Then, in the later decades of 18th century, as the Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain, there was another transition. In which the symbols of work were no longer the hoe and the plow; they replaced by the mill and the assembly line.
And now we stand at the brink of a change that will be the greatest of all, for work in its old sense will disappear altogether. To most people, work has always been an effortful exercising of mind or body—compelled by the bitter necessary of earning the necessities of life—plus an occasional period of leisure in which to rest or have fun.
With the Industrial Revolution, machinery—powered first by steam, then by electricity and internal combustion engines—took over the hard physical tasks and relieved the strain on human and animal muscles.
There remained, however, the “easier” labor—the labor that required the human eyes, ears, judgment and mind but no sweating. It nevertheless had its miseries, for it tended to be dull,
repetitions, and boring. And there is always the sour sense of endlessly doing something unpleasant under compulsion.
And yet, such jobs have been characteristic of the human condition in the first three quarters of the 20th century.They made too little demand on the human mind and spirit to keep them fresh and alive, made too much demand for any machine to serve the purpose—until now.
The electronic computer, invented in the 1940’ s and improve at the breakneck speed, was a machine that , for the first time, seemed compact enough, versatile enough and (most important of all) cheap enough to serve as the brains of affordable machines that their place on the assembly line and in the office.
This means that the dull, the boring, the repetitious, the mind-stultifying work will begin to disappear from the job market—is already beginning to disappear. This, of course, will introduce two vital sets of problem—is already introducing them.
First, what will happened to the human beings who have being working at these disappearing jobs?
Second, what will happen to the human beings that will do the news that will appear—jobs are demanding, interesting and mind-exercising, but that require a high-tech level of thought and education?
Clearly there will be a painful period of transition, one that is starting already, and one that will be in full swing as the 21st century begins.
The first problem, that of technological unemployment,will be temporary, for it will arise out of the fact that there is now a generation of the employees who have not been educated to fit the computer age. However, (in advantage nations, at least) they will be the last generation to be so lacking, so that with them this problem will disappear or, at least, diminish to the point of noncrisis proportions.
The second problem, that of developing a large enough number of high-tech minds to run a high-tech world—will be no problem at all, once we adjust our thinking.
In the first place, the computer age will introduce a total revolution in our notions of educations, and is beginning to do so now. The coming of the computer will mark learning fun, and a successfully stimulated mind will learn quickly. It will undoubtedly turn out that the “average” child is much intelligent and creative than we generally suppose. There was a time, after all. When the ability to read and write was confined to a very small group of “scholars” and almost all of them would have scouted the notion that just about anyone could learn the intricacies of literacy. Yet with mass education general literacy came to be a fact.
Right now, creativity seems to be confined to a very few, and it’ s easy to suppose that that is the way it must be.However, with the proper availability of computerized education, humanity will surprise the elite few once again.
According to the author, why will there be a painful period of transition in full swing as the 21st century begins?