While you were fretting about WWIII or the plague or global warming or just making the rent or getting laid or getting by, the future arrived and it’s terrifying. For starters, it’s taking a two sentence cue and writing this damn article.
A few weeks ago I was talking to an old friend about the future and he said “Hey, I know I sound crazy but all our data’s been wiped. We’ve got nothing to go on. The best we can do is make a list of stuff we want to do before we’re all gone and hope for the best.”
I then remembered a quote from Elon Musk: “If something is important, it will be done. Everything else is just bullshit.” The future really did arrive because I remember that, a few months later, Elon said something similar in that same speech: “The future will be better than the present and the present will be better than the past. It will be one of the more exciting times to be alive on Earth.”
Now, after having said all that, I would like to offer some hope. I know you’re having a great day, even if it’s cold and grey and rainy outside, but I’m here to tell you that the future is here and it’s a good one. What will be good about the future? Let’s take a look.
The future for sure will be better than the present. The way in which we interact with people has already changed drastically since the dawn of the digital age. At some point in the near future, we will probably develop AI systems that can answer questions, help us do our shopping, keep track of the weather, and be better communicators than we are. In short, these AI systems will let us spend less time with other people. The future will be better than the present because a) we’ll use our time more efficiently and b) we’ll be surrounded by helpful, friendly and efficient AI systems.
You’ll be spending less time with other people. I don’t want to alarm anyone but there will come a time in the near future where no human being is ever required to talk to another human being. I know this is a strange thing to say but I don’t want to alarm anyone. I want to bring you a ray of light, I want to get you thinking about how the future will make things better.
You’ll be surrounded by intelligent systems that help you navigate the world. I think of these as the personal navigators of the future. I’m going to make some assumptions about where these systems come from. They’ll be made from natural languages, so that will mean that the systems will be able to communicate with the outside world.
And since AI systems are really good at communicating, you’ll probably see them becoming a lot more visible. You’ll interact with them a lot more and they’ll be the primary form of communication. We’ll also find out that using natural language to get things done and make things happen is a much better way to communicate. This means that your personal navigators will be able to help you find directions or help you book a taxi or a hotel room. You’ll get more done with fewer people.You’ll spend more time helping other people. It’s easy to imagine that you’ll be too busy with your work to spend your time helping others. That’s not the case though. As the natural navigators get a lot more attention, they’ll become more and more helpful. I imagine that eventually they’ll be able to help you answer questions, track the weather, give you dinner and even drive you to the doctor.
You’ll be able to do all this while you’re out having fun. You’ll be able to help others and also keep track of the things that you need. These AI systems will also be helpful when you’re out having fun. The personal navigators will be there to ask for directions when you need them. They’ll make the right phone calls for you, they’ll know where the best restaurants are. They’ll bring you the right thing to drink and a seat with a good view. They’ll show you how to keep track of the weather. They’ll be your personal concierge. They’ll make sure that the entertainment is all sorted for you.
The good news is that these AI systems will be so useful that you won’t ever miss talking to another human being. When it comes to entertainment, that’s already the case. The AI systems are so good at it that you’ll never miss talking to other people. The same thing will happen when you’re looking for directions, or your next taxi, or a nice place to eat.
At the same time, you’ll still have friends and family. You’ll still have people to tell you about your day and ask you how your day was. They’ll be the ones who come to your house for Thanksgiving. They’ll be the ones who show up to your birthday parties. In short, there will always be people around to say hi to and ask how you’re doing. These AI systems will be there to answer the other questions that you need answered.Speaking of being able to answer questions, you’ll have friends who have answered more questions for you than you could ever imagine. Imagine how the questions will stack up over time. Over time, your friends will know the answers to all the questions you have, and they’ll be able to tell you more questions than they have time for. This is how you’ll get a lot more done. You’ll get a lot more done by having friends who know everything that you need to know.
I don’t want to alarm you, but it will get a lot better before it gets a lot worse. We’re at the dawn of the digital age where AI systems are coming online. They’re evolving faster than we’re changing. In a few years, these AI systems will be at a point where they’re more intelligent than all of us combined. They’ll be doing a lot of the work that we do.
That’s the first thing that you need to know about the future. We’re only at the dawn of the digital age. It’s one thing to say that the future will be better than the present. It’s a completely different thing to think that the future will be amazing. You can think that the future will be great if you like to think that a lot of people will die. It’s a different thing to think that a lot of people will live.
Let me put that into perspective for you. The present is bad and the future is going to be good. I’m sure that you’re having a great day today. It could be even better. However, even on a great day, we’re about to get hit with one of the worst things that can happen to humanity. It’s called climate change. It’s a big subject and it’s a big deal.
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Editor’s note: Harry Siegel wrote just the first paragraph of this piece, and the GPT-J at https://textsynth.com/playground.html wrote the rest. We haven’t altered the GPT-J text except for cutting a few redundant paragraphs.
