Preparing to welcome the robots that will spare SA job losses and pain
Benefits of the fourth industrial revolution will outweigh negatives only if we have a plan, writes Njabulo Skhosana
A fourth industrial revolution (involving convergence of the physical, biological and digital) is under way. Central to it is the emergence of artificial intelligence-based technologies such as robotics, machine learning, natural language processing, computer vision and speech recognition — collectively called cognitive technologies. Companies and researchers are rapidly bringing new products and services to market and transforming entire industries. The defining quality of these technologies is that they allow machines to be used for physical and mental tasks that were previously only the domain of humans. Some of these technologies have proven to be more productive than human labour and have various points of application across the economy, from agriculture to medicine, banking and more. The anticipated increases in productivity could no doubt provide a much-needed boost to global economic growth and result in significant socioeconomic benefits. As such, use of these technologies ...
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