Well - there's producing but there's also buying, selling, reviewing, approving, communicating, serving, teaching, learning, instructing, auditing, marketing, analysing, sourcing, managing, supporting, hiring, firing, retiring, coaching, etc etc

Not many of those, per se, are "producing" and many production roles (of physical things) don't need anything more than an iPad either - just an interface. I think we should also recognise that tablets have the power of computers that not many years ago were being used for "producing " too. I'm not saying there's no place for "proper" computers but I think it's overstated. I also think that it encourages the wrong behaviours and actually stifles productivity in a true sense.

But we can agree to disagree.

Politely, of course, because we are civilised folk who can disagree without being disagreeable (something of an anomaly in the interwebs, I believe).

I certainly agree that there are many places where 'proper' computers are used unnecessarily but I'm not sure that restricting the input methods is always helpful.

Indeed, while there are tasks which cannot be performed without the use of a computer, I suspect there are many many tasks for which a computer - of any flavour - is unnecessary.

Always polite

Yes - there's nothing to stop you adding a temporary keyboard or pointing device when you need it. We have a little portable keyboard that the kids share between themselves when they want to write an essay.

Actually two things have hardened my views on this:
1. Doing without a car in Amsterdam - so I'm dragging around a brick of a laptop on my bike.
2. Hot desking environment - not just being able to leave my PC sat there all the time. I also work at several sites and from home. Also, very very little information is stored on my machine.

I see each of these things as becoming more common - the IT environment needs to catch up.