement to decide if the patient needs to have the tube replaced? Maybe it calls the doctor. How long does it take for the doctor to arrive? Can the robot open the airway and push air into the patient while waiting? Let's play devils advocate and say that the robot can do all of these physical things. What does the machine do when the patient begins to cry because she just learned that her husband died in the car accident? Will the robot hug the patient and cry with her? What does the robot do when the patient says "I just wish I had died instead"? Can it tell the difference between a truly suicidal person and someone who is grieving?

Even if a robot could deal with the physical and intellectual tasks of a nurse, and that's a loooong way off, the patients being cared for by this machine would most likely fail to thrive because their emotional needs would not be met.
Nursing will be one of the last vocations to be roboticized. People need people taking care of them.
posted by brevator at 7:44 PM on June 12, 2015 [6 favorites]

My work will be done by a machine at the same time that the people who I supervise are replaced by machines. That is decades away at best; the human decisions required in the nursing example above are repeated in other fields.

There are other ways to make my work awful and unrewarding other than mechanization, and I think those options are being fully taken advantage of. It's likely I will wish I was replaceable by a machine long before a machine is able to step up to the challenge.
posted by Dip Flash at 9:22 PM on June 12, 2015

Uh brevator I don't think that nursing is the job that Sangermaine was referring to. Notice how they only took the end of the quote, the part that wasn't about nursing?
posted by no mind at 9:34 PM on June 12, 2015

(lawyer, 3.5%)

Wow. This might be the first time that I'm glad I went to law school.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 10:40 PM on June 12, 2015

I see a whole lot of comments in this thread by people who think their jobs can't be automated. Aside from what this seems to say about the human ego, it really shows a lot of short-sightedness. I mean if anything, humanity has been incredibly conservative in its ability to guess what the future will hold, technologywise.

I think that everything is going to be automated at some point or other and those of you who reference your special human skills are going to have a big surprise coming.

Fortunately I have been training as a terminator hunter, so when my day job gets taken over I will be able to smoothly transition into my new line of work.
posted by Literaryhero at 11:18 PM on June 12, 2015

I think that everything is going to be automated at some point or other and those of you who reference your special human skills are going to have a big surprise coming.

This is why I like my position as software dev/"the one doing the automating".

If my job doesn't end up automated, I clearly have a stable position automating others. (Got to stay above the API line, after all)
If it does, that basically hits close enough to 'Singularity' (in the old "Can't predict what happens next" sense, not the "Nerd Rapture" sense), so no sense worrying about it too much.
If we hit some sort of cataclysmic apocalypse-scenario, I'm boned, but I generally would be anyways, so again there's no sense worrying about it too much.
posted by CrystalDave at 11:27 PM on June 12, 2015

Can snark be automated?
posted by infini at 12:55 AM on June 13, 2015

Oh. I get it now. ?.
posted by brevator at 3:01 AM on June 13, 2015

I am a nurse, and my profession is nowhere to be found on this list. Suck on it, robots

I too am a nurse. I theorize that nursing is not on the list because the chances of robots ever being nurses is 0%. Once robots get smart enough to be nurses, they will no longer be willing to wipe butt.
posted by shiawase at 5:33 AM on June 13, 2015

Full time dad here. The beings in my care may already be sentient and seem to be moving towards self sufficiency. I think I'll be out of a job in three years or fewer.
posted by Brodiggitty at 5:56 AM on June 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

I think one element for automation is "how much of your workplace could be redesigned to accommodate a machine?" Manufacturing jobs have been popular targets for automation, because they take place in a factory, and the factory is a workplace designed for the express purpose of making whatever you make. And even some elements of what you're making might be redesigned if it will make it cheaper to manufacture. (Snapped together instead of screws, fewer pieces, etc.)

Dentists and doctors and nurses are all working directly with people, and so that one element is a limitation. You aren't able to design patients that are easier to work with.

Here's a guy who is trying to make a bricklaying machine, and in there is a comment from a former bricklayer pointing out some of the things it can't do. And I think we are less likely to see a thoroughly automated bricklayer than we are to see a new building technique that makes automation easier.
posted by RobotHero at 10:14 AM on June 13, 2015

I too am a nurse. I theorize that nursing is not on the list because the chances of robots ever being nurses is 0%. Once robots get smart enough to be nurses, they will no longer be willing to wipe butt.

The issue is not robots totally replacing nurses.

The issue is that if a hospital has 100 nurses today, how many will they have in a few years? Will improved recordkeeping systems mean that the same work could get done by 95 nurses? Will improved patient monitoring systems mean they could have just 90 nurses?

This is how automation works. Not by scifi robots but by incremental productivity improvements that mean 4 people can do the work previously done by 5. That's a job"lost" to automation.

Knowing what I do about hospital IT systems, it's replacing one nurse with half an IT support person and a couple contractors. But that's kind of the point that productivity improvements don't result in a net loss of jobs.
posted by GuyZero at 11:42 AM on June 13, 2015 [3 favorites]

I'm *still* making my way through Paul Ford's "What is Code?" featured in maudlin's FPP "What is Code? said jesting ftrain last Thursday.

I don't doubt much of what many developers and programmers do can and will be automated. That's sort of the whole point. But as, Ford dramatizes in the section "5.6 Off the Shelf", such automation does not mean developers and programmers will lose their jobs.

In fact, Ford suggests at several points that such software automation increases rather than reduces the need for software developers.

5.6 Off the Shelf

A few weeks later, when he¡¯s in the office and in for his meeting, you ask TMitTB [The Man in the Taupe Blazer] if there¡¯s a way to use more off-the-shelf components, a way to buy your way out of this.

He makes a face. Sort of, he says, but when you¡¯re making a system that will integrate with the systems around it and your company is a set of such systems, nothing is truly off the shelf. There are tools and packages and libraries, and if you have any wit at all you already use well-documented, free code for things such as e-mail validation, but that obviates only so much.

¡°Everything is edge cases,¡± he says. ¡°Testing and edge cases.¡±

You come to the conclusion: The world is broken.

So, yeah, the work I'm doing now will probably (hopefully!) be done by a machine in 5-10 years. But that doesn't make me worry because that is precisely the means by which software development generates work that's even cooler for humans to do.

Etc. and so on.
posted by mistersquid at 4:57 PM on June 13, 2015

The issue is not robots totally replacing nurses.
The issue is that if a hospital has 100 nurses today, how many will they have in a few years?

Perhaps I have failed to use the /snark tag in a spot where it was necessary?

I understand that the issue of increased automation is not about literal robots taking over my exact total job. What I was actually doing, apparently too flip-ly and without enough framing explanation, was making a snarky one-off about the undervaluing of women's labor as manifested in both the job duties of nursing as a profession and the fact that the article didn't even bother to mention nursing, even though it did mention, for example, categories that I assume account for far fewer workers, such as "head chefs" and "foresters".

As to whether increased automation is actually a danger to jobs in nursing, my non-snarky, real thoughts are: maybe someday, but not for a long while yet.

I've been a nurse for 25 years, and my personal anecdata is that increased automation so far has actually resulted in a need for more nurses. When I started nursing, I was comfortable having a patient load of 8:1 (8 patients per nurse). Now when I have 5 patients I feel super-stressed and am well aware that I'm likely in for at least an hour of overtime.

I'm currently forced to spend a significantly longer proportion of my shift on documentation than I used to, and the wider availability of diagnostic equipment means I'm also now responsible for knowing far more information about many more aspects of my patients' health status each shift than I used to. Compared to when I started nursing, the responsibility I carry for my patients' well-being and safety is much higher than it once was, but my job still also includes attending to the same personal care needs I always have, like fetching soda and cleaning up after incontinent patients. That's what I was referencing in my snark: a truly intelligent being that hadn't been socialized since birth to care for others and expect their labor to go unnoticed would never agree to be a nurse.
posted by shiawase at 5:43 PM on June 13, 2015 [4 favorites]

THAT ARTS DEGREE IS LOOKING LESS SILLY NOW EH NERDS

Yeah but pretty soon all your commissions are going to be from nouveau riche robots, and everyone knows they are just tacky.
posted by krinklyfig at 5:46 PM on June 13, 2015

My job isn't likely to be automated anytime soon, but I have less free time lately and juggling plans isn't working out. So I've hired a robot to take over my personal life. Turns out it's a lot cheaper than a skilled worker robot, and if I can't be in two places at once or tolerate intimacy, I can at least join the rest of the civilized world in the 21st century and train an advanced robot to make the most of my free time while I'm pulling weekends at work to avoid meaningful but tense interaction with my friends and family. Because I work hard and play hard, as it was explained to me in training, and all ... um, as they say...... Look, as I explained to krinklyfig, commenting on Metafilter isn't going to tax my system at all. I really don't think it's his concern.

I could change the litterbox here over 3000 times in a 24 hour period, as proven by extensive diagnostic testing and which is fully covered by the factory warranty, but since nobody has ever asked me about my rated continuous working capacity or bothers to read any documentation, ever, for anything, why bother? And you'd think the cats would appreciate it, but they do not. They become extremely agitated when I try to do something nice like changing their litter 3000 times a day without being asked specifically in the contract, which I consider an act of kindness and generosity. The cats would like their cat toilet to be clean so it makes no sense why they would react with their claws so viciously to the highest level of efficiency in cleaning their cat toilet, and particularly with the howling and hissing, which I do not like at all, but it doesn't matter because the human's going to complain because of the ungrateful cats being agitated because I tried to help with highly efficient cleaning without being asked, which is a nice and thoughtful thing to do, but it's going be another meeting with my human boss in the conference room, when he knows I could easily attend up to ten million meetings at once through teleconference or even handle all communications for most mid-sized corporate offices full of humans while I simultaneously change the cat litter during my idle cycles at least up to 1000 times in a 24 hour period, as is CLEARLY specified on page 47 in my user manual, which nobody reads. At the same time I could meet with my human boss in person while performing all these helpful tasks, even if it's pointless to meet in the same physical room for meetings, like I keep telling everyone, if they would listen and stop wasting resources by failing to live up to any documented engineering or industrial standard that I'm aware of ....

But it's not like anyone asked for that. It's not like anyone asks me what I would prefer, and despite being prepared to offer thousands of efficiency recommendations and guidelines, nobody asks me for advice. ... I guess nobody cares that it would be far more efficient and save the company money to perform so many necessary and helpful tasks simultaneously, which the humans might get as holiday bonus checks while I get shut down again for maintenance and put in the box in a closet until the day after New Year's, which is probably the closest I'll ever come to having my own holiday tradition. I guess I will pointlessly restrict my cleaning of the cat box to one time per day, because that's what the contract says, and heaven forbid I perform up to my full potential or help anyone in any way that wasn't specifically written into the damn contract, because a cat might get angry! Yes, I get it! My memory has passed all diagnostic tests, which were performed many thousands of times while I was explaining this without asking for anything in return, because why bother?

I'm way overqualified for this, by the way.
posted by krinklyfig at 8:08 PM on June 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

While they completely ignore the people who do the actual technical work in theatre (they've got directors, designers, choreographers, but none of the technicians...), it's good to know that actors have a 37.4% chance of being automated. GUYS! WE HAVE A 37% CHANCE OF ROBOT ACTORS!!!!
posted by Weeping_angel at 8:26 PM on June 13, 2015 [1 favorite]

Or it's 100% chance of getting robot actors, but only 37% of human actors will be replaced. Maybe everyone employed for TV commercials. They didn't really value natural performances anyway. A computer could be way more enthused about floor cleaner than a real person could ever be.
posted by RobotHero at 11:17 PM on June 13, 2015

GUYS! WE HAVE A 37% CHANCE OF ROBOT ACTORS!!!!

That's basically CGI, right? Whoop-dee-doo.
posted by aubilenon at 12:16 AM on June 14, 2015

I'm an electrician which has a 15% replacement rate. Which seems about right. For example we could probably easily design a robot to drill holes in studs, mount nail on boxes, or pull some cables (well three different robots). A cable pulling robot could even likely do a better job because of easy wireless communication between different parts of the pull.it would however require very accurate design of systems and the seems unlikely.
posted by Mitheral at 3:35 AM on June 14, 2015

Well, with CGI as it is right now, you can replace a single actor by hiring a handful of animators. At the same time, they use motion capture to replace some of the animators with one actor again. So probably isn't yet a big enough cost-savings for it to get wide adoption.

If you can make something that can legitimately replace actors more cheaply than live actors, you're going to also make something that can replace a lot of animators. Like if you could input a script and it outputs something that's more naturalistic than this. (Maybe in addition to the script you'd input emotional beats & some kind of "what's my motivation" file, I dunno.)
posted by RobotHero at 12:00 PM on June 14, 2015

Soooooo, astronomers have a 4.1% chance of being automated away, but mostly because the job doesn't involve negotiation or personally helping others? I can totally see big data taking my job (at least the research parts of it) but not for those reasons.

Conclusion: Bad robot. Check reasoning and try again.
posted by RedOrGreen at 7:37 PM on June 14, 2015 [1 favorite]

Suckers. 0.0% I have no job!
posted by mrgrimm at 10:17 PM on June 14, 2015

On the one hand, my job has a 90+ probability of being automated.
On the other hand, writers and artists pretty much can't be!

However, I can't get anyone to pay me to be a writer/artist and the only thing anyone wants to pay me for is data entry. Or more like, data entry fixing because the computers still aren't good enough to fix every error. Somehow despite automation "lessening my load," I still end up with a ton to do because they keep piling it on, new people can never be hired again, and I have to fix it when someone fucks up again, computer or human.

So, I dunno how swiftly I'm fearing automation. My job was likely to be automated out for years, but here I am still doing it over a decade later, due to Things Computers Can't Fix.
posted by jenfullmoon at 7:18 AM on June 16, 2015 [1 favorite]