Comment by Archer6621
18 hours ago
I don't know whether you can really call it winning. Who is actually benefiting from the win here? Another small example: something you see now at restaurants are these QR codes being put on the tables, to remove the need for a waiter to come by and ask, or for you to get up and order, but by automating that away you also remove that little bit of social interaction for both the people ordering and the waiters.
There are many other little examples like this, where beneficial side-effects go lost from automation. I suppose LLMs serve as a prime example of how this can affect people quite negatively (e.g. skill atrophy), if not careful. I think adaptation only goes so far, and we are being arrogant in thinking that we can adapt to everything, because a large part of how we function as humans is not as adaptable as we think, e.g. our emotional and instinctual needs, or how we maintain skills that are essential in the long-term.
It also has been an incredibly short period with incredibly large changes, to be able to say that things will just adapt; perhaps they will, but at what cost, and who wins from it?
> remove the need for a waiter to come by and ask, or for you to get up and order, but by automating that away you also remove that little bit of social interaction for both the people ordering and the waiters.
Okay, but were you coming to the restaurant for social interaction with the waiters? Have you stopped going to those restaurants that serve you good food at a reasonable price and which are otherwise desirable places to eat because of the lack of social interaction with waiters?
People dislike places that charge too much for mediocre service, and those places disproportionately use the QR codes for ordering and don't pass on the savings from labor reduction to the consumer. Very few people actually miss their waiter interrupting their conversation to tell them the specials.
The QR codes are an interesting case. Restaurants in my area have been abandoning them. I think it’s because it actually slowed service down.
We stopped going to one favorite place because the wait for a table became interminable. You’d spend forever standing there watching people waiting 15-20 minutes to get a busser’s attention so they could ask a question about the food, and then another 5-10 minutes for someone who actually knows the answer to come out and talk to them. Or, after the meal was over, people would just camp out indefinitely.
My favourite example is the petrol station attendant. Not only something really convenient went away but also the opportunity to upsell.
Loss on every side, still happened.