I also work in manufacturing metal parts, mainly because it pays better and is more stable than using my creative skill, and I am currently without a workshop. Creative skills are often devalued on here as well as operating skills are devalued in factories. The 'industrial revolution' is often cited as the end all argument, despite a complete lack of understanding of the skills and labor required for both manufacturing and creative processes, to appropriate the efforts of said creative skills for free. And as someone who has had to 'wrangle the robots' in our semi automated line I can safely say automation is not nearly as widespread or glorious as it is made out to be. The data didn't fall from the sky and it wasn't created by robots. It takes humans to make data just like it takes humans to work in factories.

Everything you said about factory work is also true of creative work. Authors will tell you that it's 10% writing and 90% rewriting.

I try not to guess at motives and goals of people I don't know because I don't think they matter. It doesn't sound like your opinions would change if Altman submitted to a brain scan where you could verify his purity (or not), and honestly mine wouldn't either. And no, I dobn't see pathos in for-profit entities talking about safety. Carmakers, construction companies, and theme parks all do the same thing.

I see AI as a productivity multiplier, much as you described factory automation. And I see a lot of information workers suddenly echoing the same concerns we all ignored from factory workers, because oh wow now it could affect us.

> I am talking about creative work. The kind of work where people had to go and first identify the issue themselves (not to mention come up with a unique solution in the first place), and then tell others how to work with it.

I’m sure film photographers complained about digital photography when it was first introduced. And painters about film photography. Etc etc.