10 ms·
> As the nurse incorporates AI into her job, the nurse is able to oversee and accomplish more. She can spend more time talking with patients and helping them un
by JacobiX 8d ago
> As the nurse incorporates AI into her job, the nurse is able to oversee and accomplish more. She can spend more time talking with patients and helping them understand diagnoses. Productivity increases.
This feels economically naïve.. If AI lets one nurse do the work that previously required two, the default pressure in a cost-driven system is not "great, now nurses can spend twice as long with patients" It is "great, now we can run the same operation with fewer nurses"
- watwut 8d agoMoreover, the nurse is frustrated, because she lost whatever agency and autonomy she had before. Her job is now obey whay AI said instead of making decisions by herself.
- jdiff 8d agoMarshall Brain really nailed it back in 2003 with Manna. https://marshallbrain.com/manna1 https://marshallbrain.com/manna1 AI leaves humans as the limbs of the machine, with less and less thinking or comprehension required on their part.
- morkalork 8d agoA reverse-centaur
- plastic-enjoyer 8d agoYeah, it will be assembly line working all over again.
- chrisjj 8d agoURL not responding here.
- jdiff 8d agoHm, also not responding here. I don't think this thread is well-trafficked enough to have hugged it to death, but here's a PDF alternative link: https://milweesci.weebly.com/uploads/1/3/2/4/13247648/mannapdf.pdf https://milweesci.weebly.com/uploads/1/3/2/4/13247648/mannap...
- chrisjj 7d agoThanks!
- yencabulator 7d agoHe died in 2024. The domain is paid for 10 years, but the hosting probably got shut off.
- imglorp 8d ago"meat proxy"
- asdff 7d agoAnd the less people are required to think, the less they think, the less they are able to think.
- RGamma 5d agoThis has already been the case with classical software. AI only stretches it further.
- JeremyNT 8d agoExactly. If their productivity fantasies are real, the precarious (and already very anti-worker) balance between capital and labor immediately disintegrates. Serious solutions to this would look like nationalizing tech companies, mandating shorter work weeks, seizing the assets of the oligarchs and redistributing them. Not... letting the invisible hand of the market sort it all out.
- bigbuppo 8d agoInvisible hands are the tool of pickpockets.
- boogieknite 8d agoyoure comment is getting to the real economic future: nursing unions will not sit back and let this happen. if the "productivity fantasies" (well said) are real this will get ugly. the competent nurses where i live are in strong unions
- WalterBright 8d agoThe industries with the highest costs - health care, housing, education - are the industries most heavily interfered with by the government. The industry with an absence of government interference, software, has seen prices drop to zero.
- throwawayqqq11 7d agoApples and oranges. You cannot allow certain vital services to be run profit driven, when you care about the quality of that service. Thats a nobrainer to me, because nobrain makes purchase descisions too. The IT sector in general doesnt deal with comparably vital services and is due to its immaterial nature much more competive. Driving costs to zero/minimum is a logical outcome of healthy free markets, which is a direct contradiction to profit driven enterprise. That is why Peter Tiel hates competition and my profit margins for eg, grocerie stores (healthy localized market) are quite low. The only way to satisfy the fiscal pressure, baked into the system and upheld by propaganda, of "get more or loose", is to cut spending/quality in such a market. And the only way to prevent that are institutions above the free markets slowly failing to deliver. This "slowly failing to deliver" is imo a key characteristic of late stage capitalism and i can see it everywhere (you too?). BC. in financialized economies, the incentive is elsewhere, than maintaining rural infra, "health care, housing, education".
- Gud 8d agoIt will bring down the prices for nursing and allow more people who previously couldn't afford health care to afford it, theoretically.
- thrance 8d agoHealthcare prices are not dictated by labor costs, but by how much the leeches who own everything are willing to charge people for it. For example, insulin is dirt cheap to make, yet billed at exorbitant amounts.
- FuriouslyAdrift 8d agoAt least in the US, the ACA recalibrated how insurance companies get re-imbursed. Their margains are set as a percentage of the payment that goes to direct care. If the prices go up and their margin ratio is fixed, then it is in their best interest for charges to go as high as possible. Same as everyone else in the supply chain. Everyone is suddenly making money hand over fist and the insured can't say no to the premiums. https://www.moneygeek.com/insurance/health/aca-medical-loss-ratio-profit-paradox/ https://www.moneygeek.com/insurance/health/aca-medical-loss-...
- arrowleaf 8d agoNo? Prices are market-driven in our society, not necessarily a function of labor costs. In the very long-term best case scenario, the increased profits going to the company from these efficiency gains may encourage more competitors to pop up, and either drive prices down or offer more for what you pay.
- engeljohnb 8d agoI know this is just an example, but I'm going to say this every time the subject comes up: since human lives are the cost of making the wrong decisions, AI can't be allowed to be a decision maker of any kind in healthcare. If my blood pressure crashes because my nurse is caring for 15 patients at once and didn't notice that the AI decided to pause my norepinephrine, I won't consider "the AI did it" to be any acceptable excuse.
- zahlman 8d agoI want to emphasize your point. As a basic matter of valuing humanity qua humanity, this holds even if the AI could be shown to make the decisions more accurately than a human could. In fact, especially in those circumstances, if we take the warnings of X-risk even slightly seriously.
- RigelKentaurus 8d agoNot to say that I don't agree with you to an extent, but you should see AI-delivered healthcare numbers to human-delivered and make it a fair comparison. From Google: "Annual Deaths: Over 250,000 people die each year in the U.S. due to medical errors made by healthcare professionals, including doctors and nurses. Ranking: This figure positions medical errors as the third leading cause of death in the United States, following heart disease and cancer." It is highly possible that in a few years, AI will be a lot safer in the majority of healthcare situations.
- ryandrake 8d agoThe difference is that humans are at least supposed to be accountable for those 250,000 errors. Those humans can naturally care about doing a good job, or they can be motivated to care. They can fear consequences and take pride in avoiding mistakes. AI can do none of this, and cannot be held accountable for mistakes. I would take a human with a 10% mistake rate but who can be held accountable, over an AI with a 0.1% mistake rate that is totally unaccountable for its mistakes.
- jurgenburgen 8d ago
- d3dd 8d agoIt shows a complete lack of understanding of what these people actually do.
- deleted 8d ago[deleted]
- vkou 8d agoMeanwhile, costs will somehow go up by 40%.
- pezezin 8d agoMy dad is a retired nurse. Most of his work was giving shots, treating wounds, extracting blood, putting IV catheters, etc. In other words, physical tasks. How is an "AI agent" or LLM going to take care of that?
- derektank 8d agoObviously not an LLM, but AI models + robotics are likely to automate many healthcare tasks in the long term and are already beginning to automate tasks like blood draws. The Aletta autonomously handles each step of the blood draw, while a trained phlebotomist initiates each session and remains available to respond to any issues throughout. The device guides the patient to position their arm, after which the patient or supervisor presses a button to start the blood draw. The Aletta then uses near-infrared light and Doppler ultrasound to locate a suitable vein and tell it apart from arteries. If no appropriate vein is found, the device will not attempt the procedure. Once a vein is identified, the Aletta proceeds through the remaining steps on its own: applying a tourniquet, preparing the skin, inserting and disposing of the needle, changing collection tubes and placing a bandage. The supervising phlebotomist confirms that collection tubes are filled in the correct order and verifies that all tubes are adequately full following the procedure. https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-authorizes-first-its-kind-robotic-blood-draw-device https://www.fda.gov/news-events/press-announcements/fda-auth...
- beachy 8d agoWhen I watch medical professionals at work, a lot of the time they are writing or typing, reading or shuffling through notes, talking to others or waiting for results from some lab down the hall. Or any number of things that to me look like crappy admin tasks. I'm sure they aren't all, but friends who work in the hospital tell tales of woeful inefficiencies and pointless beauracracy. Of course YMMV and this is a public health system.
- pezezin 8d agoThis was also a public health system (Spain), but I guess it might depend on the country. Now that you mentions labs, he spent the last 10 years of his career (maybe more, I don't remember clearly) working at a food analysis lab and there was a lot of waiting for results there, but it is what it is, microorganisms take their time to grow and no LLM in the world can make them go faster.
- marginalia_nu 8d agoAnthropic is eyeing an IPO. Of course they're spinning a narrative where their product will reshape the entire economy. They have a vested interest in doing so in the most literal sense of the meaning.
- pj_mukh 8d agoActually it is “great, now this nurse can bathe and give company to two patients instead of one with her paperwork otherwise taken card of”
- nostrademons 8d agoNurses do actually end up spending more time with patients, it's just that they spend more time with rich patients. The actual, tangible form this is taking right now is concierge medicine, home health aids, private practice, etc. My wife's (very good) ob-gyn had enough of working in institutionalized medicine where she's paid about what a L4 FANG engineer makes and pretty much has to follow the script that the health-care system dictates, and quit. Now she does perimenopause consultations for FANG execs at $1200/hour. My uphill neighbors are in their 90s. I think the wife was in VC or something back in the 70s and 80s. There's a steady stream of nurses and home health aids up to their property. Seems like they've got a full care team working out of their home. Across industry and industry, we see the same pattern. The mass-market product gets cheaper and less labor intensive, at the expense of any human touch. Everybody displaced, if they're any good and wants to stay in the field, moves up-market to do custom professional services for rich people. They pay for it, because if you want people to do good work for you, you have to pay them more than they can get otherwise.
- bmitc 7d agoThis has a surprisingly easy solution: get rid of the rich. It's never, in the history of the world, been in anyone's favor, except the oligarchy, to privatize everything.
- austhrow743 7d agoUse technological gains to reduce costs while maintaining results hasn't been the historical rule for healthcare so I think you should say what makes this technological gain unique.
- xg15 7d agoYeah, this whole blog was repeating the old fairy tale narrative of automation "if we automate the work then workers will have sooo much more time!" I'm surprised they expect people to still believe that stuff.
- slfnflctd 8d agoOur culture and the socioeconomic structures it reinforces will not change easily. More than ever, I feel we need both grassroots activism and key players at the top of the hierarchy. Otherwise, it is all too obvious where most of the rewards from increased productivity will go. The wealth hoarding has got to be curtailed.
- throwawayqqq11 7d agoWhat changes fast thou, is economic structures and societal structures will follow. This is classic marx (base<->superstructure) or the power aspect of economics. One true dystopia i see possible, is mecha hitler slowly displacing and controlling (white collar) city dwellers to the point of silent obedience. This Anthropic article is imo propganda to buy time for shareholders and to delay potential stroms. Claiming AI as actors in a capitlistic system will fix systemic issues, is like claiming super sonic planes will fix world hunger.
- alphawhisky 8d agoCall me crazy, but maybe our healthcare shouldn't be a "cost driven system". Maybe that was the issue before AI. But hell, what do I know?
- nickpp 7d agoWhat exactly do you think should be the motivator for people working in healthcare then? For companies creating healthcare products and services? For investors pouring money into health care research? The goodness of their hearts?
- JacobiX 8d ago[dead]
- Squarex 8d agoIt will always be until we have unlimited resources.
- sheauwn 8d agoCosts can continue to be a factor in something, it is in most things, without it being the "driver".
- lotsofpulp 8d agoWhat does cost driven system and driver even mean? The cost of something is the ratio of demand to supply. If something is not costing a lot, then it means there is sufficient supply that obtaining it is not going to require sacrifices elsewhere. If something does cost a lot, then it means there isn't sufficient supply, and obtaining it is going to require sacrifices elsewhere. Healthcare is obviously one of those things, especially with a top heavy population age histogram, where supply is not going to be sufficient so costs will remain high. And if costs are high, then obviously they will decide how resources get allocated, that is the very nature of something that is high cost.
- woah 8d agoIt is possible to spend an infinite amount of money keeping a human being alive, and every year there are more ways to spend more money keeping someone alive a little longer. Once you're not spending an infinite amount of money for each person, you are in the territory of denied claims, "death panels", waiting lists, and all the other things people like to complain about depending on their political persuasion.
- simianwords 8d ago> This feels economically naïve.. not really. almost all technological processes have increased the quality of the service.
- JacobiX 8d agoAir travel is a good counterexample here: technology made airlines far more productive, but much of the gain went into lower staffing, higher throughput, and cost cutting not a better passenger experience
- WalterBright 8d agoIf you were right, the airlines would be highly profitable. They aren't. Where the gains went are lower ticket prices.
- triceratops 8d agoTo be fair it is a better passenger experience at that price point.
- bitmasher9 8d agoI once saw a receipt for a cross-country train ride in the late 1950s and was shocked at the price. It was significantly slower and more expensive than a similar plane ticket today.
- brailsafe 8d agoThat tends to be true now as well for a variety of reasons. I'd be more interested in the cost then between both modes of travel.
- SoftTalker 8d agoYes, in the USA Amtrak tends to be quite a bit more expensive than the equivalent trip by air. And far slower. Maybe excluding some of the east coast commuter routes.
- cucumber3732842 8d ago>great, now we can run the same operation with fewer nurses" And outside of industries with government enforced perversions of simple "supply and demand" forces (we're not talking Nth level effects here) this means more access to the service or lower prices or both. Edit: Which is to say you won't see any benefit in healthcare but you will in a ton of other industries.
- jplusequalt 8d ago>And outside of industries with government enforced perversions of simple "supply and demand" forces (we're not talking Nth level effects here) this means more access to the service or lower prices or both. Greater access at the expense of the number of people employed is not necessarily a net positive. In the case of healthcare, the data is fairly clear that higher nurse staffing ratios lead to better patient outcomes (read: decreased chance of death or serious complications). This is particularly true for ED and ICU nurses. Also, in the case of healthcare, I'm fairly certain that hospitals in the US are legally not allowed to turn patients away. So "lack of access" is not currently a problem for serious medical emergencies.
- psadauskas 8d agoDuring the industrial revolution, people thought that all these new machines and factories and electricity meant that everyone would only have to work 4 hours a week since it made everyone so much more productive. That's not what happened, though. Everyone worked the same amount for the same pay, just in more miserable repetitive working conditions, while the factory owners kept all profits from the gains in productivity.
- d3dd 8d ago"while the factory owners kept all profits from the gains in productivity." Because this is what drives continual risk-capital.. very few countries are willing to upset this. Get over it man - I hate hardended capitalists but stop crying. This is the system we have. Wanna beat it? Go ahead and start a firm. Then you'll find out how tough it is. The thing I cant get over is enough software engineering folks collectively hold immense power. Whats wrong with you lot (im not a software engineer)? Get your sht together. P.s. Im starting a firm who's central mission is to attack capitalists (ofc I won't say it out loud in that way). I will find out for myself how much of a backbone software engineers etc have when I employ them.
- fg137 8d agoI didn't read the article but headed straight to comments because I cannot trust a single word Anthropic says about economy. They have an incentive to play dumb and talk as if AI is net positive for the world.
- NickHirras 8d agoOne of the sections is: A profound economic transformation In the extreme scenario, AI is more productive than humans at the vast majority of knowledge-work tasks. It does nearly all of them autonomously, and it creates essentially no new knowledge tasks for people. This scenario would likely require recursively self-improving AI, adopted quickly for knowledge work. As AI diffuses, annual GDP growth rates reach 15% a year, leading the economy to double in size every 4.5 years. As a society, we’re far richer than we’ve ever been, but many fewer workers have jobs in knowledge work, and unemployment has risen beyond typical recessionary levels.
- fhejfnenjdcn 8d agoMass automation will be disastrous for GDP in service economies. Service economies exist to provide services to other people who also provide services. If the services themselves get automated, you don't need that massive inefficient system to support service-providing workers anymore. GDP goes to zero.
- Ekaros 7d agoI believe lot of "service" jobs are fundamentally make up work. Or not actually productive. Just there because it can be afforded. Or someone decided that it is "needed". Some amount of it produces net negative value. Some neutral and lot probably value we could even manage without it. Actual productive value is probably not that big part. Now replace all that and you still produce same overall. Not more actual physical stuff.
- fhejfnenjdcn 7d agoI agree, but as long as we're measuring GDP, it's catastrophic.
- randusername 8d agoThe whole idea that AI will usher in this utopia where workers in healthcare are able to realign their primary job functions with obvious value creation by sweeping all the paperwork under the rug is just silly. It will just fester out of sight and out of mind: audit bots and compliance bots and malpractice bots and insurance bots will arms race creating such a mess it will become unfixable.
- zhivota 8d agoThere's an optimistic future where Medicare becomes so much more efficient it becomes politically obvious to expand it because it's outperforming the mess that is private sector healthcare. With AI I could actually see this being a possibility since it doesn't depend on a huge army of competent employees in a government office.
- pydry 8d agoIt feels economically naive because theyre presuming LLMs are magical boxes that replace humans. I doubt 99% of what a nurse does would be meaningfully aided by an LLM and where it would help it'd probably be a crappy band aid around a bigger festering issue anyway (e.g. poorly managed IT, deliberately confusing insurance processes).