The rise of AI in all (administrative) processes will change society beyond recognition; we are truly not ready for that.
Last Friday, I attended a very inspiring presentation by Ton Foks at the INNOVATE Festival. He gave a thorough prediction of how AI will change the business world and society as a whole over the next 15 years. His story was supported by the measurable growth of AI’s cognitive capabilities.
What he alluded to by mentioning the book and film 2001: A Space Odyssey, but didn’t elaborate on, is the moral side of AI. He did highlight that AI will take over practically all administrative tasks, and how that will change entrepreneurship and society, making a basic income inevitable.
However, something other science fiction writers have also pointed out before is that society is held together by what we call “moral arbitrariness.” People who are outraged when someone in their neighborhood is wronged, but completely indifferent when a much greater injustice is committed to someone from a different “tribe”. Where a third of people will always vote for a strong racist and fascist leader because they think it will be good for them. (Oh, and people like to forget that this never ends well.)
AI will painfully expose these kinds of “oddities.” While people talk about implicit bias in trained models, they’re only scratching the surface. We are talking about built-in feelings of entitlement.
Something to think about: what will change in society if everyone is truly treated the same, and therefore rules and benefits are truly the same for everyone? Over the next week, consider this through the lens of a truly unbiased AI. What would that do to daily life, politics, and society?
LET’S TALK if you’d like me to speak to the people in you AI project.
