Everyone seems to agree on one point: automation is inevitable, and work will have to undergo a great revolution. The question is whether that change will be for better or for worse. Most experts lean towards the latter and hope to find innovative solutions to contain the massive wave of layoffs. However, while the Western world believes robots will steal jobs, Japan decided to flip the equation and use robot waiters to provide employment for paraplegic people or those with reduced mobility that the labor market cannot (or will not) incorporate.
While reading these words, you are probably scrolling with your mouse, typing something on the keyboard, answering a phone call, or finishing the cup of coffee on your desk. They seem like small, almost insignificant details. But that everyday, minuscule profile of our actions makes us forget how privileged we are. Let's think for a moment about people paralyzed from head to toe, without motor activity, fed through tubes, and expressing themselves only through their eyes or a minimal movement of a facial muscle. Modern medicine does everything possible to restore their condition, but that is not enough. A sense of value and usefulness is critical, and in Japan they decided to explore a possibility: giving these people employment with the help of robots.
In April of last year, the company Ory Holdings opened a sort of hybrid between a café and a laboratory to evaluate the potential of using robots controlled by paraplegic humans as waiters. The robotic platform is called OriHime-D. Each unit weighs 20 kilograms, measures 120 centimeters tall, can speak, move, and manipulate basic objects, with a special emphasis on disposable coffee cups. The first OriHime-D was in charge of Nozomi Murata, who suffers from autophagic vacuolar myopathy, which causes skeletal muscle atrophy. We should also note that the robots can be controlled by people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, using only their eyes.
The most recent pilot test of the café, called 'Dawn ver. Beta' and inspired by the anime Time of Eve, ran from November 26 to 30 and December 3 to 7. Remote employees receive 1,000 yen per hour (just under 9 dollars), the standard wage for a part-time job in Japan. The project had assistance from The Nippon Foundation, the Avatar Robotic Consultative Association, All Nippon Airways, and the general public through a crowdfunding campaign. If everything goes well, the café will open its doors permanently in 2020, aiming for the Paralympic Games.
https://old.neoteo.com/el-futuro-de-la-automatizacion-y-por-que-nos-importa/
