Man And Superman - Human History Bifurcates (Video)

Artificial intelligence enabled automation is sweeping through society and it will have a species level impact on humanity during this century. During a keynote address on August 22, 2019, at the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture in Kolkata, we explore this evolution and the nuances of humanity’s future. Here is the recording and transcript:

It’s a great honor and immense pleasure for me to return to this forum after three years to discuss a topic that I had spoken on back in October 2016: The Future of Capitalism. Some of you may have heard that talk either here, in person, or on YouTube.

Let me summarize the basic premise of what we discussed, before I address today’s topic, Man and Superman. 

I had said that I am optimistic about the next couple of decades. I believe, strongly, that entrepreneurship and entrepreneurial capitalism can be democratized, and wealth can be created in the middle of the pyramid using capitalistic principles. In the next 2-3 decades, the potential for distributed capitalism is very high and the outcome should be extremely positive around the world. That is the mission upon which my current work with One Million by One Million is based. We’re trying to help a million entrepreneurs achieve a million dollars in annual revenue and beyond, thereby creating a trillion dollars in global GDP and 10 million jobs.

However, beyond our entrepreneurship development work, there is tremendous inequality due to technology and automation on the horizon. In the 30-50 year timeframe and beyond, technology and automation will create unprecedented disruption. 60-80% of ALL jobs will, likely, get automated. Now, that is a scary situation.

I am sure you’re thinking, ‘Oh, I’ve heard this before. Machines replacing jobs. New jobs always emerge.’ Yes, in the Industrial Revolution, for instance, that was a major concern, but we’ve seen tremendous job growth since then. This technology revolution is, however, different. Before, machines could not think. Now, they can. And because of the processing power available in tiny chips, they can think incredibly fast. Process unbelievable amounts of data in a nanosecond. Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Robotics are moving forward at breakneck pace right now. The march of automation looks pretty much unstoppable.

So, what does society look like in an all-play-and-no-work world? You see, work is an essential block of human existence today. Work offers identity, structure, and meaning. If you take work out, human beings will have to figure out what their identity is all about. If they don’t have to go to work for significant chunks of the day, they need to find alternative means of creating structure. These are not easy things to come up with on the fly. In a post-work world, there is the danger of people with nothing to do becoming zombies who watch television all day long, or play computer games. An idle brain is a devil’s warehouse, as the saying goes. I find the idea of a society comprising mainly of idle people extremely scary.

Now, this is also a scenario in which Capitalism fails. Most people don’t earn money anymore and have to be put on some sort of welfare. Inequality grows to extreme levels. Only a very small percentage of people make huge fortunes. There’s a small affluent class. The rest has no jobs and hence, no means of subsistence.

There are, needless to say, two schools of thought. A Utopic one, in which society becomes so rich that people’s basic needs are all met, and people have infinite leisure to pursue art, music, scientific research, sports, hobbies, friendships, spiritual contemplation, etc.

A Dystopic one, in which people become zombies. 8-12 hours a day of television watching and playing immersive video games, instead of going to work. Long unproductive days. Identity crisis. Social unrest. Crime.

And by the way, people are quite poor. Basic needs are met, but no one has any money to buy anything discretionary. So people don’t have any incentive to produce anything of value either except the basics. Or some luxury products for the super rich which no one else can afford. The super rich go on vacation to Mars on Elon Musk’s space ship. Humanity, otherwise, lives an uninspiring existence.

All this is not that far away. 30-50 years. Capitalism will come under tremendous duress if not an existential threat. We will go back to a fortune at the tip of the pyramid society, and that tip will be incredibly small. A few thousand people will control all the wealth in the world. Capital will drive wealth, not labor. There is no reason to work. Hence, there is no incentive to work. People who own the machines will make the money. And that’s one of the key issues driving the concerns over the future of Artificial Intelligence.

The first major conclusion that I have arrived at since the 2016 talk I gave here is that human history is about to bifurcate into two distinct classes: the wealthy, powerful, highly educated class that will come to dominate the future; and the useless zombie class that will be the planet’s majority.

Today, I shall further explore various aspects of this bifurcation.

Already, eight of the world’s richest people own as much wealth as 50% of the world population combined. Inequality will increase further, as automation sweeps through society, further hollowing out the middle-classes. Extreme inequality, pretty much, is inevitable.

Already, the highly educated are stratifying themselves into isolation. Social mobility is declining, even in America, where the American Dream was once a matter of great pride.

Imagine what would happen when simply being reasonably educated is no longer enough! With even white-collar jobs getting automated, you pretty much need to be a genius to have any ability to make a living, let alone create wealth.

Being Man is no longer enough, you need to be Superman to survive.

Add to that yet another scientific curveball: medical advancement in brain implants and genetic engineering. The rich geniuses will not only get the best medical treatments for their ailments, they will also be able to afford more esoteric and expensive enhancements through medical procedures like brain implants. The benefits of this scientific discipline will accrue to the Superman, leaving Man further behind. 

Have you heard of designer babies? The progeny of the wealthy will be designed to specifications of brilliance, editing out all diseases and genetic disorders that have often been handicaps thus far. Inequality increases even further, and in a few centuries, are we then looking at Superman driving Man to extinction?

This is the key question I want to explore today.

In doing so, I would like us to make one key assumption for this evening: biotechnology-enabled brain enhancement is going to happen. There will be roadblocks and speed breakers that will slow the adoption of this technology. Policy is one such speed breaker. Religion could be such a speed breaker. Why tamper with God’s creations? It is a sin. Economics could be a speed breaker. Only the rich can afford, the poor cannot.

But once the technology is ready, all these questions will get answered.

And that answer, I believe, lies in the future of Education.

Think, for a moment, how powerful an education opportunity this offers to humanity.

If a nano-scale implant can be installed on a human brain that immediately empowers that individual to speak and write English like Shakespeare, French like Proust, Bengali like Tagore, understand Economics like Amartya Sen, Physics like Einstein, dance Ballet like Anna Pavlova, and play sitar like Ravi Shankar, in the end, humanity will embrace the technology.

The key question would then be, what ought to be in this implant? That, in my opinion, will be one of the greatest philosophy questions of the twenty first century.  

Tonight, we have congregated at an institution that first and foremost cares about philosophy.

However, if you look at modern education systems around the world, philosophy is not part of the compulsory education system. 

Ethics is not taught in secular schools, by and large.

What creates a happy life isn’t taught in schools.

As technology has become the dominant force of economic advancement, software programming has taken precedence over most other disciplines. 

But that is about to change.

We won’t need programmers in another couple of decades. Automatic code generators will be writing software.

Brain implants, thus, won’t necessarily need programming languages as part of the repository.

Rather, they would need social intelligence.

Why has humanity been so successful as a species on planet earth? Because, through a complex and sophisticated set of narratives, it has managed to get the species to collaborate, not just compete. 

Human beings do not operate as a survival of the fittest society. We cooperate. The strong and the privileged take care of the weak, the downtrodden.

No other species operates this way.

And what are those narratives that have driven this instinct of collaboration? 

Religion is perhaps the foremost of those. 

Christianity touted the concept of service as a path to heaven. Swami Vivekananda built this institution around the same basic principle. The Jewish community is deeply philanthropic and service oriented. 

But counter to this age-old principle runs human selfishness. The crass animalistic instinct of might is right. It is okay to swindle people. It is okay to steal. As long as you don’t get caught.

So, it seems to me that one of the key pieces of the brain implant ought to be this service and philanthropic orientation.

And alongside that, a deep sense of justice, fairness, ethics, righteousness.

What if we can simply eliminate dishonesty through brain implants? What if this evolutionary step humanity is about to take ensures that the new Man will be ethical by design? Imagine how powerful a step we could be taking! 

The rest - whether a person will become a Physicist, a dancer, a painter, or an Economist - can be determined that same way it is determined today. 

Of course, many design questions will come up, as we explore the adoption of this technology.

At what age do the implants get installed?

Is an implant hard-wired, or can it be updated?

I am going to assume that implants will receive updates as our phones do today.

Thus, if implants can be updated as the child develops, then the basics of education can proceed the way they do today, but at each step, with a stronger foundation. No longer would there be any risk of a child not fully grasping a lesson in Algebra or Trigonometry. Everyone grasps everything. No more competition for grades. Learn. Then learn more. Think. Then think more. Learn to be creative. Invent. Innovate. Based on that learning. No child fails. No child is left behind.

The child reaches 18 with a broader and deeper knowledge of the options to then make a choice of which discipline to make her vocation. Further updates to the implant happen accordingly. If Physics is her choice, then she starts her journey with all of the existing knowledge and understanding of Physics in her brain right away. She then builds on that knowledge and explores how to advance that knowledge. Our young physicist is operating at a genius level off the bat. Let us now see what she invents.

Cross-disciplinary updates are possible. If she is interested in Biotechnology and Organic Chemistry, both topics can be updated at a very young age. May be, she then goes on to invent cures for depression at the cusp of these two disciplines - addressing brain chemistry in innovative ways.

In the design of the implants, I also feel there needs to be a comprehensive strategy for how to teach people to build strong relationships. An epidemic of loneliness is running through society today. Since the advent of social media and the smartphone, addiction to the device has become a chronic disease. People don’t meet, talk, eat together as much. They text.

But again, going back to ancient wisdom and philosophy, long ago, Gautama established community - sangha - as one of the core tenets of his new religion, alongside dhamma - righteousness and Buddha - self-knowledge. Buddhism, the most secular of today’s religions, has much to offer in building the philosophical framework of tomorrow’s technology and society. 

The brain implants that will drive the functioning of tomorrow’s society need built into their framework a desire for people to get together, eat, drink, talk, make music, dance, tell stories. A desire for human, in-person communication, camaraderie, interaction, collaboration. 

And technology itself - social media and the smartphone - could contribute to advance community rather than becoming forces fostering isolation.

In summary, we are, as a species, going to leverage technology to upgrade Man to Superman. A much larger population of humankind will be able to not only survive, but thrive, if we succeed in making this evolutionary change.

The parts of society that will reject this evolutionary change, most likely, will become extinct.

Darwin’s Natural Selection principle will apply. The fittest will survive. 

The fittest, however, will be the technologically enhanced. 

And we need to root the designing of this technology in philosophy. In wisdom derived from thousands of years of human history.

As human history bifurcates, we need to systematically ensure that as large a population of Man successfully upgrades into Superman as possible. That would be the best, most robust way, of saving the species from extinction.

This begs the question how. The economic question of the how is daunting. But I also believe that it is not insurmountable. 

Let us draw a parallel in contemplating this issue.

My ancestors were successful, wealthy, highly regarded members of society. They considered philanthropy and social contribution an important responsibility. Among the various ways they contributed was by building schools.

Bill Gates, one of the richest men on earth, has made philanthropy, especially education, a core charter for his post Microsoft life.

So, humanity has already got a framework for education related philanthropy.

In the world we’re designing, an important component of education will become these implants we’ve been contemplating this evening. So, instead of building schools, late twenty first century philanthropists may simply fund large numbers of implants to upgrade large populations of Man to Superman.

There also exist frameworks for supporting public schools with taxpayer money. The same flow of funds can continue towards funding education, except, instead of schools, this money would support implants in the future.

So, with a bit of imagination, the funding required for upgrading humanity from Man to Superman is viable.

There is another issue that we need to contemplate in designing humanities’ upgrade path to Superman: the role of the narrative.

I said earlier that religion has been one of the foremost narratives around which human beings have collaborated. Religion has necessitated that members of various groups look after their weak. Religion has offered holidays during which to get together around specific stories. Durga Puja, the greatest religious holiday here in Kolkata, is built around a wonderful story of the goddess visiting her parents with her children. It is a celebration that brings people together, fosters community. Pretty much all religious holidays have this characteristic. All these wonderful aspects of religion are worth preserving.

However, religion is also creating havoc in the world right now with terrorism, fanaticism, and colossal mayhem. The story has gone out of control. 

In what gets implanted into the brains of billions of future Superman, how we deal with religion needs to be thought through very carefully, lest we create billions of fanatics, instead of billions of educated, enlightened, tolerant, secular human beings with strong ethics.

Of course, the greatest contribution of this order - Sri Ramakrishna’s secular message of tolerance - All religions are paths that lead to the same God - needs to be systematically programmed into the brains of late twenty first century Superman.  

Now, while we have arrived at the topic of God, I feel the need to say a few words about the need for a definition.

To me, God represents transcendence. 

I do not believe in an omnipotent, omniscient, benevolent God that watches over us. If there was such a God, humanity would be further along on the path of peaceful coexistence. The slaughter of man in the hands of man that we still see all over the world begs the question: are we defining God in the right way?

I know it is sacrilegious for me to stand here and pronounce that the concept of God - the narrative around it - needs to be rethought.

But it does. The narrative is outdated. It does need to be rethought. Especially as we contemplate what ought to be programmed into the brains of billions of people in the next revision of the human species.

God isn’t watching over us and making sure everything good happens.

Everything good is not happening.

If you have any doubt whatsoever on this subject, remind yourself that Bashar al-Assad is currently the President of Syria. He regularly slaughters his people. Why are these people any less worthy of the mercy of an omnipotent God? Is everything good really happening?

No, everything good is not happening in the world.

But there is God.

God is in the moment when we experience beauty, human warmth, love.

God is in the good we do in the world.

God is in the love we love.

God is in the Art we create.

God is in the work we do, in the excellence we seek.

God is in the Science we pursue with dedication.

God is in the purity of our existence.

God is in simple decency.

This secular philosophy needs to be built into the technology that will drive the future Superman species.

In case you’re thinking all this is science fiction, consider the recent news that Elon Musk’s secretive brain technology company is already testing implants on monkeys. So what I have discussed today is not that far fetched.

At MIT, researchers have figured out ways for people to do Google Searches just by thinking. Imagine, the entire repository of knowledge from the Internet available just by thinking! 

We’ve discussed the future of education for a while. Let us now talk about the future of healthcare.

In my last talk, I had touched upon this a bit. I had said, If you think about what a doctor needs to do to diagnose an illness, she needs to consider all the symptoms, take into account all the test results, consider all the treatment options, factor in all the side-effects of various medications and their interplay with other medications the patient is already taking. This is, effectively, a multivariate optimization problem that a doctor has to do in her head. And, she needs to keep up with all the new research and advances in medical science, and factor those in as well. The field of medicine is full of incorrect diagnosis and mistreatment of illnesses. Now, if you replace this whole process with software, which IBM is trying to do with their Watson supercomputer, medical diagnosis becomes a truly scientific, deterministic process. I can tell you, if I have the option of being diagnosed by software versus a human doctor, I would always prefer software. It will be far more accurate.

Tonight, with the assumption that the brain can be seriously augmented, we can take this discussion further. What if all the medical knowledge of the world is not just buried inside the head of a doctor? What if each individual has that knowledge programmed into the brain? Anytime there’s a symptom, human beings can self-diagnose rapidly what the issue is and what is the recourse. Sure, there would still be need to surgery, advanced testing, etc. But basic healthcare takes a giant leap forward.

Think about it. Let’s say, you are diabetic. Anytime there is a sugar low below a certain threshold, the brain immediately triggers you to go eat something and compensate. Today, millions of people die of this kind of issues. No longer.

The field of genetic engineering is of immense importance in this context. There are so many diseases that can simply be edited out at a gene level before a baby is born. Imagine a world without schizophrenia. Chinese scientists have already created two babies who have a dramatically reduced probability for contracting HIV. The regulations and ethics of this field are currently murky, so research is stalling a bit. But sooner or later, I fully expect that this field will advance, and there would be a dramatic impact on the quality of human life. What if Alzeimer’s Parkinson’s, Cancer, Cardiac diseases, Diabetes, Schizophrenia, Autism, etc. can all be genetically edited out? We’re going to be a much healthier species.

You can take this line of thinking and apply it to any field and extrapolate what might happen.

So let us discuss the questions that I have stirred in your minds tonight. We have 30-50 years before this technology starts getting incorporated into society. Before that, a thorough philosophical reckoning of where humanity wants to go needs to be conducted.