The Ballad of John Henry, Steel Driving Man
John Henry was hammering on the right side,
The big stream drill on the left,
Before that steam drill could beat him down,
He hammered his fool self to death.
Who among us could not feel a grudging kinship with the Steel Driving Man, you know, fighting the inevitable with spirit even though the outcome was as certain as death and taxes? Besides, who could feel the slightest affinity for that big mechanical steam drill that was taking a man’s livelihood away and all for the sake of the dollar that some faraway good-smelling Dude laid down so he could make even more dollars without breaking one iota of steel driving sweat.
We all may crack an amused smile at the thought of a real live man actually challenging a steam machine to a steel-driving contest with only his muscle, grit and determination to match the power of steam. We smile, of course, because of the foolish nature of the contest. But then again, I wonder what most contemporary people were thinking and feeling at the time when in 1997 they witnessed a more recent contest between a real live man (Garry Kasparov) challenging a thinking contest with only his brain, grit and determination matched up with the power of billions and billions of silicon switches fastened together with the lifeless software of the chess-playing computer, Deep Blue?
Somehow I think we probably feel a little differently about the thinking contest due to the contemporary and cognitive nature of the contest. But, I don’t know why! The two contests are identical and the outcomes just as inevitable! Perhaps we don’t even think the chess match was a foolish contest because of the notion that the magnificent organic thinking machine, the human brain, is surely the ultimate cognitive device that no mere machine could ever match. The human brain will surely prevail for all times just like John Henry thought his muscles could surely prevail over the mighty mechanical steam drill even though we now concede our magnificent muscles are no match for lifeless machine power.
Here is a thought to muss up your day when trying to decide what to do about being outsourced by the machines of automation and all because some faraway good-smelling Dudes are still trying to make more money without breaking a contemporary sweat. John Henry and Garry Kasparov are not the only contestants in a continuing struggle between man and machine that started when Gorg rubbed two sticks together to make fire. We all are front and center in the enduring contest and so will all of our progeny. Research shows that we are loosing far more contemporary jobs to automation than jobs that are lost to distant lands where labor is cheaper and more abundant. Indeed, one of the biggest loss of jobs today is due customer outsourcing.
What that’s you say? What is customer outsourcing?
Customer outsourcing is transferring a job that was once done by a paid employee to a paying customer instead. Here is just one minor scenario of customer outsourcing. You drive your rattletrap Chevy to the local gas station emporium where you get out of your seat, pop in and quickly remove your Master Card or Visa (a lot of lost jobs of people taking money, counting money, bookkeeping, accounting, depositing, etc.) and wait for the computer screen to instruct you to continue. After being authorized by a great big computer somewhere that is connected by satellites, relays and God only knows what, lift the pump-handle and pump your gas (more lost jobs of gas attendants). Hell, I’m even checking myself out at the local Wally World and Home Depot and buying stuff off of the Internet by clicking a mouse and causing a massive whirling of untold computers that fetch my latest Ronco gadget, package and ship it without a single paid employee in sight.
All of this is made possible by technology and (oh no Mr. Bill!) Machines. Because this is a continuing process, it is less noticeable in our everyday, put the meat-on-the-table lives. For example, before the industrial revolution, well over 50% of all people in the country was working on farms while today we produce all of our food needs by less than 1% of the population, i.e., million and millions of jobs lost to machines and we rarely think about the farm job losses as we rant about all of our current jobs going to China, India and machines.
And the non-physical jobs like engineering, accounting, marketing, research are also being outsourced to machines and cheaper labor, so no one is immune to job loss except the rich (that is if you believe making money off of money constitutes a job).
I think you get the picture and if you get the picture then you know that contemporary job losses will continue on at an ever-accelerating rate and due mostly to automation (machines). What to do? Hell, I don’t know either but I do know that at some distant point in the future the Cyborgs will have all of the jobs and I really don’t know how humans will make a living. That’s right John Henry:
RESISTANCE IS FUTILE,
YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED
