Optimistic scenario
Based on our previous posts, you may have noticed that the authors are techno-optimists. This applies to both the impact of technology on humanity and the speed of its implementation. As Winston Churchill said, “I am an optimist. It does not seem too much use being anything else.” We believe that everyone working today on the development and adaptation of artificial intelligence, mobile devices, robots, augmented reality, and other tech mainstreams is contributing to a better future. This philosophy is shared by the Pitch Avatar team, to which we have the honor of belonging, and, as far as we know, by most other companies in the high-tech and IT sectors. That’s why we chose the artwork of the remarkable artist and dreamer Robert McCall as illustrations for this text.
What underpins our optimism? Three seemingly obvious reasons:
- Technological development makes people’s lives better. Objectively, compared to our ancestors, we live longer and our lives are surrounded by much greater comfort. Comparing our lives with those of our ancestors in caves, tents, dugouts, and huts highlights how much progress has improved our everyday living conditions. Add to this the advancements in medicine and food production. While many people today still suffer from malnutrition and lack of access to modern medicine, compared to historically recent times when hunger and disease plagued most of the population, today’s situation is significantly improved. We have achieved this primarily through technological development. Not to mention “minor” advancements like education and transportation. Few of us think about the times when traveling fifty kilometers was a major journey, or when a person who could write and had read thirty books was considered educated.
- Progress, especially technological progress, expands and creates new opportunities for intellectual and creative realization. Today, billions of people are freed from the need to inherit their parents’ physically demanding, monotonous, and quickly exhausting work. The industrial revolution era, when humans were extensions of machines or conveyor belts, is rapidly fading into the past. Each year, progress creates more intellectual and creative jobs, giving rise to entire economic sectors. A classic example is computer games. What started as a byproduct of IT has become a major cultural phenomenon, providing entertainment to billions. For many, eSports has become a profession, and game development a highly profitable industry. It’s easy to see that progress is steadily moving towards freeing people from monotonous, hard, dangerous, and routine work, leaving them with only intellectual and creative tasks.
- None of the large-scale negative predictions by alarmists have come true. Skeptics have predicted everything from mutual destruction in a super war, eco-apocalypse, and humanity’s extinction by artificially created viruses, to machine uprisings, mobile phone zombification, and technocorporation dictatorship. All of these remain in dystopian and cyberpunk narratives. We haven’t even come up with a serious tech religion. While one could argue that negative forecasts and scenarios served as warning signs, likely preventing humanity from leaping into the abyss, it’s more probable that our species possesses a collective instinct for self-preservation, keeping us within reasonable boundaries. A good example is the still-functioning system of treaties and restrictions related to nuclear weapons and atomic energy. Or the ongoing, albeit slow and arduous, green shift towards more environmentally friendly production technologies. In short, all apocalyptic predictions remain as unrealized as the 19th-century alarmists’ claims that cities would drown in horse manure. As you can see, nothing of the sort happened, thanks to technological progress.
Of course, the authors understand that technology will not build “paradise on Earth.” We acknowledge that in the foreseeable future, there will still be unequal access to the benefits and advantages they provide. There will always be those who seek to use progress for criminal purposes. And, of course, it will be impossible to completely eliminate all risks associated with the implementation and use of new technologies. But none of this is a reason to fear progress or artificially hinder it.
What will it look like?
In the previous three parts of our futurism series, we outlined how smartphones, augmented reality, and robots might develop, especially in light of AI advancements. To summarize briefly: We believe that in the near future, in technologically advanced countries, there will be a rapid “extinction” of all types of professions and jobs based on physical and monotonous labor. A significant amount of processes, including trade, collaboration, leisure, and simply communication, will shift into augmented, including virtual, reality, replacing the internet as we know it. Most existing jobs will be taken over by robots and AI agents. Most public and freight transport will become autonomous, with the share of autonomous private transport constantly increasing. Most household chores, from daily cooking/cleaning to repairs, will be performed by personal and rented service robots. In short, AI agents and robots will handle most work in production, services, and routine process management. Thanks to these changes, cities will lose their significance as business and production centers and transform into comfortable eco-settlements designed for maximum comfort and social interaction.
This raises the question: “What will people do in this world?” For centuries, political, social, and economic models have been built on the premise that most people must work a significant part of their lives to meet their basic needs and those of their children. But if smart machines and programs handle all the essential work, what will society look like? It seems the answer lies in the fact that technologically advanced states and unions of states will need to radically rethink their economic foundations. Most likely, the economy will be based on the principle of unconditional basic income, meaning citizens will receive equal shares of the total state income.
Does this mean people will become idle, indulging in entertainment and pleasures in reality and virtually all the time? No, and again, no.
Firstly, we are inherently inclined to want more. And this “more” can be earned by choosing a creative intellectual occupation that suits our taste. Science, art, sports, invention, philosophy, and other pursuits requiring such uniquely human qualities as imagination, intuition, and a sense of beauty will always be at our disposal. Intellectual and creative activity is good precisely because it has no limits other than those defined by imagination. Technologies of the near future will be excellent tools for self-realization. Today, only a few lucky people can afford to do work that brings them personal joy and satisfaction without worrying about food or shelter. In the near future, this will become the norm.
Secondly, let’s remember that we are social beings. For a long time, hard work has hindered us from fully realizing our social potential as spouses and parents, friends, and club members. As optimists, we believe that the free time and new technologies will elevate social interaction to an entirely new level, possibly creating new forms of it. Who knows, perhaps the new society will reward social interaction with additional benefits, much like today’s salaries for work.
In any case, we are confident that an exciting future awaits us. And we are pleased to think that we are working in a field aimed at bringing it closer.
