Ronnie LoSordo, post #3 period 5!

I. Robots could do work of 3.5 million people by '25
Friday April 4, 2008, Kyodo News
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nb20080404a3.html
II. As we all know Japan is greatly known for their great technological knowledge, video games, cars, computers you name it. But now a concept that was only believed in fictional movies, is now real. Japan is considering creating robots to do most labor in society. Japan calculates that in 2025 Japan could face a labor shortage of 4.27 million. The issue is the declining birthrate and the masses of retirement of baby boomers. So in result Japan wants to create advanced robots. They believe the invention and popularization will cover around 80 percent of the labor shortage 2025. They project that the robots will become a stay-at-home robot doing household chores, they believe that if this happens more women can enter the labor market. The specified 3 areas of work that the robots would be in would be; agriculture, medical and nursing care services, and cleaning and delivery. The government is said to be addressing this conflict now with The whole concept of this idea is frightening, because these "advanced robots" could take over the concept of labor or hard work.
III. A) This article is closely related to the AP Theme "development and transformation of social structures" It does because the idea of robots taking over most of the jobs in society could completely change how social classes are ranked. With the idea of the "working class" be destroyed the economic and social structures may be completely altered with this faint yet terrifying idea.
B) This conflict could be closely related to a decreasing birth rate and an increasing retirement rate. The calculations show a shortage of more than 4 million people of the working class, and with panic, this idea could've easily sprung up anywhere, hopefully not to be carried out.
C) The point of view would most likely be from a male or female from Japan, since the whole idea is being introduced in Japan.
D) There is no definite signs that show that you should approach this article with any caution. At the end he/she explains how the government will try to solve the problem by "considering using more foreign workers and retired people to address these issues." This shows that he probably doesn't want this to happen.
E) To get a full understanding of this problem, I would need to hear an opinion from a male or female from the working class in Japan. This would help because it would show how the Japanese workers would feel if they had there jobs taken away by robots.
F) I believe that the concept pf robots taking over the working class of society is very frightening. I've seen the movie I-Robot and when I had seen this film, I never would have thought that something like that could ever happen nonetheless in my lifetime. I believe that the work in society keeps the society in order and stabilizes it also. Although we do have poverty problems, robots would make this worse because the opportunity of receiving a job would be slim to none. I for one, who is receiving a job this summer, believe that this idea should not happen any time soon however bad the population decrease is.