Erik Brynjolfsson Quotes

I think in general technology always sort of makes some jobs less relevant, or perhaps, even obsolete, but I will say that the idea that sort of workers will find nothing else to do seems like it's way too pessimistic on the capabilities of everyone as human beings, right?

I think a lot of people will be liberated from a lot of oppressive manufacturing jobs, or a lot of service jobs, because they'll be done by computers. There'll be the world's best education available online and free.

I either delegate something, I dump it, or I deal with it.

The world of A.D. 2014 will have few routine jobs that cannot be done better by some machine than by any human being. Mankind will therefore have become largely a race of machine tenders.

The promise of artificial intelligence and computer science generally vastly outweighs the impact it could have on some jobs in the same way that, while the invention of the airplane negatively affected the railroad industry, it opened a much wider door to human progress.

I think that solving the job impact of AI will require significant private and public efforts. And I think that many people actually underestimate the impact of AI on jobs. Having said that, I think that if we work on it and provide the skill training needed, then there will be many new jobs created.

I believe that society needs to confront this question before it is upon us: If machines are capable of doing almost any work humans can do, what will humans do?

The robots are coming, whether we like it or not, and will change our economy in dramatic ways.

Automation is driving the decline of banal and repetitive tasks.

You’re going to have some very amazing capabilities in the economy. When we have computers that can do more and more jobs, it’s going to change how we think about work. There’s no way around that. You can’t wish it away.

One of the problems that exacerbates procrastination is the feeling that you have lots of different things to do and no clear sense of which matter more, when they should be done, etc.

There will be little drudgery in this better ordered world. Natural power harnessed in machines will be the general drudge. What drudgery is inevitable will be done as a service and duty for a few years or months out of each life; it will not consume nor degrade the whole life of anyone.

Software substitution, whether it's for drivers or waiters or nurses ... it's progressing. ... Technology over time will reduce demand for jobs, particularly at the lower end of skill set. ... 20 years from now, labor demand for lots of skill sets will be substantially lower. I don’t think people have that in their mental model.

Robots are the new middle class. And everyone else will either be an entrepreneur or a temp staffer.

Every duty which is bidden to wait returns with seven fresh duties at its back.

The ruler should employ person in tasks according to their abilities because Knowers ( or the means ) and efficient employees make impossible tasks also possible.

Don't think to hunt two hares with one dog.

One of the best ways of avoiding necessary and even urgent tasks is to seem to be busily employed on things that are already done.

Sometimes you might think the machines we worship make all the chief appointments, promoting the human beings who seem closest to them.

How are we going to make our livings in a society becoming increasingly jobless because of hi-tech and outsourcing? Where will we get the imagination to recognize that for most of human history the concept of Jobs didn't even exist? Work, as distinguished from Labor, was done to produce needed goods and services, develop skills and artistry, and nurture cooperation.

The key to having more time is doing less, and there are two paths to get there, both of which should be used together: (1) Define a short to-do list and (2) define a not-to-do list.

The spinning wheel is not meant to oust a single man or woman from his or her occupation.

It's hard to guess how smart the machines are, but a good rule of thumb is that they're always smarter than you think.

I am not fighting machinery as such, but the madness of thinking that machinery saves labor. Men save labor until thousands of them are without work and die of hunger on the streets. I want to secure employment and livelihood not only to part of the human race, but for all. I will not have the enrichment of a few at the expense of the community. At present the machine is helping a small minority to live on the exploitation of the masses. The motive force of this minority is not humanity or love of their kind, but greed and avarice.

With the increasingly important role of intelligent machines in all phases of our lives--military, medical, economic and financial, political--it is odd to keep reading articles with titles such as Whatever Happened to Artificial Intelligence? This is a phenomenon that Turing had predicted: that machine intelligence would become so pervasive, so comfortable, and so well integrated into our information-based economy that people would fail even to notice it.