It didn't look like Rosie...

My friend and I stood at the counter of our local purveyor of fine fast foods. I was talking to a person behind the counter about whether to add extra cheese to my cheeseburger. From the corner of my eye, I saw a fellow placing his order at a kiosk. There was no human interaction, just the tapping, (gently rapping??) on the the user interface and then he walked away. His activity effected the same outcome as my quality time with the pimply faced teenager behind the register... delivery of a delicious but nutritionally dubious burger.

Robots are all around us. They don't look at all like Rosie from the Jetsons, but they're there, and the list of tasks they perform increases almost daily.

In the discussion that ensued, my friend tried to convince me that robots could never completely replace the human workforce. "After all", he said, "someone has to build the robots." I slowly chewed the conveyor belt cooked burger and nodded my head in approval....