"The Unfortunate Shape of Things to Come..."

mrrsm

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Most of the time… the majority of our concerns and repair needs force each of us to do our own “retrospective” and look back in time into the history and designs of our vehicles than can go as far back as 25 Years or more involving GM Automotive Designs to solve these problems. But for those of you a whole lot younger than I am (by perhaps more than a Half Century here…) you will all be dealing with what Herbert George Wells coined as “The Shape of Things to Come...” involving some very extreme changes in the designs and hardware of vehicles that; beginning with 2018 and looking far into your futures... will be coming with astonishing speed... putting many these vehicles almost completely out of the reach of even the most accomplished among us to repair.

This topic is not just some abstract thought experiment that I’ve conjured up for you all to consider for my own amusement. I have a very personal, very real and dreadful memory of the awful consequences that came along with the sudden sea change to the Automotive Repair Industry that occurred in the late 1980s to a very close friend of mine. “Jerry L” was a good, solid family man… with a thriving Small Automotive Repair Shop. He was a generous and friendly man who could barely write his own name… but he was capable of putting his gifted hands to the building of powerful engines for Dragster Race Cars and he had a large local clientele of faithful and loving customers in need of Common Auto Repairs that allowed him to support a wife and four children very well for almost two decades.

But then in the late 1980s ... Almost overnight… his customers began to purchase vehicles that were literally “Beyond The Scope” of his abilities to effectively repair. With the loss of revenue from all those paying customers… his life rapidly unraveled to the point where a man who could hardly read had managed to do so well for so long… finally ....saw no way out of his troubles. Sadly… He killed himself in his garage soon thereafter. That was my first introduction into the affect that OBD1 and OBD2 Design Changes would soon have upon the Automotive Industry... and to me The First Casualty to fall in the Age of Electronically Controlled Automobiles.

And so… I would encourage anyone who dwells primarily “in the past” when it comes to their present repair difficulties ...NOT to overlook the next wave of changes that began in 2018 and which will rapidly accelerate over time. Within the phased space of the next decade… The Automotive Industry will not only surpass your expectations about what is coming your way… but will serve to outstrip your abilities to deal with them much sooner than you think. I encourage all who are curious to read the linked White Papers on the various topics of concern and learn and prepare as much as you can before these events to arrive and disrupt your expectations of being able to fix and repair what soon will be the dominant vehicles on our roads and highways. Pay particular attention to the topic of Telematics.

Diagnosing GM Databus Wiring Problems on Modules using a 2003 Chevrolet Silverado as an Example:

http://www.automotivetroubleshootingsecrets.com/automotive_wiring.html
http://www.automotivetroubleshootingsecrets.com/2003_Silverado_dlc_diagram.html


General Motors OBD2 Diagnostics Systems and Equipment:

https://advancedautomotivetraining.com/downloads/OBD II Network Diagnostics State.pdf

High and Low Speed GM Databus Differences:

https://www.gmtruckclub.com/forum/threads/gmlan-data-bus-system.104480/

It's a Local Area Network; actually, may be considered 2 LANs, a high speed network and a low speed network. The low speed is used for the human to vehicle interface (push a door lock button, the door modules lock the doors). The high speed is for the communications between various vehicle control modules and their sub-modules (powertrain, body control, audio, brakes, etc). Most of the modules have 2 states, "awake" and "asleep". An idle state will induce some modules into the "asleep" mode, while others are commanded into that mode. The modules have battery power when the ignition is off, turning on the ignition commands the modules into the "awake" state. Things like the Retain Power feature, are software controlled; these modules stay "awake" for a defined time after the ignition is switched off. At the end of the defined period, the BCM (I think it's the BCM) commands these modules to sleep.

White Paper on Automotive Security Issues:

https://www.nxp.com/files-static/automotive/doc/white_paper/AUTOSECURITYWP.pdf

Telematics: How Access to Telematic Information Data-Streams will affect access by Vehicle Owners in the Near Term and Distant Future:

http://aftermarkettelematics.org/wp...cs-Data-Definition-White-Paper-12-10-copy.pdf

Automotive Component Changes Anticipated in the Near to Distant Future:

https://www.etools.org/resources/Documents/Marketing/Market Research/ETI White Paper - Final Presentation 4-6-17.pdf

OBD2 and CAN-BUS differences explained

http://www.oneminuteinfo.com/2014/02/can-bus-obd-ii-explained-for-dummies.html
 
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vipergg

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Dec 7, 2011
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They cant fix what they have now say nothing about all the stuff like rear cameras , auto braking , collision avoidance etc ..... People will be driving around with a lot of warning lights on the dash because they cannot afford to fix these mostly unneeded options .
 
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mrrsm

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Very soon... It will get even more interesting with "self-driving cars" gradually replacing what we now have. There is a prescient 1960s Science Fiction Paperback I read as young school kid that covers just how far this idea can go when human beings completely surrender their joy and ability to drive their own vehicles over to ‘sentient technology’… and what happens over the period of… A Four Day Weekend.

At that time, in comparison to much of the same science fiction reading diet I was consuming… I remember thinking that the very idea of ‘self-driving cars’ was silly to the point of being absurd. In looking back to the book now… I keep thinking how very wrong I was about this idea becoming an inevitability. Remarkably... that paperback is still available on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0007FCDJY/?tag=gmtnation-20
 

Mooseman

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Dec 4, 2011
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Like anything else, things evolve. Take the movie "I, Robot" for instance. I'd say everything in it is certainly in play for that reality happening, but, like Will Smith's character, we'll have a longing for the good 'ol days. Just hope we don't get enslaved by our own creations.

However, we have to be able to adapt. When I started wrenching, I cut my teeth on '70's iron and as vehicles and systems evolved, I followed. I didn't limit myself to just doing brakes and oil changes. I read up, even before the Internet, on how to work on these systems. I adapted. Unfortunately, your friend found a permanent solution to a temporary problem.
 
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mrrsm

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The dreams and aspirations of human beings are like paper... sometimes... they can tear into shreds so easily. Your assessment of Jerry's fragility and his troubles is a harsh ...but realistic one. Not all of us can rise to the occasion when changes call for it. Even the Genius Doctor in the Movie "I, Robot" ...so highly admired and respected by Will Smith's character ... eventually chose suicide when he could not escape the AI trap he had created for himself and for Mankind.

De mortuis nihil nisi bonum
 
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Reprise

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People will be driving around with a lot of warning lights on the dash because they cannot afford to fix these mostly unneeded options .

Actually, many of these issues will be addressed via over-the-air (OTA) software updates - Tesla is already doing this now, for example. In some cases, 'fixes' will be pushed to the vehicle as a prophylactic - so the end user will never 'see' a MIL - and they can choose their notification / interaction level (to some extent - think 'Windows 10 updates', if you will).

As for cost -- there's a school of thought that suggests that if the person could manage the acquisition cost of the vehicle, they could also afford a post-warranty VSC (and in some cases, the manufacturer may provide 'free' updates for life - it's a lot cheaper to push software than to pay a dealer network for 'hard' repairs).

The interesting part (to me) will be to see how fast the fleet converts to electric (& other) propulsion methods - I'm now seeing actual PSAs on TV on acquiring all-electric vehicles, manufacturers (Volvo) announcing the end of ICE-based vehicles, 'established' companies promoting all-electric offerings available now (Audi & BMW are recent examples).

A question that comes to mind for me, given the now-overt campaign to change people's thinking on ICE-based vs newer propulsion technologies -- how soon until people who cling to older tech (e.g.; 'us') are regarded as pariahs / social outcasts / Luddites -- for hanging on to this tech.

As time / technologies advance, more of us will finally abandon the ICE - but for now, the new tech doesn't exist for me to haul around a 6000-7000 trailer cross-country - at least affordably. But Moore's Law will eventually take care of that (although I'm misapplying it somewhat, as it applies to more to computing power / costs, specifically.)

Given the inherent & proven reliability of electric motors, there's going to be a LOT of mechanics (outside of dealer-based ones) on the same path as Jerry. Hopefully, they won't choose the same path he did - but history suggests that there won't be a 'soft landing' for many.

Just hope we don't get enslaved by our own creations.

We already are, sir...we already are. I heard an interview on NPR the other day with the 'Westworld' (HBO) creators, who described this very thing - not so much in a 'future' context re: their show - but in a current one, re: FB, Twitter, et al. I found it interesting that both of them more or less eschew social media because of this.

Subscribing to this thread :thumbsup::thankyou:
 

Mooseman

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Dec 4, 2011
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So true. Driving through the blacked out areas after the tornadoes, I noticed something unusual these days. Kids playing outside! No video games, no Internet and no phones due to dead cell towers, kids were outside being kids.

Moved this thread to Off Topic as it is not really a tech thread.
 

mrrsm

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For those of us who wish to delve deeper into the topic of Artificial Intelligence ... as "60dgrzbelow0" over on another forum... I penned a durable amount of White Paper quality information in a lasting Thread there on this very subject that is central to the topic and its broader implications as an undeniable, unavoidable existential threat:

http://www.60degreev6.com/vb5/forum/misc/off-topic/23514-human-skin-as-an-input-device
 

DocBrown

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Dec 8, 2011
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This is already happening. My Sierra was recently in a local shop to have an electrical issue with the starter system fixed. My dad picked it up for me and was talking to the shop owner, who is a friend of his, a guy was in there with a late model Ford F-150. The backup camera was flaking out and his dealer didn't know what to do with it so he brought it into the neighborhood shop. The owner told he can't even begin to troubleshoot this, and to take it to a different dealer.
 
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Mooseman

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Yep, it's at a point where even dealers don't know how to fix their own stuff.
 

mrrsm

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The strangeness effect at play in your scenario is that for once... the man on the OTHER side of the Dealership Counter felt even more queasy from the situation at hand than the Customer did. This is very important to understand because right now... and I do mean NOW... THEIR jobs and livelihoods will be THE largest and one of the earliest segments of world societies' "Economic Big Dogs" to suffer from the paradigm shift from an industry that at one time was dominated by a large number of Well Paid, Skilled Human Labor being rendered virtually useless and unnecessary.

Another one would be Radiology... made worthless as a Career Choice for General X-Ray Technicians and Schooled Radiologists in short order after a Deep Mind Computer Algorithm along with Machine Learning in its hip-pocket was used by Google to plumb their vast data-banks to view 80,000 MRIs ...and discovered around 38% additional areas of cancerous tumors that had NOT been discovered previously by the Human Beings that took those images and later rendered analytical opinions ...that were patently wrong.

The impact of even incomplete examples of AI implementation like this one will be so profound as to make governments world-wide have to re-imagine what "human labor" is when all manner of adaptive machines can do those jobs without one scintilla of human effort or interaction. What does this say about the actual utility of The Human Race as a purpose-driven organic system... ostensibly "in control" of literally...everything? What will all of these unemployed and disconnected and disjointed populations around the world DO with themselves... not to mention who will pay for the costs of living for what will essentially be the better part of 7,000,000,000 people standing around without anything to do?

For those of you with your entire lives and futures ahead of you ...versus 'Very Old Dudes' like me... Your lives and the impacts of these unbelievable inventions and overwhelmingly powerful technologies are NOT mere speculation on my part. You will need to stay ahead of the learning curve and focus on areas of human endeavor-job training that the remaining employed, well paid, well educated and rarefied among you will still be willing to pay for. I'm not kidding.... forget about getting an overly expensive college education that will leave you with a job shelf life approximating that of vegetable produce in the local supermarket. You have less than a decade to work this serious problem out before your choices won't make any difference.

If you are finished shaking your head and laughing out loud in that style of "Whistling as you are Walking Past a Graveyard"... you can start to get grounded in the problem by investigating articles that discuss "Governments are considering Paying the Jobless a Living Wage" to off-set the sudden discontinuation of so many jobs that were once thought of as the exclusive provenance of Humankind. Look Deep and use your clever senses to really THINK HARD about what your futures will be...either with...or without any real purpose. If you assume that because you are Young and Capable... "The World is My Oyster..." you may soon discover that Oysters no longer survive along the bays and shorelines of the world because they accidentally stood in the way of the Goals and Objectives of a Sentient AGI "Agent" that needed that property for its own unfathomable requirements:

I like this next video the most because of how elegantly and comprehensively it covers so much ground in explaining "Why We SHOULD Be Afraid of AI..."


 
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mrrsm

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"Any Sufficiently Advanced Technology... Is Indistinguishable... From MAGIC."

Arthur C. Clark

If you ever saw the Walt Disney Cartoon version of Mickey Mouse as “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” you will recall that while being especially lazy… the intrepid Mouse sneaks his Master’s Pointy Chapeaus and conjures up a spell while wearing this Empowered Merlin Hat causing a common Wood Pole Straw Broom to come to life and run amok while simply following its 'Prime Directive' given him from Mickey’s magical gesticulations to: “Take these Wooden Buckets and Fetch Water from the Well to Fill this Cauldron...”. The Cartoon Mouse soon falls asleep with visions of having enormous Magical Power at his beck and call, hurling starry fireballs across the Deep Blue Cosmos with the flick of his fingers... and it all seems so wonderful to him… right up until he wakes up and realizes that once he set The Broom in motion… he lost control of the tool that keeps over-filling the Cauldron and flooding his Master's Lair:

In desperation… he smashes that Broom into little wooden bits with an Axe. In turn… they also come to life, replicating the same size, power, and magnifying the mode of action taken on by the One Original Broom. This nightmare was actually frightening to me as a child because I could empathize with an animated character facing the impossibility of the problem he has let loose by playing around with powers that can never be controlled. As a Cautionary Tale… this one has always topped them all as THE Metaphor for those intent upon creating a Strong AGI (Artificial General Intelligence) to be careful what you wish for… because unlike “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” there will be no one to play the part of The Merlin to rescue us from ourselves from Corporate Greed and the dreadful results of so many participants in this headlong activity while drinking the AI Kool-Aid and suffering from a terrible excess of Intellectual Vanity and Avarice:

This is the only complete sub-10 Minute version of the segment taken from Disney’s Movie “Fantasia” available:


This Two Part Series covers the Threat to the General Work Forces around the world ...made worse by the smug, self aggrandizing attitudes of the German Industrialists and Scientists touting “The Fourth Industrial Revolution” proudly bragging about how much more efficient and profitable companies will become at the expense of people who… without Jobs… will NEVER be able to afford the products that once made by hand and which paid them all a living wage.

Thus their lives and the economy of spending that Money in a worthwhile closed cycle which had greased the German Economy to become one of the best in the world is now being profoundly threatened. What will happen to the vast number of German Workers who may not possess the knowledge, training and skill set good enough to remain or obtain ANY employment. When you constantly work to “improve efficiencies and maximize profits”...eventually… human beings will get factored completely out of that equation. So the question begs… Who are you going to sell these products to when no one has enough money to buy them? Welcome to “Industry 4.0”.

Part(1)

Part (2)
 
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mrrsm

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Merely six (6) Days had passed between the time of my last post and the announcement on October 4th, 2018 that General Motors and Honda, Japan had signed a Multi-Billion Dollar Deal for a Joint Venture to build Autonomous, Self-Driving Vehicles based on an Electric Car Platform. The timeliness and on-topic nature of this event amazes me that something as abstract and dubious as the End of The Era of Modern and Post-Modern Mechanics is staring us all right in the face... Right Now:

https://www.zacks.com/stock/news/326305/general-motors-amp-honda-tie-up-for-selfdriving-technology

Before Elon Musk made the mistake of thinking out loud on the Joe Rogan Pod-Cast while drinking some Hard Hooch ...and toking on a Huge Dooby ... he had no idea that his 'personal stock' would take a dump on itself when he announced that he might take his Tesla Company private after chatting with the Saudis about setting up Solar Farm Areas in Arabia that would produce enough electricity to power the entire needs of that country.

Such visionaries who have achieved so much success while facing a tide of corporate resistance and artifice of road blocks are no different for Elon Musk than it was for Nicola Tesla in his adversarial battle for the use of Alternating Current versus the Direct Current proposed bitterly by Thomas Alva Edison. Nonetheless ... in the earlier days, he easily overcame such jealousies and raised the value of Tesla's Stock on the Market quite successfully:


This is the short, Adult version describing the unfortunate outcome of the Rogan-Musk visit:


Of course every other unimaginative, but Greedy Bastard that loved that 'schadenfreude' moment Musk gave to them wanted to immediately oust the man from his position as CEO of the Tesla Company cried foul and the SEC promptly slapped a Whopper of a Fine on Musk. They also placed him under severe restrictions from mentioning anything that might cause the stock to plummet in value.

The problem then facing theBoard of Directors of Tesla though was "If we get rid of this Annoying Genius... Who will take his place and keep laying us "The Golden Technology Idea Eggs"? The short answer was,of course: No One. So they HAD to keep him around ...or lose The Man With The Ideas in a very bad bargain.

Meanwhile... there are quite a few self-made Billionaires who lately have been sticking their lugubrious Green Fingers in the eyes of the Big Three Car Makers and admonishing them with, "You Car manufacturers should wake up... stop complaining about Elon Musk... and realize that your present business model is unsustainable. The way to make vehicles for the future is to follow the Model of How Elon Musk's Tesla Car Company is Making Them...":

Here is a video documentary about The Tesla Robotic Car Factory. Other than a handful of Human "Robot Trainers" ...Do you see any People doing any REAL work here? The optimum expression Musk wants to hear from them is, "We should be able to run... Full Auto... From Now On..."


...and finally.. Elon Musk's take on "Smart People Who Doubt the Existential Threat from AI" "Hah.... FOOLS..."

 
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mrrsm

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It is no secret that I am a Rabid Fan of The SpaceX Company... and hold its creator and "Idea Man" Elon Musk in the very highest regard. If you watched that last video segment, what you have seen there is The Man, Himself who has managed to prove beyond all doubt that he can only be described as THE Most Optimistic Humanist that ever walked the Earth. He can bear this title, not because of how he thinks and what he feels... but because of what he has actually accomplished as a "Self-Made Man" and and a Gifted Entrepreneur, designing and building everything from Electric Cars to Rocket Ships more than capable of carrying Earthlings to The Moon and to Mars ...and Beyond.

Yet... Across the Gulf of Space... (... Props to H.G. Wells for writing THAT chilling line from his novel, "The War of The Worlds"...) even as his Own Red Tesla Roadster travels in an Elliptical Orbit that will allow his "Driver", The Inanimate Starman to sit behind the wheel and ride in elegance for around One Billion Years or so... Musk felt compelled to document his sad cynicism about The Future of Mankind in such a subtle, yet frightening manner... that perhaps we, as the presently Pre-eminent, Dominant Intellectual Species on this Planet... will never last long enough to encounter his Tesla Roadster ...ever again. But that does not mean that it will not be found.

The Proof of Elon's Fear about this is well documented in what he said in that last video over his concerns of the Existential Threat Artificial Super Intelligence represents to the Survival of The Human Race. And now... You can see the actual, physical proof of his worry about this matter in the attached image that of a silk-screened message written into a Green Circuit Board that is built into that Orbiting Red Tesla Electric Roadster...and it Reads:

*Built on Earth by humans*

MADEONEARTHBYHUMANS.jpg

Now think about this for a minute.... what you WOULD have expected to read should be something like this:

"Made in America"
"Made in The U.S.A."
"Made in China"
"Made in Japan"

...as ANY and ALL of these possible builders would make perfect sense to ANY Human Being gazing at such a label. But in THIS case... Musk has written that expression with The Qualifier... ' by humans' with a Lower Case 'h' ... to distinguish the potential Non-Human Reader from The Men on Earth born of Woman ...with the gifts of Thought and Action capable enough to have built Machines to carry OTHER Machines out into The Universe....and even still... create the ones that will doom them back here on Earth.

So here is Elon Musk... a Man with the Vision to want us all to listen to "The Better Angels of Our Nature"...and to be driven by Human Intellect to Solve Our Problems with Common Sense and Good Judgement and to co-exist with one another. But even more importantly... NOT to consciously create The Monster Boogey-Man of AGI Super Intelligence if we want to last and to extend Humanity out to the Stars. We must prevent the Future of Humanity from being ultimately lost to a Super Intelligence so powerful that it will become one capable of supplanting Humankind with ease in time because it will essentially be ...an Immortal, Thinking Thing.

If this comes to pass... One Day ...long ahead in the Far Distant Future... The AGI Agent WILL manage to eventually find Elon's Roadster ...floating aimlessly somewhere out there in the Blackness of Space. Perhaps by then... after countless millions of years of endlessly drifting, by then... the Tesla will have lost its beauty and luster...and will be filthy and care-worn from being bombarded by Cosmic Rays, Inter-Planetary Dust, The Sun's Radiation and even pelted all to Hell and Gone by Micro-Meteorites.

Perhaps, with a Dry, Metallic, Tinny Laugh... The Intelligent Agent might even be amused with having found this Ancient Mechanical Toy after reading that silk-screened message from a by-gone, extinct species of Human Beings. And Maybe... Just Maybe... Elon will have been clever enough to have saved a vile inside of Secret Pocket inside of The Starman's Suit Pocket that contains the message of the Code for the Three Billion Nucleotides that make up The Map of the Human Genome ...Durably Laser Etched into the sides of a Very Large Blue Sapphire Crystal.

And if it turns out that the AGI Agent is still so very, very curious... It may accidentally give us all... One Last Chance to exist ... and to make a comeback as the Earth's First and Only Intelligent, Organic Life Form. Knowing Elon Musk... it would NOT surprise me if has done this very thing... :>)
 
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