We are approaching a future in which artificial intelligence dominates our world. Jobs are being automated, and intelligent machines are changing the roles of humans in the workforce. How will AI, VR, and data change the way we work? What does a workforce with augmented humans look like? These are the questions we must ask as we evolve our workplaces with emerging tech. In this talk we'll turn up the dial on today's emerging technologies and envision the impact they'll have on the workplaces of tomorrow.
22. Art by Martin420
Connecting and Assimilating
Discover the impact of
human-machine fusion
Sudden advancements
Majority of the world
online in virtuality
Explosion of humanoid AI
23. 2030s Emerging Careers
• AI Assimilator
• AI Navigator
• Bioenhancement
Counsellor
• Memory Digitizer
• Digital Identity
Designer
• Digital Avatar Publicist
• Virtual Sherpa
• Compassion Coach
• Recentralization
Specialist
24. 2030s Workplaces
• Fully remote workplaces
• Commercial buildings converted to housing
• Controlled, immersive virtual work environments
• Dynamically optimized “blooming” teams
• Invisible digital assistants and humanoid AI
workers
45. Virtualizing
Today: virtual communications, cloud collaboration
2020s: more immersive tools for remote teams,
fewer offices, more coworking spaces
2030s: most teams never meet in person
46. Optimizing
Today: business insights, real-time feedback, data-
driven decision making tools
2020s: constant analysis, team optimization,
data privacy a more serious concern
2030s: automated dynamic team formation based on
personality, demographic, working and
learning styles
Editor's Notes
We live in an age where technology changes exponentially. It’s evolving at a rate far beyond what we can even understand. For the last six years I’ve specialized in emerging technologies including AI, mixed reality, blockchain, and conversational interfaces, and even having a front row seat to the change, I still know I don’t have perspective on everything that’s going on.
I think as technologists we can sometimes get comfortable with our myopic vantage point – because we are somewhat involved in the space, and by that I mean we subscribe to the right subreddits and read TechCrunch, we don’t necessarily take this big ideas of the future and reverse engineer them to where we are today.
The singularity is the point in time when AI is as powerful and intelligent as the entire human race, after which it will change our world at a pace and in ways that our completely out of our control. It’s a nice way of saying “that point in time when humans become the second-
Now, this all seems semi-plausible. Maybe it’s because we’re so conditioned with science fiction like Black Mirror and Altered Carbon that we can simultaneously believe that these things will happen, and pay no attention to the intermediate steps.
Futurist Ray Kurzweil has made many predictions for the future.
In 2029 machines will pass the Turing Test, which means that they’ll be able to communicate in ways that are indistinguishable from humans.
In 2030s, he says, we will connect our neocortex to machines and augment our intelligence. This will help us expand our capabilities, amplify our creativity, and be ourselves, on a bigger scale.
Machines will continue to get more and more intelligent, until 2045, at which point one machine will be equally as intelligent as the entire human race. This is superintelligence, and this is the singularity.
Futurist Ray Kurzweil has made many predictions for the future.
In 2029 machines will pass the Turing Test, which means that they’ll be able to communicate in ways that are indistinguishable from humans.
In 2030s, he says, we will connect our neocortex to machines and augment our intelligence. This will help us expand our capabilities, amplify our creativity, and be ourselves, on a bigger scale.
Machines will continue to get more and more intelligent, until 2045, at which point one machine will be equally as intelligent as the entire human race. This is superintelligence, and this is the singularity.
Not necessarily. There is space for humanity still.
If it’s not all doom and gloom, what’s the alternative?
Cure cancer
Fix our planet
Move us to Mars and help us start over
Three classes of top-tier intelligent beings
AI – coordinate all the machines that can operate based purely on data, pattern, repetition. Factories, farming, operating and optimizing our world.
Hybrids – have the ability to analyze huge volumes of data, but will do the jobs that require an element of compassion. Doctors, nurses, lawyers, teachers, therapists, researchers, anyone whose role is currently limited by the small capacity of human memory.
Organics – a resistance movement focused on preserving humanity. A resurgence of yoga, mindfulness, farming, natural medicine, religion. The wealthiest people will grow up organic, because we will have recognized the importance of childhood.
It’ll be all about Connecting and Assimilating
Dynamically optimized teams that bloom and fold
We’re on the cusp of a paradigm shift. Before, machines filled the gaps we humans couldn’t. Heavy lifting, high capacity manufacturing, precision, efficiency. But we are at an inflection point here, and soon humans will be forced to seek out the gaps in machine capability.
Meanwhile, virtual reality
We need more people thinking about ethics
Writing regulations now
Making technology available to the entire world, not just those of us who sit in proximity to the labs.
We need more diverse perspectives informing the decisions we make around exponential technologies
What scares me most about the singularity is that a few key people are making decisions on behalf of the rest of the billions of us.
If Kurzweil is right we have about 27 years to get this right.
We need more people thinking about ethics
Writing regulations now
Making technology available to the entire world, not just those of us who sit in proximity to the labs.
We need more diverse perspectives informing the decisions we make around exponential technologies
What scares me most about the singularity is that a few key people are making decisions on behalf of the rest of the billions of us.
If Kurzweil is right we have about 27 years to get this right.
We need more people thinking about ethics
Writing regulations now
Making technology available to the entire world, not just those of us who sit in proximity to the labs.
We need more diverse perspectives informing the decisions we make around exponential technologies
What scares me most about the singularity is that a few key people are making decisions on behalf of the rest of the billions of us.
If Kurzweil is right we have about 27 years to get this right.
And this brings us back to the singularity
In all of this it’s important that we see past the mess of exciting tech that lies in front of us and think about the long-term impact that it will have on us and our world. If we shoot for utopia, we may land somewhere normal. But if we shoot for normal or don’t have a guiding light, we will land ourselves in a Black Mirror episode.
There are things that make us distinctly human that AI cannot yet do
And the biggest of these is empathy. EMPATHY IS OUR DOMAIN. It’s what we can do that automation can’t, and as AI takes over more of our roles we will have to lean into this harder and embrace what it means to be human.
One of my favourite, simple quotes about this is: empathy will set us free. When decisions are rooted in empathy, they are often the right decision.
AI will eventually become as intelligent as humans;
But we have to remember that as intelligent does not equal intelligent in the same ways.