[gcfffgfg]

Maybe human potential isn’t that great. At least not for most people.

At a local grocery store they employ mentally handicap people to man the check out counters. They aren’t even aware that the automated counters make their jobs totally useless.

They are extremely slow at checkout.

And yet, I am very pleased with this grocery store because they’ve given a menial task to people who would otherwise have nothing. A chance to be in society and interact with us. Maybe, given the self checkout, it’s theater; but I don’t care. What’s the alternative for these people? Euthanasia? Do you see value in their lives?

[TomMarius]

You are missing my point. What you are describing is charity, and sure, let's do a lot of charity, way more than we do. I am also shopping at the local store where disabled people are the cashiers and I really like the social aspects. That whole concept is orthogonal to this discussion.

Let's not do something like non-automatic metro because ... What? I still don't know a single reason other than "these are jobs and they are considered prestigious and well paid" which is not a reason to me, especially since people here would say it about nearly every job I could talk about. There is not that much jobs today we can automate as well as riding trains, so why not start there?

I would hate myself if I decided that it's a good idea to force a person, even if they're mentally incapable (that would make it worse, actually), to spend whole days in tunnels, having to mindlessly push a button, when there is a proven way to easily automate. I just don't know why would someone do such a crazy thing from my point of view?