Indeed, what the authors describe is what I would consider Work 2.0 in the 21st Century.
In the pre-industrial era, work was meant for the non-affluent. The affluent themselves spent their time in leisure and intellectual pursuits and indeed would look down upon labor. However, today it seems like our entire global society is structured around work we do. One might even say that our identity and self-worth derives from work, at least as a twentieth century social construct.
The authors Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson, who run the MIT Center for Digital Business, illustrate a world where creativity, problem solving, scale come from sources that we are not used to seeing.
As the title of the book indicates, the book drives home three mega trends in digital technologies:
Machines: More and more human work will be done by machines and economics tells us that we will invest more and more in machines and machine learning. The book gives a fairly extensive treatment of machine learning. Nobel Laureate Daniel Kahneman goes as far as to say that on the whole, solutions presented by an algorithm powered by machine learning, will outdo those delivered through humans; whether they are radiologists, advisors or any other such professions where experience and judgement is valued.
Platforms: The economics of platforms leads the authors to predict the rise of platforms over products because it engenders complementary investments that make the platform more useful. I have been intrigued by the developments in Bitcoin and Block-Chain technologies. This book gives the most extensive treatment I have seen on this topic, but in layman's terms.
Crowds: focusing on external innovation, they explain the rise of "crowds" which has given rise to the sharing economy and encourages open innovation. Crowd-sourcing might indeed become the Work 2.0 term of the 21st Century.
Here is the situation as Machines, Platforms and Crowds inexorably rise ....
Machines can pretty much do it all. A few platforms (Amazon, Uber and Facebook to use three examples) can provide the scale the world needs. And the majority of us as individuals will become bit players contributing teeny-tiny chunks of labor as part of the crowd.
..... and here is the situation we are going to be confronted with:
Firstly, companies and how they are structured, Work 2.0 and how it is done and compensation and how it is distributed will be nothing like we are used to. The majority of Work 1.0 that we are used to doing will become obsolete.
An elementary and often used example to strike home the point the book is making:
Horses, bullocks, elephants and camels provided transportation until the 19th century. An entire business ecosystem thrived around it. In the 20th Century, that wholesale stopped being the case.
In the 21st Century as Work 2.0 comes into full force, humans will be the equivalent of horses, bullocks, elephants and camels - i.e. the entire thriving eco-system won't be needed in the new century. Author Yuval Noah Harari, the historian at Hebrew University predicts that Artificial Intelligence will create a "useless class" of humans in his book Homo Deus.
The book describes this situation, but does not wade into sociology or social remedies for what havoc all of this is about to wreak on societies.
In the face of this I do not wish to be William Buckley and "stand athwart history, yelling stop, at a time when no one is inclined to do so, or to have much patience with those who so urge it."
So what should we be doing?
Here are my thoughts in that regard:
Education: Urgently introduce teaching on Artificial Intelligence in our educational curriculums across the board. I don't mean that everyone should become a computer programmer. Rather everyone should be taught what it is, its applications and implications.
Financial Mobility: The social safety net should be sufficiently strong and portable that Workers 2.0 can do their work in micro-chunks as part of the crowd and not worry about their compensation having to pay for very basic needs such as healthcare and education.
Social Compact: Our cultures should recognize more broadly, more deeply and more authentically those accomplishments that are non-financial. That could be volunteering, care for the frail and elderly, contribution to the arts or human understanding.
In the past, as I have contemplated technological progress, I have romanticized my own individual life, should it be afforded leisure. Sitting by a stream, with my dog Fred by my side, writing and composing and being paid for it!
History shows us that social and technological transitions can be painful. So I do worry, that if we don't handle the transition to Work 2.0 wisely, forcefully and swiftly, that it will engender a lot of pain before we or our progeny hopefully enjoy its benefits.
13 comments:
Thanks for your excellent book review, which inspires me to read the book.
It reminds me of science fiction stories I read as a teenager, where robots would do all the work and humans would be free to do whatever they wanted. These stories focused on the "gee-whiz" aspects of the science and technology, without addressing the inevitable societal issues.
Indeed, we need to be thoughtful about the transition to such a world, to help ease minimize the pain for the affected individuals whose livelihood will be threatened by the transition. I agree that the new technology could help free resources to focus on serious challenges that need attention, such as the environment, education for children, care of the elderly, and support for vulnerable populations.
Good review and a wake up call to transition to Work 2.0
Good review. And from your review, and others’, the book seems to be pretty good primer about what’s been happening and what may well be about to happen if things continue along this path.
While I’m not your average, every day, run-of-the-mill luddite (I’m still libertarian enough to be skeptical of the dystopians’ predictions of the end of all employment, not to mention humanity). I often tell myself that once again jobs we can’t imagine today will more than replace the ones being eliminated by this three-pronged technological/economic revolution.
Still, I have to admit that I do often think that things are different this time. And therefore these sorts of criticisms are not as easily dismissed these days.
Very nice review with a rather alarming view of sociological implications!
For the first time we are living in an era when reality outpaces imagination.
This was very interesting to read: thanks for the heads up! Fascinating account...
I have a strong and even scary reaction to the ideas in this book though, I will not live to see whether the predictions in this book comes true or not.
First: Rich will always rule,period. Whether people work for them or machines work for them. The more and more machines replace human work, more and more control will go into the hands of the rich. It may even go to a point when people (without work or even identity) may revolt.
Second: I am still not convinced that machines can do EVERYTHING humans can do. If it does happen, people will become irrilavent and that is a dangerous thing for the welfare of the society.
Third: It is true that for most part, work defines who we are (except for the rich and the politicians). But if machines take over completely, it is they and their masters who control the world and not the majority of the people who will be without work.
Fourth: This might create a scary situation that millions of people will be without work for whom there is no mechanism for their voices to be heard and this situation may result in a death of democracy resulting in anarchy.
At this time all these are speculations and no one really knows what exactly will happen and weather even the earth will survive from the actions of rogue nations. I can only hope that things will turn out in the end for some kind of peaceful resolution of the problem of machines overtaking humans will be found and peace will remain on earth.
Great review!! ✅👍🏽
I see an uncanny parallel to the title and your conclusions!!
Your first point of Education of AI relates to learning of *Machines* (no longer just).
Second point of financial relates to a stable fiscal *Platform*.
The social compact is about empathizing with the *Crowd* around us!!
Very well analysed.
I totally agree with the Financial mobility comment.
Real freedom and liberation of human race can be achieved in letter and spirit if the basic requirements of a decent living is assured.
Very well done! Thought-provoking. Love the thought of platform, not products. Gonna read the book.
Love your attempt at positive responses. However, I feel no matter how much you try to put a positive spin on it, you see the machine future as a dire threat to society. (This worries me because I consider you on the upbeat edge of “irrational exuberance.”) We can fall back on “we’ve faced apocryphal forecasts before and they’ve never been wholly right” but, do you believe this time is different? (Usually an absurd notion.)
I do see it as dire even if not in the long run certainly in the transition
We are so used to only dealing with crises instead of circumnavigating them ....
Your thoughts?
Obviously, the big questions are: 1) How, how much and for what will people be paid (or earn a living, perhaps? 2) If the government is somehow providing assistance, where will its tax revenue come from if folks are volunteering or , worse, sitting around watching machines do their work?
You’ve this one I’m sure: In the future, companies will only need one employee and one dog… the employee to feed the dog and the dog to keep the employee from touching the machine.
Maybe, some sort of bartering? Everybody works way less and makes a lot more per hour? We’re already 70% service- and support-providing economy (I think) — health care, food provision, entertainment, etc. But who and how are the people who are consuming those services earning the money to pay for them? Of course each of those require products to be made in order to provide them (including content for entertainment). But even in ag, where food is made, the trend is increasingly much bigger and fewer farms with less laborers per farm, enabled by extraordinary tech, e.g. drones. The boss man now sits at a desk watching computer monitors.
The one thing I’m pretty sure of is that a few billion people are not going to allow themselves to starve (or be bored) to death… even if it meant destroying the machines á la the Luddites!
Great review. Glad you could find the time to read the book and pen the review.
My two cents: 1) Will the world become more efficient due to technological advances that everything becomes easier to attain. My thought: yes 2) Will this pave the way for humankind to learn to do and to provide more humane work and more artistic work? I hope they do. This should result in a paradigm shift from learning to do routine tasks, to learning to really be creative.
Post a Comment