Agricultural Robotics: The production of agricultural robots is done in stages. The first generation of robots is being developed as crop scouts that collect data in the field. The second generation of robots will be able to perform field operations such as mechanical weeding and micro spraying. This operation will most likely be performed with large robots that resemble current equipment. The third generation of robots will be as part of a fully autonomous crop production system.
Photo: Robohub.org & Vision Robotics Corporation
Like Pandora’s Box once opened, the inexorable progression of robotic labor-replacing technology in the fields is leaving us with a dilemma.
Do we try to stop or slow down robotization, as did some workers who destroyed factories or machinery during early capitalism? Do we blame and attack the foreign worker, as has happened so often in U.S. and European history? Or do we do something entirely different?
First, we have to realize that the new labor-replacing technology is being introduced because the individual capitalist is obligated to do so in order to survive cutthroat competition with other capitalists.
In the past, labor-enhancing technology meant that a section of working people could live better than the rest, at least until the competition caught up. Often, this meant that workers in developed countries such as the United States could count on wages up to ten times higher than in lesser developed countries such as Mexico.
The introduction of labor-replacing technology has totally changed the landscape. Industrial cities such as Detroit have been devastated by this new technology. The high-paid jobs with benefits of these workers are gone, and even their pension benefits are being attacked.
Now something similar is happening in the agricultural heartland of the country. The stall in immigration reform is related to this.
Capitalism has nowhere else to expand than at our expense. t has penetrated every corner of the globe, and is eliminating the distinction between town and country.
We stand on the threshold of an entirely new world, if only we grasp the significance of our time and act accordingly. If the new technology is in humanity’s hands, we can achieve it. This will take a revolution in our thinking and demand our uniting as a class. If we do not act, we can be certain of more repression, misery, war, and suffering.
As the visionary Martin Luther King once said: “I have seen the promised land.” If only we do the right thing, then we can also say: “Free at last! (from want and persecution and for a better life.)”
