I am sure the people who enjoy driving metro can do so in VR. Why would we forcefully hold onto a job that wastes human potential?
Maybe the issue is the difference in my understanding of human potential. There is simply so much more to do for these people that I can't see why someone would want to forcefully hold onto old ways. Why would you force a person to spend all days in tunnels?
Technology for automated metro is there for many years. Not using it is foolish. If you don't like people losing jobs, simply take the savings and employ the people elsewhere in the city, e.g. as bus drivers.
If want to help humans achieve their full potential, you need to have a system in place to enable that before you automate away their jobs. If you replaced all train conductors with robots today, most of them will wind up desperately scrambling for another (probably worse) unfulfilling job to keep food on the table.
Are you sure there is absolutely no shortage of workers and thus few dozens of people will be completely unable to live their lives anymore after you automate metro? I don't think that is true.
You said that there was "so much more to do for these people" that doesn't "waste human potential" if only we didn't "force" them to do dreary metro jobs. I'm saying that if you take away their dreary metro jobs, most of them will just wind up in dreary non-metro jobs unless we have a better situation standing by ready to receive them, which we don't.
If you want to free people from a life of drudgery, you need to offer an alternative, not just lay off all the drudges.
Edit: Or are you specifically opposed to underground jobs, not bad jobs in general?
The point is elsewhere, it doesn't matter whether the job is bad in my opinion or not. A metro rides on tracks in empty tunnels, and automated metros are technology from 1990's, not using it definitely wastes human potential. On the other hand, tram, bus or car driving is still a hard problem because of the unpredictability, so obviously, even though you're maybe not using your human potential to the fullest as a driver on the ground, it's at least something that a computer can't do, making it a valuable addition to the society, and it also saves these people from being locked to tunnels. I'm not sure about NYC in particular, but there are not enough bus drivers in the whole EU.
Maybe human potential isn’t that great. At least not for most people.
At a local grocery store they employ mentally handicap people to man the check out counters. They aren’t even aware that the automated counters make their jobs totally useless.
They are extremely slow at checkout.
And yet, I am very pleased with this grocery store because they’ve given a menial task to people who would otherwise have nothing. A chance to be in society and interact with us. Maybe, given the self checkout, it’s theater; but I don’t care. What’s the alternative for these people? Euthanasia? Do you see value in their lives?
You are missing my point. What you are describing is charity, and sure, let's do a lot of charity, way more than we do. I am also shopping at the local store where disabled people are the cashiers and I really like the social aspects. That whole concept is orthogonal to this discussion.
Let's not do something like non-automatic metro because ... What? I still don't know a single reason other than "these are jobs and they are considered prestigious and well paid" which is not a reason to me, especially since people here would say it about nearly every job I could talk about. There is not that much jobs today we can automate as well as riding trains, so why not start there?
I would hate myself if I decided that it's a good idea to force a person, even if they're mentally incapable (that would make it worse, actually), to spend whole days in tunnels, having to mindlessly push a button, when there is a proven way to easily automate. I just don't know why would someone do such a crazy thing from my point of view?
Maybe the issue is the difference in my understanding of human potential. There is simply so much more to do for these people that I can't see why someone would want to forcefully hold onto old ways. Why would you force a person to spend all days in tunnels?
Technology for automated metro is there for many years. Not using it is foolish. If you don't like people losing jobs, simply take the savings and employ the people elsewhere in the city, e.g. as bus drivers.