The AI Paradox - how to prepare for the future ?
We can't deny that the world is changing at a pace that is quite difficult to follow and AI is taking a more and more important role. We see new things coming out, not on a monthly or yearly basis but on a daily basis. There are new models, new ways of working, new interfaces, new user experiences that AI makes possible.
Nowadays, it's not just a question of whether AI can actually substitute jobs. It's already doing that at a large scale. Companies like Meta are laying off a lot of developers and substituting them with AI. AI is here to stay and AI is evolving. Probably most of us don't really realize at what speed this is happening.
Some people still think that there are a lot of jobs that won't be affected by that but it's not the truth because AI doesn't come alone. There is so much development at the moment around robots that are actually powered by AI that will replace jobs like electrician or cleaning personnel.
The AI Paradox
The problem with that, and what I consider an AI paradox is that if people lose their jobs on all fronts, we will have on one side a whole sector of the population that has reduced income and on the other side things, products, and services that get cheaper and cheaper to purchase. But who is going to purchase all that if people don't have any money anymore? The economy lives from the consuming population and if this population can't consume anymore, what will happen?
This is something that Ford understood when he started mass producing cars. He made sure that all his employees were earning enough that they could afford to buy a car.
It's a question of what system the future holds for us because the capitalist system that is relying on people getting wages for their work seems to be at a dead end. There is a second level because our government structures are also based on this concept of people having a salary and getting taxed on the salary.
Crisis ahead ?
So if employees don't have any money, if governments run out of money, we could think that the economy will come to a kind of standstill. I believe that this is already happening at the moment, that we have actually reduced consuming activity in all the different categories. What is worst for people is that they don't have the security that their income will last.
Let's say that you are a software engineer and then you see that other people are laid off. It brings fear to you. What do you do? You start to reduce your expenses, you save because you don't have trust into the stability of your future employment. This means that less money is circulating. This is a circle that leads sooner or later to an economic negative growth or a crisis.
So maybe we shouldn't put too much energy into fearing for our jobs. Maybe we should think about how our future could look like in the face of AI and robots taking over a lot of the workforce that exists now. This is the big question and I think that it's worth thinking about.
Geopolitical challenges of the future
One other thing that I would like to point out. If products are very cheap to produce and there are no more wages to be paid, there are other things that start to matter even more, like the things that the whole AI economy requires:
- energy
- soil
- primary resources
- water
These four elements are the future strategic items that the governments are fighting for. Even if we are not aware of this directly at the moment, it is already happening when you see billionaires that try to go to space to figure out how they could use the resources from space. When China is thinking about building a huge power plant in the atmosphere that would collect the solar energy, when we see China and other countries fighting over our arable land in Africa, all such things contribute to the same picture. This is the future challenge that we all face. The struggle of power will be to have access to these key ingredients: water, energy, soil, and primary resources.
How do you see it? How do you think the evolution will happen? Will there be a big crash, a big crisis or will it be an organic transition?
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This is the sort of thing I started to think about yesterday. After watching https://www.channel4.com/programmes/grayson-perry-has-seen-the-future
I'm not sure about the DRM restrictions on that. But maybe a UK VPN will work? Also, a quick search suggests that it might be available on Apple TV. But I have no experience of that.
Anyway, my takeaways from Grayson's documentary in the context of your post are:
Personally, I'm more optimistic about the long-term. But I believe that people who are advising the next generation about career choices need to be aware of developments.
!BBH
I tried to look at the show but I couldn't log in.
I also see it like that. AI can't function without working infrastructure and stability. Well maybe one day it will have robots to maintain the system and not be dependent on humans but I don't think that AI has any interests in eliminating us... Well maybe we are naive :-)
I'm sorry you can't see the show. So I asked what has grayson perry discovered about AI development in San Francisco
That doesn't really cover the long term issue that I mentioned. But I'm sure that you can refine the prompt if you want to.
Anyway, he interviewed a rich guy who, fearing the worst, has started an isolated, off-grid community of rich elites. With one of its aims being to stockpile 10 years of food from their own land. Which to me says they are abandoning humanity for a decade of escapism.
Give me naivety over paranoia any day!
Agree 100% with that :-)
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STOPThanks a lot for the curation!
I think it will be a huge crisis, but honestly, I think that technology isn't developed enough for us to consider space right now. I think that things will go by slowly, and right now, AI is getting a ton of investment, but whether that investment pays off is still up in the air. I am still seeing a bunch of people fighting against data centers, and I don't think it will be an easy fight.
What I believe is that the first investments are the ones that are most expensive. Chatgpt and co. will have difficulties to be profitable. But we see already now new models like Gemma 4 coming out by Google that require just a fraction of the infrastructure to run. I think we will see a movement where AI gets cheaper, more efficient, and uses less hardware. These AI will be profitable in my opinion.