The steam drill didn't beat John Henry, the system of technology, resources, and people behind the steam drill did. Until a computer decides that it wants to win a chess tournament and teaches itself how to play, humans will always be at the helm.
The problem is that it could be just one human. One person could own all of the machines. They would advise him, protect him, and carry out all of his orders.
Just imagine the President having his entire White House automated. The NSA? Automated. The military? Automated. Police? You get the picture. Robots and computers replacing everybody. One person in charge. 100% loyalty. Small pockets of resistance trying to hack into and take over robots, data centres, etc. Vast computing resources under the ruler's command employing all manner of encryption, fuzz testing, logging, surveillance, etc. in an attempt to eliminate the resistance.
It's like the plot of the Terminator movies without the general AI in charge. Instead, it's a legion of special purpose AIs serving the one guy.
The AI doesn't need to be fully conscious to kick a human's arse in the workspace.
> Operate what? At the current pace the only operating required will be flicking the ON button.
Maybe GP refers to a human operating the expert system like a manager operates an expert. :) And managers make good money on that, so no problem here.
No but that's the entire problem. Why computer "assisted" when computers are getting to the point where they can do it on their own completely?
Robotics already outperform humans physically, and AI is (in many areas) approaching humans. So the risk here is complete replacement, not supplementing.
In the near term your solutions are solid, but that's a band aid. Humans will soon simply no longer be able to compete at all except for niches.
>the human simply operates the expert system.
Operate what? At the current pace the only operating required will be flicking the ON button.
>when was the last time you calculated an amortization schedule by hand
5.5 years ago. :p