Are Junior players being set up for a tough life?

Off topic but there's a significant difference between world beater vs world and world beater vs kid.* Maybe it's not real to Strickland. Maybe not. They both played well enough to win their engagements, that's all I can tell.

*see Strickland vs Seo
I’m confused- what do you mean? That one solid match against a world class player doesn’t prove much?
 
I agree with that assessment in the short term, plumbers/carpenters etc "can't be replaced" But I think that's only in the near future. Looking down the line a bit, I don't believe that at all. My first grandson was just born and I fear there won't be any sort of job for him in 20 years.

Robotics and general automation has come a long way in a short time. It's not right in front of you yet so it's not on our radar so to speak. And it has done so without AI being on board. Now that AGI is the goal for all these global tech corporations, expect to robotics to be kicked into overdrive with the goal of replacing ALL HUMAN LABOR this is the only way these companies can turn a profit and that is absolutely their only goal damn the fallout/consequences. I could talk/complain about this all day. The future is quite BLEAK no matter what path you choose I'm afraid.
https://www.cnn.com/2026/04/19/china/china-robot-half-marathon-intl-hnk
 
OK, so one day there will be a robot that can give Filler the seven. How will this affect the game long-term?
his quote "overdrive with the goal of replacing ALL HUMAN LABOR" wasn't referring to having an effect on the game as much as people having choices in how they make a living, which I believe was part of the dicussion. That was my impression anyway.
 
his quote "overdrive with the goal of replacing ALL HUMAN LABOR" wasn't referring to having an effect on the game as much as people having choices in how they make a living, which I believe was part of the dicussion. That was my impression anyway.
I reacted to the attached article about the robot that broke the world record in the half marathon, thinking about how it might translate to pro pool. There's every reason to believe that a pool playing robot might greatly excel one day.
 
OK, so one day there will be a robot that can give Filler the seven. How will this affect the game long-term?
I use the paraphrase, "Make what you take." (It's a conceptual thing :LOL: ) If a bot could just manage that, people would learn what the players are trying and take it to the next level.
 
his quote "overdrive with the goal of replacing ALL HUMAN LABOR" wasn't referring to having an effect on the game as much as people having choices in how they make a living, which I believe was part of the dicussion. That was my impression anyway.
Correct. More of a commentary on the world and our trajectory than pool specific.

The fallout of all of this will touch all jobs, tasks and even yes our silly pursuits and activities.
 
I'm sure many will remember the TV show from the mid-1970s called the "Six Million Dollar Man." It was predicated on the idea that it was possible to reengineer a human being in a way that made him faster, stronger, and gave him better vision. While it all seemed pretty farfetched in the 1970s, I am starting to think it might be possible. If it is, it will have far reaching implications in many areas of life, including sports.
 
well it kind of puts the routine advice "go get a college education" into perspective. in three years so much have changed, that it may not be a great advice anymore. it's the white collar jobs that are predicted to go first, and are already disappearing
 
well it kind of puts the routine advice "go get a college education" into perspective. in three years so much have changed, that it may not be a great advice anymore. it's the white collar jobs that are predicted to go first, and are already disappearing
Your observation is what I think the OP does not take into account.

I don't care if robots play pool. I also think a lot of people will probably agree with me. I care how humans play pool or run marathons. When it comes to human competition in sports, it's not interesting to me if we design a robot to do the sport better.

The original questions was about whether young people are set up for a difficult life, because the terrible adults in their life don't prevent them from attempting to become professional pool players.

My point is this: all jobs...and I mean all jobs, but especially jobs that have previously been insulated from technological advances like entry-level white collar work--the kind young people do--will be disrupted in a negative way sooner rather than later. On top of this challenge, you have to consider the cost of obtaining the education to make people "qualified" for entry-level white collar work is extremely expensive, and it requires most people to take out loans that cannot be discharged in bankruptcy. Still further, old people are not retiring, so they are remaining in jobs to prevent middle-aged workers from advancing, and when older people do retire, they are "retiring" to lower-level jobs and working part-time sometimes--maybe the kind of jobs young people would start out with. Would an employer rather have a part-time senior employee with a career of experience or a full-time young person that has no experience?

When you consider the costs of a four-year degree, you have to consider that the market is almost demanding a graduate degree these days for white-collar work...unless your bachelors is in a field where they will allow you to pursue that during your career. Even then, many people still have to get an MBA or some kind of Masters. The real final cost of the education is the cost in money + the cost in time spent in obtaining the degree before any "real" career and earning begins. Should we encourage young people to engage in 5-7 years of expensive education for the chance to compete in a market place that prefers A.I. or older experienced workers? To me, it is a tough sell.

I agree with the sentiment that becoming a world-class pro pool player is hard. The problem is that breaking into lucrative white-collar work is also hard, and it's getting harder by the day and the prospects for this work in the future gets bleaker by the day. (in part, because of A.I.).

I agree that in the near future the trades offer an attractive answer to the problem I mentioned above. However, I live near a well-known and highly reputable trade school. Its student body gets bigger every year and not by a small amount. My little town is busting at the seems with future diesel mechanics, which is fine...for now. How many diesel mechanics do we need? I realize there is a shortage, but year after year of rising class size will chip away at this.

In the near term, most young pool players should probably be diesel mechanics or join the military (of course they might die in the military) as opposed to attempting a career on the WNT. However, we don't know the individual complexities that adorn the decisions of any particular young person. Given the changing dynamics in this area, I think it's good to acknowledge that and let people make their own choices without shouting criticism from the boomer peanut gallery.

I also think the path to being world class at any discipline is extremely hard, but information on how to get there is cheaper and easier to obtain than it has ever been.

If there is a silver lining here, maybe it's that in the future more people will play great pool and more people will enjoy watching great pool, because A.I. is doing our work...right before it kills us.

kollegedave
 
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