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Comment by gnok | Hacker News Reader

'The Comfort Xpress Hotel in Oslo now allows guests to reserve, check in and check out without ever having to deal with a pesky human.' I love technology as much as the next geek, but there are some places I would really like to deal with pesky humans -- hotels, hospitals and restaurants come to mind.

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One of the things about travel is that you often end up at arriving at a hotel very late at night, and leaving very early in the morning. These are the times that I'd pay extra not to speak to a human being.

even if it's half the price?

(remember that food, health, and lodging are probably where most people spend the majority of their money)

Given how rarely I'm in a hotel (probably twice a year and only on holidays, upper bound), I have no problem paying a little (or twice) extra to talk to a real human being. For instance, I'd like to be able to converse about the hotel, good restaurants and some interesting places around that the locals visit. A pleasant conversation after a painful flight is always relaxing and nice.

Given how much human error happens in hospitals, I would be happier to have less pesky humans involved.

Given how many bugs (no pun intended) the average programmer is capable of inserting into programs, I'd be much happier with an adaptable-to-cockups human than a pesky "computer says no" entirely automated solution.

Unfortunately, medicine today isn't deterministic. A lot of decisions are made with 'instinct' -- a fancy word for intangible experience. Human error is always going to be an issue. What might prevent human error in the design of said automated systems?

It is conceivable that automated medicine would have a lower failure rate for common diseases than "instinct."

I can agree with that. But you've made two implicit assumptions here:

1. The disease is diagnosed and identified as 'common' 2. There are no other complications because of say alcohol abuse, or a genetic condition with kidneys and so forth

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