Human flourishing or human floundering?
In my recent posts, I have discussed at great length system-specific AI and the possible architecture of amalgamated corporate AGI (Artificial General Intelligence). In these final few posts in the short series, I will take an in-depth look at some possible implications, ramifications and consequences that may occur due to the advancement of AI in the workplace and subsequent corporate evolution. I will also look at how I think these changes will affect the lives, jobs, and careers of the people working in the corporate sectors where adoption of this technology and its siblings/offspring is high.
At the end of the article, I will also consider the possible benefits of adopting a UBI to aid human flourishing and development.
So, let’s get started.
TLDR
AI is going to become an integral part of every aspect of human life within 20 years whether we like it or not. As a global society however we are really in trouble unless we position the human experience at the heart of the creation, evolution, adoption and integration of AI. Without human flourishing as the goal of this range of technologies (rather than simply streamlining, refactoring, removing, or re-purposing existing manual or human-interface roles) we face a very dark and ultimately regressive future, without the person being the central interpretive motif of technology we risk dehumanising the human experience, devaluing the intrinsic creativity of every person in the global community and ultimately, creating a Utopia for the few and a hell for the many.
What is AI, and what role does it play in human development?
Artificial Intelligence is a broad term covering as previously mentioned a spectrum of mechanisms to employ machine learning or automation of task/decision/analysis and where computers can learn, understand, and make decisions and undertake repetitive tasks for us. In this article, I use the term AI to capture the broad possibilities of systems employed. The overall goal of AI (depending on who you ask) is for me, to improve the lived experience of humans by removing barriers to quality of life, satisfaction, flourishing and personal achievement or growth, for example, to decrease the workforce requirement or repetitive/low-level human tasking (for example and increase the efficiency of work operations) and make space for bringing added or new value to both the employer and employee.
I like this quote from an article by Yingwu Gao (VP of Product Engineering and AI Practice at Pactera Edge) titled “The Purpose of Intelligence in AI and the Role It Plays”:
The purpose of intelligence in AI is to make a person’s life better, improve people’s productivity, relieve people from mundane tasks, streamline and optimize business operations, and reach remote and dangerous places while keeping humans safe.
AI can be programmed to recognize patterns based on algorithms, to work with and build upon those algorithms, to create knowledge and wisdom and give meaning to data. It can also make decisions and imitate human “interactions.” The human standard of living has been on a spike for the last several centuries. The next step up in the development of human life is AI as has been predicted by many experts, some of whom have also posited dire warnings about what an AI future may bring.
AI doesn’t have to be evil to destroy humanity — if AI has a goal and humanity just happens to come in the way, it will destroy humanity as a matter of course without even thinking about it, no hard feelings.
Elon Musk — Entrepreneur and Car Salesman
Success in creating AI would be the biggest event in human history. Unfortunately, it might also be the last, unless we learn how to avoid the risks….The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race. […] It would take off on its own, and re-design itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn’t compete and would be superseded.
Stephen Hawking — Big brained genius.
AI will probably most likely lead to the end of the world, but in the meantime, there will be some great companies!
Sam Altma, Chairman of Open AI
In the long term, artificial intelligence and automation are going to be taking over so much of what gives humans a feeling of purpose.
Matt Bellamy, Singer
What does this technology mean for the people impacted?
Building, enhancing and making use of AI, its applications and possibilities come with obligations to at least attempt to understand its social and economic (and thus cultural) impacts as well. AI (and its sibling/offspring technologies) will allow and assist the global community to make greater and greater leaps forward particularly in the areas of climate change, education, sustainable manufacturing, stewardship of the environment, medical analysis and research, unleashing human potential and our connectedness, however, what this advancement in technology will mean for the people who have jobs in the direct line of sight, related, impacted, or automated fields remains to be seen but can be guessed at. New technology is invented every day and a layman might be forgiven for thinking that AI will see a similar level and speed of progress to say, the PC or TVs however, it is the consensus of many experts that this linear progression will not be the case. AI is and will continue to be an increasingly fundamental element of human and societal evolution but will increase its self-development to a point whereby the rules of linear progression go out the window. If ever the term “exponential growth” was applicable to anything (and Lord knows it has been bandied about a LOT since 2020) then the growth of AI, the capabilities, complexity and reach of it is worthy of that phrase.
The efforts of global AI innovation by state actors, universities, private enterprises, and ideologically driven organisations have laid bare not only the importance of significant investment in the ethical policing of AI development but also the importance of the mitigation of the impact on or compensation for the huge parts of industrial “society” that will be affected by this usurpation of human effort by AI-driven technology. However, this will not be of course an instant phenomenon, AI is not something new and whilst the steps forward will continue at an increasing rate (as AI becomes more and more “involved” in its own evolution and development) we are still at the dawn of the new age, we are still in the initial stages, and frankly, I am not sure how long it will take for AI to take over the corporate landscape completely nor indeed what that looks like. We can see already a push for AI-based strategic and operational decision making, and many more intelligent and articulate voices than mine have offered views, perspectives, road-maps and ideas on this — perhaps consider these two for some light but insightful reading on automation and/or AI; Pascal Bornet on Intelligent Automation and Sean Culey in his brilliant work “Transition Point”.
So, is AI going to kill jobs?
Short answer: Yes, some and more in the future. The most frequently expressed concern when it comes to AI (aside from “is my toaster going to kill me” or “will my internet-connected fridge be a big player in the rise of the machines”) is its effect on the jobs market, the manual, repetitive and process-driven jobs that are currently done by humans and what happens to those humans that were doing those jobs. As we already know, unemployment is increasing day by day and millions of people are finding that their jobs are not “for life” and the precision for which they have trained their whole lives can now be done by robots at a fraction of the cost, without needing a rest break or requiring membership of a union (yet).
With that in mind, one could, maybe should, be concerned about the unstoppable evolution of AI and its seemingly relentless march towards domination of the workplace. The economics of AI and robotics will eventually be viable enough to filter down through corporation sizes to the very low end of the SME market and in reality, any business owner or leader would opt for a tried and tested AI “solution” if it meant a reduction in overheads, complications, and restrictions, and if it came with a minimal impact on customer experience and a massively improved production or service bandwidth. This then is the main concern for the workers who will be impacted in the first and second waves of this particular industrial revolution.
That being said, the situation is not as immediately bleak as one might think. AI has serious potential to take on a wide range of (currently) human jobs and provide an efficient and accurate replacement for manual toil and processing, but it has a LONG way to go I think before we will see a seismic social shift. Fortunately, the AI we are thinking about doesn’t exist yet, but it won’t be a long time before we see the birth of AGI (as quantum computing becomes mainstream)and non-dependent autonomous intelligence. These first few generations of prevalent AI are not capable of posing a serious threat yet to large parts of the human productivity landscape, skill base or decision making but the beach landing has definitely taken place. We can predict with a degree of certainty that with the development that is happening in AI now coupled with advances in quantum computing, AI may replace a large number of humans “doing” over the next few years.
So what do you think? Human flourishing or floundering? Drop me a comment and let me know your views!
In my next post, I will consider the impact of AI/Automation on jobs going forward.
