Our dilemma is that we hate change and love it at the same time; what we really want is for things to remain the same but get better.
Sydney J. Harris
As human beings we find ourselves repeatedly in situations in which we know better, but act against this better knowledge. In other words, everyone knows what is going on, but continues to participate. This cognitive dissonance is not easily resolved, however it is a good start when individuals not only participate, but also seek out alternative paths.
Quite a few employees in the automotive industry have come to terms with the Zorro morality: during the day, working on the latest luxury class car, and in the evening participating in a grassroots rally for a car-free city center - et voilà: The
Cake for Simultaneously Eating and Keeping
. The technical abilities are only used at a well paid, safe job, while the personal value and moral perceptions must take place on one's own time as a recreational activity.
The goal of automation is to reduce the human workload in production and manufacturing. The advancing mechanization should pave the way back to paradise, so that people no longer have to eat their daily bread in the sweat of their brow. The development of robots to perform care work demonstrates that even reproduction work is increasingly automated - all while remaining as humane as possible. Overall, work (including work for other people), is thus dismissed as something inhuman, which nevertheless has to get done somehow - just like a
Cake for Simultaneously Eating and Keeping
, which bakes itself again and again all on its own.