We were very struck by this 60 Minutes report in the USA where we finally saw the famous Boston Dynamics robots in action – you know, those humanoids capable of doing backflips on their own or maintaining balance when kicked hard in the legs. Well, here they are, ready to replace humanity and make work disappear (Finally!), under the intrigued gaze of the last human workers still alive in a Hyundai factory in Georgia (USA).
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The images are very impressive: filmed by drone to heighten the dramatic effect, we see Atlas the robot in question dozing on the factory floor, then suddenly waking up (no doubt because the cameras are there, otherwise it would have continued its nap) and straightening up on its legs in a contortion worthy of a Shaolin monk, which will impress everyone over 50 who has lost the simple ability to get up without a noisy groan of pain and effort.
Then, we see it getting to work: taking out pieces of windshields and placing them on a rolling cart at the speed of a pre-retiree two months away from retirement.
The contrast is striking. While Atlas seems very good at doing backflips or jumping onto a platform with ease, it seems much less so when it comes to doing real work. We wouldn’t be surprised, at the editorial office, if Atlas had been trained with data from young brains.
Further back, an engineer (from Boston Robotics) discusses with the journalist covering the report, looking a bit like he’s wondering what he’s doing there. Spoiler: his bosses undoubtedly need to raise funds to teach their robot to do something other than triple backflips and were led to believe that a small paid advertorial on the famous 60 Minutes show would be a good way to convince investors.
Our smartphone battery was dead, so we couldn’t use Google Translate to translate his words, but we understood that Atlas was primarily there to learn and would be much more efficient in the future. A bit like a high school intern, asked to lend a hand rather than doing nothing all day at the company’s expense, but an intern who would become so strong and skillful that the workers watching him with a mocking smile will undoubtedly laugh much less in two or three years when they don’t report to their unemployment office, because in the US, it’s a country of self-made men, and social security, unemployment, or vacations are really for European losers. Anyway… we’re getting sidetracked.
Of course, we’re joking, but there’s no doubt that one day, these robots and many others will be part of the landscape: in our factories, our stores, our homes. And we’ll all wonder what purpose we can still serve if they do all the work for us.
Let’s rejoice. When that happens, it will be us doing somersaults in the air. That’s all we’ll have left to do.
