Comment by Growlzler | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Growlzler | Hacker News Reader

Robots can't taste. Something that no one really wants to take on for a number of reasons the first being that we haven't a clue how it works. Variables in a Caesar Salad occupy wide spreads. Blending taste is still an art that most Chefs have trouble achieving as will the machine intelligence that conquers taste. Wondering how machine intelligence will handle hunger pangs caused by the sudden thought of a Caesar Salad, ensconced with Pain au Levain Croutons, shaved Parmigiano-Reggiano and salted Anchovies on the side. Even the selection of the right sea salt affects the outcome of this wonderful concoction not to mention what mustard and Worcestershire Sauce is best used. The other problem stems from the camaraderie that such a meal requires (haven't even got to the wine pairing yet) to be wholly satisfying. Some people have problems with the origin of the language that really counts as in "companion" - stems from "one whom with you break bread with"...,

I think you're romanticizing the concept of food preparation a bit much. You don't need to be able to taste, or feel hunger, to cook a good meal or choose a wine. I fully expect that a machine could not only do so, but ultimately do so more consistently than any but the most skilled of humans.

I fear such a thing would lead to Starbucksization of food and beverage production. As mentioned in plenty of other comments here, Starbucks baristas mostly just push a button to get a shot of espresso from one of their machines. They optimize for consistency and "good enough" - and indeed the machine pulls the same shot, every time, from beans which are over-roasted for consistency and good enough for mass consumption and a predictable experience across thousands of stores.

But that isn't what makes food and drink interesting. I enjoy going to a place because they pull a particularly great espresso shot and use it to prepare a macchiato in a way that I like according to proportions of milk and espresso that I think taste best... or a bar which has a particularly great wine collection according to my tastes... or a restaurant which has a fun twist on on a french classic which I like more than the original. Of course, each of these establishments could have a custom version of whatever algorithm you're envisioning which picks the perfect wines, pulls the perfect espresso shots, or prepares the perfect meal - but will they? Or will the platform that enables such extreme automation also enable such extreme commodification, like Starbucks vs a boutique coffee shop? I think it would.

A machine doesn't have to optimize only for "good enough" or "burnt"; it optimizes for whatever parameters it was given. If there's a trick to "pull a particularly great espresso shot", then you can build a machine to do that. It's not even particularly hard, compared to, say, keeping up an intelligent conversation, doing laundry, or any number of other harder-to-automate tasks.

Of course - but people are going to control those machines, and the people who control the machines probably aren't going to be the people who (in another version of history where automation didn't take over) would be operating them with care out of personal passion.

In our Starbucks example - they also own Clover, the boutique automatic single-serve coffee brewer. It's a brilliant machine and makes a great cup of coffee. But it's artificially only available in certain markets, with certain collections of their own branded roasts. The macinery could be programmed to allow me to get a great cup of coffee at any Starbucks in America, but business incentives don't allow that (presumably - because Clovers are rare machines reserved for special store in major markets). Comiditization entails more than just automating the product and making things consistent and widely available. It also typically changes the incentives of the game and the people who are overseeing implementing them.

These machines aren't designed for foodies - they're designed to serve the rest of the populace that wants a decent, healthy meal at a reasonable price. That the machines try to appeal to foodies is just the side effects of marketing, in an attempt to provide some snob appeal to people who aren't true foodies.

There's always going to be a need for human food preparers, be they chef or cook, as foodies will seek unique experiences that cannot be provided in the large quantities that machines are designed to satisfy.

In short, don't worry about it.

I feel like you're talking about an experience that precisely emerged from the Starbucksization of food and beverage production.

Where I come from, staff in cafés would kill to make a consistent coffee every time (and they mostly do) but they're stuck with old machinery. But now that Starbucks has delivered that, customers want to go back to an authentic experience that really has never existed.

The same thing will happen to food i.e most people would love to have decent restaurant meals delivered at a really low price. The fact that some people will try to taste gourmet food prepared by real chefs is rather irrelevant to say the least...

If there is one thing that a robot can do more consistently and better than a human is tossing salad using pre-sorted ingredients.

However, figuring out what makes a delicious recipe is something machines can't do. yet.

Having machines come up with delicious recipes isn't that far off: https://www.amazon.com/Cognitive-Cooking-Chef-Watson-Innovat...

Allow me: this salad tastes bland and tired and needs a strong dressing to make it palatable.

The veggies are pre cut - so they spend even longer dying and drying than freshly prepared.

There will be more waste - those pre-cut veggies won't last as long.

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