How AI threatens to make traditional college degree ‘obsolete’

[Kamaji]

How AI threatens to make traditional college degree ‘obsolete’: experts

By Brooke Kato
Published Oct. 5, 2023

The golden standard of the bachelor’s degree is in peril as artificial intelligence rapidly advances and employers seek workers who are well-versed in that technology.

“AI’s going to make it virtually impossible for a one-off moment of learning [like a degree] to last an entire career,” LinkedIn CEO Ryan Roslansky said this week at the Talent Connect Summit, a conference of the country’s 2,000 top recruiters.

As smart tech progresses, jobs will be expected to evolve, placing an emphasis on people skills rather than trade tasks that can be learned by a machine.

LinkedIn executives highlighted the “critical” need for up-skilling as AI technology develops, meaning that employee adaptability will be an expectation, rendering program-oriented four-year degrees virtually useless.

As a result of technological innovation in the past decade, whole industries have turned “upside down,” Indeed CEO Chris Hyams said last month as he also warned that college-learned skills could become “obsolete.”

Job skills are projected to change by 65% by 2030, according to data from LinkedIn, as listings mentioning ChatGPT or similar generative AI have increased by more than 20-fold since last year.

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Source:  https://nypost.com/2023/10/05/how-ai-threatens-to-make-traditional-college-degree-obsolete/

[jmyrlefuller]

The company’s Future of Work Report estimated the fraction of tasks that could be performed by a machine by occupation — saying 96% of a software engineer’s job could benefit or be taken over by AI, while only 6% of a nurse’s job could potentially be augmented by the software.

Oh, great. Basically the economy will become increasingly one-dimensional as the population ages. Anyone who isn't interested in working in the health care industry or old, sick people who are constantly complaining will be left behind.

[libertybele]

Oh, great. Basically the economy will become increasingly one-dimensional as the population ages. Anyone who isn't interested in working in the health care industry or old, sick people who are constantly complaining will be left behind.

Careful there @jmyrlefuller I realize that you are younger then most of us but one day you will be aged -- it happens to the best of us.

I have read where AI intelligence will be able to replace doctors, perform surgeries, etc., so I don't know how lucrative the health care industry will remain.

[DB]

AI has a long way to go to actually be competitive to thinking humans. Key word is thinking.

[berdie]

AI has a long way to go to actually be competitive to thinking humans. Key word is thinking.

I hope you are right. I can see these machines we created out thinking the creators. Not today, but not too far off.

[jmyrlefuller]

Careful there @jmyrlefuller I realize that you are younger then most of us but one day you will be aged -- it happens to the best of us.

I have read where AI intelligence will be able to replace doctors, perform surgeries, etc., so I don't know how lucrative the health care industry will remain.

My point—as ill-worded as it is—is that not everyone is fit for it.

A healthy economy puts the assets of its citizens to work. That requires a vibrant, multi-dimensional job market. If the economy continues at its current path, it will grow increasingly one-dimensional. Those of us with different skills but aren't fit for that line of work will be poorly suited for it. We'll be forced into jobs we hate because the jobs we can do well are gone. Yet they'll tell us there's a skills gap and a shortage. No. The economy's out of balance, that's what it is, and you want people to do stuff they aren't able to do.

You wanna see why the younger generations are so disgusted with capitalism? This is why. We were sold STEM fields are the future only to have AI take those away, too, with our student loan debts to boot. (I paid mine off but that's not as viable now.)

[berdie]

Well, the trades are in dire need. To find a competent HVAC tech, plumber, electrician, painter, foundation repair person....etc is a true blessing. And they are swamped with work, expensive...and cocky.

I don't see how AI or outsourcing will affect those folks.

[Smokin Joe]

Careful there @jmyrlefuller I realize that you are younger then most of us but one day you will be aged -- it happens to the best of us.

I have read where AI intelligence will be able to replace doctors, perform surgeries, etc., so I don't know how lucrative the health care industry will remain.

Some tasks will not be replaced. I do not see AI changing sheets or emptying bedpans any time soon. It's the high dollar jobs which will be the targets.

Replace a bunch of doctors, and that will have an impact on the insurance industry, which sucks up a considerable chunk of their pay in malpractice insurance premiums.

[Smokin Joe]

Well, the trades are in dire need. To find a competent HVAC tech, plumber, electrician, painter, foundation repair person....etc is a true blessing. And they are swamped with work, expensive...and cocky.

I don't see how AI or outsourcing will affect those folks.

Some jobs have to be done in person, by competent personnel. Keep in mind that AI will be no better than its programmers, and they may know programming, but someone will have to tell them what to program.

[berdie]

Some jobs have to be done in person, by competent personnel. Keep in mind that AI will be no better than its programmers, and they may know programming, but someone will have to tell them what to program.

@Smokin Joe I agree to an extent. I have tried really hard to understand the whole concept. It's way too deep for my shallow little mind.

But from what I can discern, once it is programmed initially, it expands on it's own by picking up words/ideas/other programs on it's own.

That's scary to me.

[Smokin Joe]

@Smokin Joe I agree to an extent. I have tried really hard to understand the whole concept. It's way too deep for my shallow little mind.

But from what I can discern, once it is programmed initially, it expands on it's own by picking up words/ideas/other programs on it's own.

That's scary to me.

Will it wire a house? Plumb a toilet that does not back up for poor venting? Does it know the 'tricks of the trade'? For plaster? Drywall? Roofing? Can it fix my vehicle? It can't think any better than it is programmed, and where that program meets the actual (not theoretical) behaviour of humans, it will get very interesting. 

Johnny, why did you flush that hand towel?
Whaddya mean it's a bad idea to plug a power strip into another power strip?

etc...

[jmyrlefuller]

Will it wire a house? Plumb a toilet that does not back up for poor venting? Does it know the 'tricks of the trade'? For plaster? Drywall? Roofing? Can it fix my vehicle? It can't think any better than it is programmed, and where that program meets the actual (not theoretical) behaviour of humans, it will get very interesting. 

Johnny, why did you flush that hand towel?
Whaddya mean it's a bad idea to plug a power strip into another power strip?

etc...

It can teach an end-user to do any of those things without relying on paying someone exorbitant money to do it.

[Wingnut]

It can teach an end-user to do any of those things without relying on paying someone exorbitant money to do it.

Have you seen the average end-user lately.  Most of them can barely poor piss out of a boot.

[Smokin Joe]

Have you seen the average end-user lately.  Most of them can barely poor piss out of a boot.

There is a reason many of the trades are licensed, and it isn't necessarily greed on the licensing agency's part. Would you want to buy a house built, plumbed, roofed, wired by someone who was just listening to the AI? Or would you want people who know what they are doing? Some of the DIY out there is a real parade of failures.

And that's coming from a guy who has done demo, framing, drywall, concrete, a little wiring, and sweats the joints in the copper plumbing in his house when it needs to be replaced/modified. If I had the tools available, I'd have no problem with steel fabrication. I also do a lot of my own mechanic work, and have built Chevy and Ford engines, not to mention motorcycles.
But I have also been told I am not the ''average' person when it comes to all that, I do not hesitate to ask friends who know more when I have a question, and I know my own limitations.
While some of that was learned on jobs I have worked, professionally, I am a Geologist, not a tradesman.

But nowadays, I find there are a lot of people out there who get lost checking their own oil, and can't change a tire, much less hang a door, or patch drywall so you can't tell there was a problem.

They could refer to YouTube for how-to videos, often done by skilled amateurs or professionals, and that might be more help than an AI, but even that does not guarantee results that are acceptable.