If you’re using nutrition coaching apps like Lark, you know we’re a breath away from Intelligent Assistants (IA) as portrayed so brilliantly in Her, the movie.
Robots and AI Systems are already landing planes, writing news stories, and emotional robots may be your very best friend or your loyal pet.
We recommend reading this interview with Martin Ford, author of Rise Of The Robots: Technology and The Threat Of A Jobless Future in National Geographic. In his book, Martin suggests we are now at a tipping point where robotics, if not handled right, may trigger mass unemployment and economic collapse.
“We’re dramatically better off than we were 100 years ago and that’s largely because of technology. The problem is that things are becoming less simple than they were. Technology has reached what you might call “an inflection point.” On the one hand, technology is giving us all this great stuff, like medical discoveries or free information on the Internet. At the same time, technology may take away access to the basics, like a house and food. The extreme example of that is the homeless person who has a smart phone and can go to Starbucks and access all the digital abundance that is out there but has nowhere to live.
If we can address these issues, so everyone has access to a reasonable standard of living while enjoying the fruits of technology, we could have a very optimistic, almost utopian, future. If we don’t, for lots of people who are not economically at the top, it’s going to be pretty dystopian. Many people may lose their anchor to the middle class and get into trouble in terms of the necessities of life.”
Read the complete interview.
Photograph by China Stringer Network, Reuters.
Posted by Rudy de Waele aka @mtrends / shift2020.com