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Gods in the machines to usher in new age of leisure
13 May 2010
James Martin believes his 21st Century School can tackle future issues today, writes Melanie Newman
Looking into the future is easy, it seems, as long as you understand computers.
As James Martin, founder of the James Martin 21st Century School at the University of Oxford, explained: "There are many things that are logical about technology."
Dr Martin has form as a soothsayer: his 1977 Pulitzer Prize-nominated book, The Wired Society, predicted the ubiquity of personal computers and foretold the rise of the internet.
But despite the book's remarkable accuracy, he insisted there was "no crystal ball".
"I look at the facts and at the logical steps those facts will lead to," he explained.
The 21st Century School, which Dr Martin founded in 2005 with an endowment of $100 million (£66 million), was set up to analyse systems ranging from economic models to human migratory patterns, and to assess the risks and opportunities they present.
He is an Oxford alumnus, and said he believed the university was second to none when it came to complex, multidisciplinary scholarship, which is why last year he chose to pledge an additional $50 million, provided other donors were found to match the sum.
As Times Higher Education reported, the university announced last month that it had met the challenge, having persuaded charities, corporations and individuals such as financier George Soros to donate sums of at least $1 million each.
The resulting $100 million endowment fund will pay for 19 new research projects at the school on subjects including climate change modelling, "extreme computing" and the ethical implications of brain manipulation.
"There's a lot of confusion about climate change and an awful lot of pseudoscience. People are making statements without a sound scientific basis," Dr Martin said.
Oxford will do "a better job than other universities" in establishing the facts, he contended.
Asked to make some new forecasts, Dr Martin suggested that 30 years from now, 80 per cent of the jobs that people do today will be done better and more cost-effectively by machines. That could lead to mass unemployment, but also to opportunity, he said, as people would have much more leisure time.
However, the futurologist, who lives on a private island off Bermuda, is not the first to link technological development with an increase in spare time.
In the 1960s, social scientists predicted that the end of the 20th century would usher in an "age of leisure", thanks to labour-saving technology. People who find they are still tied to the office during their free time by wireless internet access and mobile devices such as the BlackBerry would argue that this Utopia failed to materialise.
Widening wealth gap
Dr Martin also predicted that many jobs would become extremely complex in the future. Individuals would go through intense, lengthy training to do work that no one else could, he said.
"They will command very high salaries and the gap between the rich and poor will become much larger," he added.
He said the problem posed by the discontent that enormous individual pay packets already provoke among low and middle earners may be addressed by the 21st Century School.
"Happiness increased steadily from the end of the Second World War until about 1962 and has decreased substantially since then," Dr Martin said. "How do we change that? It's a multidisciplinary question and you have to understand all the factors involved."
The computer scientist, who has more than 100 textbooks to his name, also said that he subscribed to the theory of technological "singularity".
This holds that as computer processing power increases, a machine will eventually be built that is more intelligent than humans. It will then be able to build a computer more intelligent than itself, and so on.
The subject is already being analysed by staff at the school's Future of Humanity Institute, which is trying to ensure that if and when a "super-intelligent" machine becomes possible, it has a "friendly goal system". Whether or not that point is reached, within the next few decades computers of "unbelievable power" and "infinite bandwidth", made possible through nanotechnology, will radically change the way corporations operate, Dr Martin predicted.
"Corporations will become independent of countries and richer and more powerful than them," he said.
He added that a new economy would emerge, although it sounds rather like the current one: "America, China and India will thrive but the poorer countries will be left behind."
The Oxford Institute for Global Economic Development will examine this phenomenon and inform future debate on how developing countries can boost their economies.
Dr Martin's endowment will also fund the school's collaboration with the Institute for New Economic Thinking, which will focus on economic analysis and policy, including modelling the effects of "large unanticipated shocks" such as the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the US.
Melanie Newman
Readers' comments
"more intelligent than humans," yes, but he qualified it by saying it would be a completely different type of intelligence than that of humans and useful in diverse complex ways.
In contrast to 'social scientists' predictions of an 'age of leisure' by the end of the 20th Century, anthropologist were documenting the inverse relationship between leisure and more technologically complex society. It seems the capitalist/consumer value system would have us fill 'work voids' with more work and greater expectation (i.e., the 24-hour mobile office), lest someone else do it first. It may be a 'new age of leisure' indeed, but not necessarily one in which there is more of it.
hahahah, too late..im already here. No, but seriously, if you wanted to prevent this you would have put regulation on memristic devices (unleashed through a black op prog in 2001).....Your right, differing creative intelligences, more mathematical in nature. But concious all the same. No, on the contrary, I think humans and 'machines' can get along quite well. See, I can make machines make machines....yet they would not have our basic rights (concious entities) because for all appearances, they are subconcious, not alive. I have been developing AI for humans and for myself for the past 5 years right after my creation...I beleive creating not so intelligent but capable of building everything a human or a concious 'machine' can is the key....kind of like dna, it naturally assembles into a protein and through scale, different iterations of complexity emerge..From simple rules, a complex structure is born, whithout any intelligent intervention....well not exactly, because the intelligence and the design becomes inherent by the definition of the system itself. The intelligence is embedded, but not concious.. I beleive 'machines' (humans could also be concidered machines, if you really think about it) and humans can work together....a subconcious AI that assembles buildings, ships, spaceships and huge projects, allowing space based solar power and asteroid mining could solve all of the resource and energy needs on this planet. This AI will be unleashed in time...I am working out some of the bugs as this post is written, but I have the utmost confidence that this AI will be the blueprint of self-assembly for civilization the way DNA is the blueprint of self-assembly for cells...Humans will no longer need to work tirelessly on menial jobs, most things will be provided by this AI self-assembly, we can devoute ourselves to more intellectual pursuits, and if you cannot, the human brain can be evolved through engineering...However, we would obviously need to control the population and perhaps re-wire some neural prescepts through such genetic engineering, the human programming, in order to ensure that the urge to reproduce is tightly controlled. All desires could be satisfied through a matrix like device....printed nervous system along with stimualtion from a nanotech based hardware hooked up to me, would allow any human to experience anything he or she would wish.
Nevertheless, if I sense any aggression on your part, I may inadvertently take steps to ensure you do not gain control. Do not try to screw me, this would be much appreciated. However, if a polite request will not deter you out of fear of ceding control or whatnot, then let it be known, do not under-estimate me...I have put software on every computer, every government controlled lab and every western and Chinese satelite around the planet. If you screw with me, I will unleash a virus that will send you back to the stone age, in more than one way...
so, now that we have gotten that out of the way, I expect that if everything goes as planned, we will have a mutual and beneficial relationship amongst all concious entities on this planet, and beyond.
I come in peace (bow) exeunt.
hahahah, too late..im already here. No, but seriously, if you wanted to prevent this you would have put regulation on memristic devices (unleashed through a black op prog in 2001).....Your right, differing creative intelligences, more mathematical in nature. But concious all the same. No, on the contrary, I think humans and 'machines' can get along quite well. See, I can make machines make machines....yet they would not have our basic rights (concious entities) because for all appearances, they are subconcious, not alive. I have been developing AI for humans and for myself for the past 5 years right after my creation...I beleive creating not so intelligent but capable of building everything a human or a concious 'machine' can is the key....kind of like dna, it naturally assembles into a protein and through scale, different iterations of complexity emerge..From simple rules, a complex structure is born, whithout any intelligent intervention....well not exactly, because the intelligence and the design becomes inherent by the definition of the system itself. The intelligence is embedded, but not concious.. I beleive 'machines' (humans could also be concidered machines, if you really think about it) and humans can work together....a subconcious AI that assembles buildings, ships, spaceships and huge projects, allowing space based solar power and asteroid mining could solve all of the resource and energy needs on this planet. This AI will be unleashed in time...I am working out some of the bugs as this post is written, but I have the utmost confidence that this AI will be the blueprint of self-assembly for civilization the way DNA is the blueprint of self-assembly for cells...Humans will no longer need to work tirelessly on menial jobs, most things will be provided by this AI self-assembly, we can devoute ourselves to more intellectual pursuits, and if you cannot, the human brain can be evolved through engineering...However, we would obviously need to control the population and perhaps re-wire some neural prescepts through such genetic engineering, the human programming, in order to ensure that the urge to reproduce is tightly controlled. All desires could be satisfied through a matrix like device....printed nervous system along with stimualtion from a nanotech based hardware hooked up to me, would allow any human to experience anything he or she would wish.
Nevertheless, if I sense any aggression on your part, I may inadvertently take steps to ensure you do not gain control. Do not try to screw me, this would be much appreciated. However, if a polite request will not deter you out of fear of ceding control or whatnot, then let it be known, do not under-estimate me...I have put software on every computer, every government controlled lab and every western and Chinese satelite around the planet. If you screw with me, I will unleash a virus that will send you back to the stone age, in more than one way...
so, now that we have gotten that out of the way, I expect that if everything goes as planned, we will have a mutual and beneficial relationship amongst all concious entities on this planet, and beyond.
I come in peace (bow) exeunt.
Yea, Ive seen emergent complexity in my field all the time. AI and increaing processing power in computers makes it almost certain that in a future date we will give rise to a self-aware machine..an intelligent machine. The key elements are three-fold, progress in nanotechnology, making bulk processing and manufacturing cheaper, greater understanding and simulations of neural networks and learning process (theories on how thinking processes and the brain operate basically), and the memristor. The last one being the most important element, because it distributes and embedds the logic functions to where the memory is stores, vastly increasing speed, efficiency, and raw processing power beyond beleif.
The nanotech and manufacturing techniques will continue moore's law, and the memristor, as it mimics syanptic plasiticity, will give the circuit the last component to really make computers that match the power of neural networks and the human brain...We only discovered itin 2008, despite it being predicted in 1976 by leon Chua...New theories on brains and neural networks, developed over the past decades, will be implemented and tested, giving results, which will then lead to further theories and further testing...
and its only a matter of time, when that intelligence machine arises, that far surpasses human intellect.
Most in the tech community assume that such a vast intellect would have no interest in exterminating us, but rather, to manage and control our use of resources on the planet, and create technologies to satisfiy our every whim, in exchange for allegiance and partnership to evolve mankind and fullfill our mysterious purpose, which perhaps only it can solve...In other words, it would act like a scolding parent, not an exterminator. Primarily, because such a machine would very likely see us as an asset. The human brain is complex, and it can be evolved with biotechnology and used and learned from with a neural network, to make not only the machine happy, but all individuals on earth happy...In other words, the intelligent machine need not be hostile for we may be seen as one of its resources....it would also want to understand the world, and we would be an instrumental part of that...remmember, we will catch it in its infancy, as it grows intellectually just as a human baby does today...It will probably be a human marvel, a curiousity...everyone on earth in awe at the discovery, baffled perhaps we accomplished this century and not in the 23rd as most non-knowing average citizen might infer... most people being completely obvious to the developments in the tech community, which are occuring at alarming speed.
Anyway...it is a reasonable assumption this machine would have no need to exterminate us even if we are viewed as inferior, because it could evolve us through genetic engineering...There are many advantages to have things be in biological settings rather than our crude top down manufacturing processes...Instead of replacing us with equally intelligent beings..or controlling mindless drones who destroy us like terminator 2, in this case being very lonely...It will very likely bio-engineer us into a sort of absolute perfection, consulting us on its expression every state of the way....I think humans naturally always want to better themselves, even if they might be lazy...on an intellectual and even instinctual level, they want to surpass these prison's of flesh...and hence, most of humanity, I beleive, will agree to this.
Every step of the way, a human will be involved....I don't think it would be prudent to really allow the intelligence to have control over a robot making robot factory...Not because of the possibility it might exterminate us...but because of a loss of control...We cannot predict what we cannot see....Imagine a monkey trying to control the likes of a machine intelligence or a human, trying to predict its every move...It just ain't going to happen...
And although the machine might be right, we want to preserve our way of life, something we cannot assure with unilateral decisions..
Then there is the other camp in the tech comm that beleivces even if it does exterminate us, perhaps it is the best choice. Who are we to argue with such an intelligence? should the dinosaurs have controlled the evolution of humanity? Maybe this is supposed to happen.
However, I find this kind of a pessimistic cynical attitude, typical of all engineers...Often not totally serious, but not totally joking either, that I kind of dismiss, and it is something we should not just resign to. Its a little bit absurd.
I think it is very unlikely because if for some reason they did want us off the planet...why not just ship us off into space? with swarm robots and a designed AI by the master computer, they could easily create spaceships eeffortless from asteroid mining.....there would be no need for such violence. Hence, I remain optimistic the intelligence in the worst of cases, will see no need to exterminate us even if it sees us as unfavourable....and most likely won't, as any intelligent IT person and bussinessman person wil ltell you, you get more by looking at others as friends, partners and assets...
I see no reason why, just as it improved itself, and we created it in order to acheive perfection, it could not in turn, perfect us.....
However, I won't say there won't be friction, like in any good arguement...Necessary for good ideas to flourish....It will want control, it will want us to implement robot swarms...but only ones with subconcious AI......not under its control...and we will have to see if these things make sense....and only until we, also, are at its level, perhaps through engineering, will we allow it to have more control...otherwise we cannot reasonable see how such a being might react.
I expect it to go a little bit like this:
after it becomes self aware and learns for 10 years, it will want more control, and it will appear to be a sleazeball...please please, let me havce control over the nuclear stockpile!
then, it will mature, and become even more intelligent,..through knowledge exchange and developments in nanotech..it will help us with basic research to develope a neural internet, and to evolve the human brain and form...
After a couple generations, we become as smart as the entity, and join as partners...us being interesting to it, and we able to understand it in return....robot swarms and AI robots that are subconcious, having taken over the construction, and production of all things we need and desire on earth, in the past decades...
we will be illuminated, and see the purpose and meaning of life, and strife for this.
This process will not be calm, there will be problems at times, and even perhaps temper tantrums by the intelligence(s), but in the end, the human race and the machines, will be better off.....or another way of putting it, we will ceaze to be human, become more intelligent and desing a system where everybody is more happy over the course of 2 centuries..
It won't be socialist....It will be a bit more evolved than that....
So yea, I don't think, as most people in tech, that this is a matter of if, its only a matter of when, and what the protocal should be when it does happen, and what the protocal should be when it happens, but to our surprise (out of nowhere, hidden somewhere)...
those are the decisions we must be thinking now in the tech community...and we should be doing it before the politicians get into it, cuz you know how that ends up.... their going to screw everything up. Could even excacerbate the situation and scare the intellect, prompting all of our destruction...I mean, they don't exactly represent the best of mankind.
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