Thank you for automating!

In high school, the language classes and discussions with friends on all things that really mattered helped me situate the math and physics that I loved in an appropriate context--humanity.  Had I known back then what I now know, and had I lived in the US, I would have pursued liberal education in my undergraduate studies.  But, all those ifs there are just that--ifs. It is like saying that if my aunt had balls, she would be my uncle!

The disconnect between engineering and the real world all around me was deeply troubling.  It was flawed.  It was messed up.  It continues to be messed up; that is what I was reminded when I read this essay in The New Yorker.  It is about automation, robots, and impact on jobs, with side notes on how they affected the elections that gave us the fascist.

Consider this excerpt about Stefanie Tellex, the roboticist at Brown University:

Tellex was admitted to M.I.T. and planned to pursue a liberal-arts degree, but her mother told her that liberal-arts graduates didn’t make any money. (“One of the best pieces of advice I’ve ever gotten.”) She completed her computer-science Ph.D. there in 2010. ...
She told me that she had never thought about the political implications of her field until the tense months leading up to the 2016 Presidential election. Her parents were Trump voters, and she found herself disagreeing with them about what the causes of society’s ills were, and what the best solutions might be. She was alarmed by the anti-immigrant sentiment emanating from Trump’s rallies, especially having spent her adult life surrounded by researchers from all over the world. Economic inequality was a driving theme of the election, and Tellex began to see that automation was a contributing factor.

Until about a year ago, the roboticist had not thought about the political implications of her field--robots/automation!  And, she is one of the better ones, given that she started with a real interest in the liberal arts.  There are hundreds of thousands of scientists and programmers who even now do not see how their field has such startling political implications.  How can one bring these to their attention?

I do not, cannot, understand how any professional can go about doing whatever it is that they do without systematically thinking about the larger societal implications.  Heck, there are hundreds of thousands who work in the cigarette industry, even after decades of our understanding about how tobacco kills.  I have no idea how all these professionals, with or without Ivy League credentials, make their peace.

I made mine years ago by quitting that career path, and doing what I now do.  I try my best to convey to students, readers, anybody who wants to listen to me, about the importance of thinking about what it means to be human and to feel that we are contributing towards securing a better future for the people of tomorrow.