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People joke about the world being taken over by robots. But when someone as high profile as Steven Hawking says “The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race,” and that “Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, can’t compete, and would be superseded” by constantly improving machines, you stop joking and you start to wonder. You ask: What would a world run by robots look like? Will that world materialize in one hundred years? In fifty? How do we ensure robots, AI, and automation support our basic social and economic human needs rather than undermine them?
For that, we turn to Martin Ford, software developer, entrepreneur, and Silicon Valley-based author of The New York Times Bestselling Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future and The Lights in the Tunnel: Automation, Accelerating Technology and the Economy of the Future. He has a degree in a computer engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor and a graduate business degree from the UCLA.
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I’ve written some skeptical posts about the automated future in the past, and the more I learn about the nature of electronics and computing (and I work in this industry), the more skeptical I get.
Firstly, Mother Nature is the ultimate master, and google etc aren’t as smart as they think they are. When the radiator in the truck starts leaking, are google confident their logarithm will be able to diagnose the problem, source a replacement part which is economically viable and have it installed without human aid?
Second, jobs are produced by business or government. Business is motivated by self interest and desire, both for seller and buyer. Government jobs are motivated by the interests and desires of community or authority. We all work so we can buy goods, an independent lifestyle, and a sense of dignity and fulfilment. These are needs unique to the human spirit. A robot does not have these desires, and it’s hard to imagine why they would. You would have to write aspiration into their code. I’m sure some boffin is out there claiming he is halfway to achieving that, but for what purpose? And do businesses want machines with aspirations? and would that mean that humans would cease to have their own desires?
What will happen to these human jobs: will soldiers become redundant? Police? Security guard? Protester? Critic? Demolisher? Garbage collector? Recycler? Thief? What about provider for food, water, clothing? Maker of shelters? Is ISIS fighter or drug dealer a job?
I also think Stephen Hawking is one of the worlds most under-scrutinised people, he is labelled as “the worlds smartest man” and that label is seldom questioned. He also has shady socialist sympathies.
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