Not so much, I think it's more that the wine industry provides a mix of science and art and tradition that makes for a very interesting AI/Automation use case. It'll be very interesting to see how it plays out over the next 20 years.
Makes sense, to really enjoy fine vodka and grape juice you have to allow it to aerate to achieve its full potential and body.
I deal with medical records all day and speak to people about their impairments and medical history. There are a million rules and exceptions and classifications on claimants and situations. In a way, if you could create a program that always had the most up to date policies and rules in place, a computer could do my job better, especially since I am still learning and because the rules change constantly. We have training all the time here as a result. The two main things that would make this hard for AI to do involves actually being able to access the info correctly and the subjectiveness of the issues at hand. I can convert a pdf into a searchable document but the technology isn't perfected yet. I still receive a LOT of records that are handwritten, or notes within typed or e-documents that are handwritten. There is actually a lot of important info in those handwritten portions. It might be foolproof if medical records were uniformly formatted the same way or with a certain program. The status of healthcare in this country is years away from having standardized medical records but if that was made to happen, correct accessing and therefore processing would be possible. There are a lot of situational decisons I make with a claim, but if with the advances of quantum computing it is possible to have learning AI, I see no reason why AI of that nature wouldn't be able to do my job. Plus, AI could juggle the variables, facts, conflicting information better than a human and with fewer errors. If it is one large program processing all the data from claims, it could become an "expert" with higher abilities and fewer errors because it is allowed to process more available data. I am limited in my ability to learn how to process these claims because I can only physically and mentally deal with a small number of cases at a time. Therefore I am exposed to less and I am only able to learn something less common by roulette: I get the case with that special circumstance, a coworker encounters an issue that we talk about together on our break, or through direct training. In the future you would probably just need a small number of very experienced workers to resolve new issues that the AI hasn't encountered yet. At first, it would take more people to operate the program because the AI is basically a new "worker" and still learning. The need for human oversight would diminish like a cliff though, and humans' role will have to shift to more claimant interactions for data retrieval so the AI can process it. Standardation of medical records has to be the first step if AI is to be introduced because AI depends on being given data it can process.
Snobbishness may save wine, somewhat fittingly. Similar to how people will pay for a far inferior, but "real" diamond that was mined out of the ground by child slaves in Sierra Leone, I think they will pay for inferior wine "hand made" by insufferable assholes in Sonoma.
Still catching up on the thread, but I don't think it matters. Unlimited demand vs scarcity of goods. There is not one exception to this rule in human history. When people are loaded up with all the bullshit commercials tell them to buy they just end up wanting more. We're exiting the industrial era and entering the age of technology, and robotic efficiency so it's unlike any era in human history too... but I still don't see the basic concepts behind what drives economics changing. It does mean it's going to get harder for stupid people because there's less brainless line work and a greater need for mechanics, engineers, quality control analysts, and so on. I'm guessing that in 50 years the low end of the service sector is going to be completely flooded with morons. Not that that isn't somewhat the case already, but a lot of the impoverished people who don't have opportunities and get stuck working at places like wal-mart are going to move towards manufacturing and the not so bright line workers are going to take their spot. We'll probably also need a higher minimum wage as the transition happens.
Isn't wine appreciation just another name for bottle label ponces? It's generalising I know but I seem to notice a lot more people who judge a wine by the label on the bottle and/or the price tag than what it tastes like. Or is it just that I don't like wine, seems a waste of nice grapes to me.
No. There are definitely "score whores" out there who will only buy/drink a wine that has been rated 95+ by Robert Parker, and I don't like dealing with those people. They are essentially the same as snobs in any other field, obsessed with status. Taste, by definition, is a subjective thing. There is no right answer for everybody. But the organic computers Clutch is talking about are people like myself, who have studied what works and why, what goes with what, what trends in flavor people are going to tend to like based on their stated preferences. At no time in my consideration of those facts do I factor in a wine's score, or label, and only occasionally price for practical reasons. The more I think about the stuff Nett said, the sadder I get, because if the predictive algorithms of things like amazon and google are as good as they are now, he's right. In 50 years or so, you will be able to enter a range of criteria and have the "perfect" wine suggested for you. Oh, and it's not a "waste of perfectly good grapes". They're different species of grapes, vitis vinifera vs vitis lambrusca. You're probably used to eating Thompson Seedless grapes which have a lower sugar level, less acidity, thinner skins and are way way bigger, like so:
No different from any industry. There are people everywhere who think more $ = better product, without actually being able to discern differences. No matter what you're into, there are ignorant snobs and knowledgeable snobs. I genuinely enjoy wine. My favorite bottle ever cost around $90. My second favorite bottle cost around $30. Sometimes cost is indicative of quality, sometimes not, and sometimes personal tastes override it.
Well this thread just got really timely. Today we got our second robot. A roomba, to be specific. We've had the one that vacuums for about three years now, just got one that mops. Those things are worth every penny. Housekeeper for our size of house is $100-150+ each visit. A roomba is a few hundred bucks, one time cost. Sure it can't do everything a maid does like counters, furniture, drapes, but it does just as good as a human at cleaning the floors. If not better a job than humans, because it truly does get every spot (thanks to radar) and it doesn't get tired and start bitching at you (like my wife). We run it when we leave for work and the house is clean when we return. It's awesome. So now that maids are losing work to robots and trump is gonna deport the rest who still have work, housekeeping really is gonna die. Quickly, painlessly. Five alive!!!
I wish I could get a roomba. But I have a lot of nooks and crannies a roomba can't reach and hardwood floors with several rugs.
Our floors are Saltillo tile and we have a ton of rugs, plus carpet and regular tile. The roomba goes over it all like nothing.. The roombas also have a brush that spins out from underneath them so they can get into the tiny areas. Ours gets under a bunch of tables and chairs without us having to move the furniture. They get stuck on cords sometimes if you have a lot of those lying around, like extension cords or surge protectors, but it's rarely an issue and you just move them then they pick it right back up.
How much area does it cover? I have a living room and two bedrooms. How would it handle the nooks and crannies like this:
What's funny is I used to have that exact rug. We threw it away after my dog shit on it, then another one rolled in it, then finally my wife unknowingly stepped in it and wiped it all over the house. We could put the rug in the burn pit. The wife and dogs, not so much. They all got hosed down.