Robot chefs take over at South Korea’s highway restaurants, to mixed reviews
(restofworld.org)
from Pro@programming.dev to technology@lemmy.world on 14 May 2025 12:32
https://programming.dev/post/30317002
from Pro@programming.dev to technology@lemmy.world on 14 May 2025 12:32
https://programming.dev/post/30317002
- Robot chefs are replacing humans at some South Korean highway restaurants.
- Tech companies say robots can help solve labor shortage in an aging nation.
- Workers say their roles have been downgraded from chefs to cleaning staff.
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South Korea is genuinely fucked as a country. Population decline is going to ruin them. It’s going to ruin a lot in the U.S as well.
The USA was actually on a survivable path with our low domestic birth rate because of the large immigration was compensating. Well, now we’ve fucked that up royally by kicking out our immigrants, and also made ourselves a pariah on the global stage so no new immigrants will want to come here.
also the tariffs, and the anti-science funding cuts have turned people off from the US.
apparently SK is worst off than japan.
Korea is not fucked. We’re doing better than the US at fighting fascism. Birth rates are on the rise. Universal Healthcare is already decades ongoing. They’re proposing a four day workweek. It’s fucking paradise compared to much of the world.
Yeah that 4 day work week might become a thing. You’ll just work 17 hours a day. Samsung just extended their work weeks to 64 hours a week regarding semiconductors after complaining about the 52 hours limit. You guys are good at fighting facism and corruption as long as Samsung isn’t involved. And your birthrate raised by .03 to .75. A healthy population needs like 2.1. And you guys are not immune from inflation and global markets so your cost of living has gone up like everyone else. And considering the poverty rate for the super young and the really old are sky high things aren’t looking good.
I’m not trying to shit on South Korea but you guys are just as fucked as everyone else. It’s no paradise
These have been in use in German cantinas for a while as well. Usually inside hospitals or larger office spaces.
Are they really making the food worse, or are people just biased against it because a robot made it? Because humans are perfectly capable of making shit food themselves as well
In any case, in a world where 1st world countries actually took care of their citizens this would be a non-issue. Either there would be some sort of UBI program in place for workers that get replaced by robots or a worker re-training program or a combination of both (e.g. people still have an income during that training).
UBI wouldn’t be just for workers that get replace by robots. The “U” in “UBI” is Universal, meaning everyone gets the Basic Income. From the guy with untreated mental illness that hangs out in the park to the richest billionaire.
Well yea, but rolling it out slowly as people get “displaced” is how it would realistically get started IMO. It would be quite a taxing program for any country to just suddenly start
The problem is that SK(and a vast majority of the rest of the world) have declining birth rates. South Korea doesn’t have a “staffing” issue, they have a people being born issue. And most of the rest of us are gonna start feeling it soon too!
If something drastic doesn’t change for SK soon, in 30-60 years they won’t have enough people working to cover pensions, let alone UBI.
You can pay for ubi by taxing the robots, both physical and digital.
UBI is entirely possible if we transfer just a fraction of the wealth from corporations back to people.
This suggestion is raised frequently, and quickly falls apart under scrutiny.
Give you me your definition of a “digital robot”.
Only humans can add love.
Thats called “eyeballing the recipie”
Love… apathy… it’s 2025, that Venn Diagram is a circle.
There’s no love in food, only improvised measurements. Adding too much or too little of something alters the taste in subtle ways to make the dish taste unique.
That’s what I’m thinking. I bet if you put a human-prepared meal and a robot-prepared meal next to each other and didn’t tell the customer which is which, they wouldn’t be able to tell. It’s like how wine tastes better if you think it’s more expensive.
Never thought about it before, but is there science fiction with a premise where humans might someday forget how to cook because it’s no longer a part of the culture?
Not off the top of my head. Cooking is frequently a recreational hobby though, it’s essentially an art form. So I think it’s about equally likely that dancing, painting or making music fade away.
Sewing is fading away but maybe that’s different enough
People do crossstitch and make unique outfits all the time. Everyone not in rich consumer countries (and the poorer people in those countries) all learn at least basic stiching.
Star trek touches on it a bit. Some people definitely still cook in the shows, but it’s almost seen as a thing for special occasions.
That’s a good point! SNW does have Pike cooking for some of his crew on occasion.
The Feeling of Power might be close enough. It’s an Isaac Asimov short story from 1958. Basic plot is that people have become so reliant on computers, they can’t do basic math or counting. It’s about what happens with mental decline with making machines do all the thinking. (There is more, and the link explains the story but I feel that I shouldn’t include spoilers, even for a 50+ year old story.
If you want, you can read the scans of the original here.
Also, Dad’s Nuke touched on this kind of subject with people having get together and they have to make their own food and come with things like Jalapeno Pie/Cake(?) and other interesting dishes which indicates that people are already losing the ability to do basic cooking.
That’s so cool, thank you. I never delved into Asimov before, but it’s sounds like I really should.
I lived in Korea for a couple of years and ate at some of these places while traveling.
It was honestly always good. Basically you do a quick order, get a ticket, then get your food. I always got the fried pork cutlet. That shit was the bomb.
Now that I am back in the states I miss the level of care and dedication that Koreans put into the food they make and I’d go back again just for the eats.
They are useful when someone works late shifts and wants something proper at like 12pm when every kitchen worker has long gone home. They usually offer a more limited menu but it‘s honestly a neat idea.
why is automation removing the joy and creativity of cooking instead of the dishes, which is what the person is left to do.
What do you think a dishwasher is
More work to prep dishes for washing than actual help
Have you ever used a dishwasher?
Yes, and I’ve been disgusted by pieces of food perma-sticked to otherwise clinically clean mugs.
Onto the mugs? I’ve never seen that happen to mugs, plates sure. Either way you can now get a sponge and clean that one problem mug rather than everything. Saves you so much time.
It transfers from plates to mugs somehow, which makes it extra gross
You know that is usually remedies by just not putting plates with half a meal still left on them into the dishwasher.
So kind of like preparing the plate before putting it in? By rinsing it with water to get rid of any solid parts, at which point I’m two moves of sponge away from having a clean plate?
Well yes. But if you have for example 20 plates you just quickly rinse them all in a row and put them in the dishwasher. Along with all the other cups and glasses and whatever pots and cutlery you used. Saves a lot of time.
Yes if you have 2 plates and nothing else I agree it’s easier to just hand wash them.
Agree to disagree? I have a dishwasher and hate it for daily cleaning, but it does a good job for burned greasy pots or stuff dirty from dough. If it saves your time for daily work, good for you.
Sure. Agree to disagree. Dishwasher is a gift from god.
Are you using a European or American dishwasher?
I feel like whatever my answer is, it will be the wrong one. I’ll take a risk though: 🇪🇺
When least have you cleaned the filter?
It was happening when it was new so I doubt it’s the filter. I don’t know I don’t use it any more, my spouse does and does the maintenance.
I see, fair enough. I’m not sure what’s wrong with the one you had. It could be the way things are being packed, eco mode or not enough detergent etc. But if you’re not using it any more then I guess it doesn’t matter ¯_(ツ)_/¯
There are two things to do when loading a dishwasher:
Give the dishes a rinse so there’s not 1/4th of a meal left on the plate. It’s not a miracle worker.
Don’t let the dirty plates sit in the machine for long enough for the dirty leftovers to dry out and stick to the plate, that makes it much harder for the machine to clean it. If that happens, run a long program.
… you don’t need to prep your dishes before putting it in the dishwasher.
How much joy and creativity do think there was in these places before?
More than there was before the cooks got put on dishwashing and floor mopping.
Imagine being able to automate a cook but science still hasnt come far enough for some kind of dish washing machine and a robotic vaccum cleaner, weird huh
Buddy you guys are acting like they can automate professional chefs? You’re lucky when they don’t tear your arm off giving you the food.
When I was a cook, even if I was just making something simple, I could still find creative satisfaction in a variety of ways. How you sprinkle on the garnish, plating, using a little more of this, a little less of that. Food to a chef is like art designed to be destroyed, so with the temporary nature of the medium, it really allows you to be creative. You’re not hung up on making it perfect, because it’s just about to be eaten, so it let’s you be more free with your design choices. It can be fun creating art while you’re supposed to be working.
but if my job was suddenly just washing up after a machine… well. That will get old real quick.
The first paragraph is a fantasy.
In this restaurant, where the chef was replaced by a salad machine, the “chef” was a human salad machine before. There was no time to play with garnish and playing, they weren’t serving Michelin star food. The term “chef” is used very liberally here, you aren’t a chef if the only thing you cook at a restaurant is assemble salad that a machine can do to the same standard.
They were assembling salads, it wasn’t a dream job.
Literally not a fantasy, but my and a lot of cooks reality.
You assemble the same soulless food everyday and you actually feel fulfilled by assembling croutons differently every day?
Hey, I can’t imagine the process not becoming muscle memory and for my brain to not be somewhere else completely, but you sprinkle salt off your elbow if that gives you joy.
cooks make more than salads. You’re being an asshole.
Automation should replace cooks, but in fast food restaurants instead of proper ones. They should free up people who work brain-dead jobs at Mcdonalds or KFC to let them work at other places, including other proper restaurants that don’t make fast food.
Lol yeah right. I’m sure the only thing stopping Brandon from working at a Michelin restaurant is his McDonald’s job off of I-95
So it’s better that he never even gets the opportunity to try to make it there? It’s better if he works at Mcdonalds until he’s 60?
Does he already not have the opportunity, robot or not?
So, why not just replace humans at odd hours of the night some rando walks in, and keep em during normal buisness hours?
Because then you have an expensive robot not being used, while still keeping the wage bill.
I think this is what SK has to do, given their slowly dwindling population. Staffing restaurants with robots will let the people who would have worked there get employed at places that may need a human worker.