Highway to Hell or Highway to Heaven?

On 12 March, the conference ‘Highway to Heaven? How AI Transforms Society and Work’ will take place at the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute (GDI) on the occasion of the 21st European Trend Day. Many questions about artificial intelligence (AI) will be discussed, including whether tools like ChatGPT will make humans obsolete in the future. What will the future hold for us and will AI even be able to promote cooperation and reduce social inequality?

On the occasion of the 21st European Trend Day, the GDI has put together an extremely exciting programme. For example, Prof. Daniel Susskind, Professor of Economics at King’s College in London, will give a keynote speech on the topic: ‘When work is no longer the measure’. He compares the economy to a cake: Production and distribution have so far been determined by human labour. Now that technical advances are making the cake bigger, the question of fair distribution as human labour declines arises.

Prof. Carl Benedikt Frey, Professor of AI and Labour at the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford, will also speak on the topic: ‘AI threatens the mediocre’. He says that ChatGPT, Midjourney & Co. bring advantages for creative professionals. Prof. Frey will talk about automation and generative AI and does not expect AI to take over, but rather to be used in certain areas. He will also provide insights into the winners and losers of AI deployment.

US media theorist and trend researcher Prof. Douglas Rushkoff from the City University of New York will explain how human creativity can hold its own against advanced AI. He warns against humanising AI and against giving it creative responsibility. Dr Maya Ben Dror, co-founder and COO of ComplexChaos, will speak about: «Taming Chaos: the suitability of AI for complex work and decision-making situations». The company is funded by Village Global, the venture capital firm backed by some of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs, including Jeff Bezos, Eric Schmidt, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg and Reid Hoffmann.

thebrokernews talks to Dr Jakub Samochowiec, Senior Researcher and Speaker at the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute.

Let’s start with the question: Will tools like ChatGPT make humans redundant in the future?

Jakub Samochowiec: If at all – and that’s debatable – such tools would only replace office jobs. It will take some time before machines can mount a photovoltaic system on the roof or help someone get dressed. You could even argue that a job that could be completely replaced by ChatGPT is unnecessary anyway. That’s an exaggeration, of course, but this technology is still an opportunity for us as a society to reflect on what work is actually valuable and to what extent wages reflect that value. Just as the pandemic has drawn attention to essential jobs.

Are we going to live in a world without work soon, are we on a highway to hell?

If technology makes production more efficient, you might think that work would be finished sooner. However, work is not a fixed amount that can be processed. Increasing efficiency often doesn’t mean saving time, but simply producing more output. We are more likely to create more images than spend less time creating them. Just as we write more messages thanks to the efficiency of email instead of saving time – even though hardly anyone is happy with this flood of messages. The additional output made possible by technology is therefore often exploited, even if it does not always meet a need.

In addition, technology makes the world more complex, which in turn means more work. A lawyer may be able to do research faster thanks to the internet, but new technology also raises new legal issues – for example in the area of data protection. So there is more work to be done. And ultimately, many activities in our service economy do not create any direct value, but only shift existing assets. I am thinking of marketing, fundraising, any work that goes into project applications, but also lawyers in court, etc. The quality of this work is mainly determined in relation to the competition.

If a campaign, a project application or a court plea gets better thanks to technology, so will those of the competition. If value arises mainly in relation to the competition, it makes as little sense to lay off people as it does for a football team to do without a player due to developments in shoe technology. This competing work therefore cancels each other out and leads to an arms race that represents an endless reservoir for technological efficiency gains. This is another reason why I don’t expect us to run out of work anytime soon – we know how to keep ourselves busy.

You will also be speaking on the topic of ‘Working with or for AI’. What is the answer?

I talk about how AI can be used as a tool, but at the same time it can be used to monitor work. There are tools that analyse texts, for example those written by call centre employees or in emails, and use them to assess performance. Machines monitor whether people working from home are actually working or how quickly a pizza is delivered. This can leQuad to the disenfranchisement of employees, undermining their ability to use AI in a productive way. There is a risk of a division in society between those who, to put it somewhat exaggeratedly, talk to machines about their feelings, sitting cross-legged with bare feet, and thus create something new, and those who are subject to machine-based micromanagement.

The future of education will be the subject of a talk by Prof. Manu Kapur, Professor of Learning Sciences and Higher Education at ETH and Director of the Singapore-ETH Center. What impact do you think AI will have on the education system?

It’s difficult to answer this question in its entirety. However, AI has huge potential as a tutor. It can explain any topic to an individual based on their prior knowledge and level, and it is infinitely patient. You have inhibitions around a teacher. If you haven’t understood after three explanations, you might feel embarrassed to ask a fourth time. That’s not the case with a machine.

Regarding the last question: what and who are you looking forward to most, and is there a highway to heaven?

I’m really looking forward to Holly Herndon. Not only does she make great music with AI tools, making her a role model and pioneer in working with AI. That can also include teaching for other professions. But she also works intensively with technology and its social and legal implications and can therefore tell us a lot about it, which goes far beyond her craft.

Dr Jakub Samochowiec is a Senior Researcher and Speaker at the Gottlieb Duttweiler Institute. He holds a doctorate in social psychology and analyses social and technological developments and their interaction. He is particularly interested in the stories we tell ourselves about the future and the images of humanity and claims to power behind them.

He wrote his doctoral thesis on political psychology at the University of Basel, where he worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Social and Economic Psychology. He also conducted research on intercultural contacts and consumer behaviour. Due to his extensive experience in empirical research, he is also an expert in quantitative research methods and their evaluation. In addition to his research work, he has experience in video production, as well as being a DJ and musician.

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