"Self-Multiplying" Robots and Perpetual Production
Robots + Renewable Energy = Perpetual Production
Will robots feed the world and save the environment or destroy society and kill us all? Nobody knows for sure, but they will change the world in profound ways. The pace of breakthroughs is hard to predict but we already see robots transitioning from expensive and worthless to commercially beneficial.
That's a big inflection point, as profit can be reinvested in further breakthroughs.
Chat GPT has captured people's imaginations, and AI is closely related to robotics since robots need the ability to "think" and produce desirable outcomes. Continual breakthroughs in AI will reduce the cost of producing everything over time, including robots and the energy that powers them.
The cost of solar energy has come down dramatically over the last decade, as has the cost of battery storage. Renewable energy is big business now, where breakthroughs reap rewards in the billions of dollars, which drives continual innovation, reducing cost and increasing yield.
In this article, I use solar energy for simplicity, but any renewable source will do. A nuclear fusion breakthrough would speed the path to "perpetual production" but even without it the combination of robots + solar + batteries can produce a similar outcome where more energy is produced than used by that ecosystem.
I'm not saying it's a good thing to have a world where the robot population explodes and does most of the work humans do now. I just think it's going to happen and is something we should talk about more, as it could happen faster than we think.
"Self-Multiplying" Robots
The human race started with two people, who made more people, all fed by the sun -- the sun feeds plants, which feed animals, and plants and animals feed humans, who make more humans and produce more food to feed the growing human population.
A similar story will play out with robots, where robots make more robots, all fed by the sun -- the sun feeds solar panels, which feed batteries and the grid, which feed robots, which are getting better at performing work. Eventually robots will be capable and efficient enough to "self-multiply."
By "self-multiply" I don't mean robots will give birth, although who knows at this point, right? Robots will become "self-multiplying" when they can produce more solar energy than they consume.
For example, if 1000 robots can build solar panels (with charging stations) that can power 2000 robots, then the first 1000 robots can build another 1000 robots. Those 2000 robots can build more solar panels, that power more robots, that build more solar panels and robots, growing the robot population.
To do this, of course, robots and AI (collectively) need to grow in the amount of tasks they can perform efficiently, which is happening. The more human tasks they can perform efficiently, the closer we move to "self-multiplying" robots that perform all the work needed to produce solar panels and more robots.
Robots (including robot vehicles) will eventually be able to mine and otherwise gather materials, transport materials to factories, assemble some materials into tools/machines and use those tools/machines to build products out of other materials. AI will provide supporting services, connected to robots by the internet.
Breakthroughs in AI (Chat GPT for example), robotics (Amazon, Boston Dynamics, Tesla etc.), solar power and batteries are reaching previously unthinkable milestones that make this scenario almost inevitable. The pace is uncertain -- years? decades? -- but seems to be quickening.
Perpetual Production
Once robots become "self-multiplying" the path to perpetual production is fairly straightforward. Robots and AI are continually being created/trained to do work that humans do. At a certain point, the availability of human labor will no longer limit how many goods and services the world can produce.
There are two basic paths to robots doing work that humans do:
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The viability of the second path is a somewhat recent development. Tesla's Optimus might be the most famous attempt. Though challenging, there are major benefits to using a single production line and supply chain to produce one type of robot, which creates scale and efficiency versus building multiple types of robots.
Tesla believes it can leverage its manufacturing and AI prowess to efficiently build and train humanoid robots to do human tasks since its vehicles are already being trained to recognize objects and act autonomously. Humanoids are difficult, but sometimes big ideas bring in big talent capable of solving big problems.
The outcome of projects like Tesla's will affect the pace at which robots become capable of doing things humans can do, but it seems that process of replacing human labor with robot/AI labor is an unstoppable force. If a country stifles its own innovation, that country will fall behind others that embrace robot labor.
In a world where robots are self-multiplying and can do what humans can do, what is the limit to production capacity? It becomes limited only by the availability of raw materials, the ability of humans to get along and not seek destruction, and the avoidance of big mistakes or a knockout punch by mother nature.
The End of Poverty and Climate Change?
Perpetual production should mean we can all have what we need and want without fighting each other for it or using fossil fuels. (It might also mean someone builds an army of evil robots, which is a conversation that should be had, but let's leave that one for another day.)
Right now, humans only produce enough goods and services to satisfy a portion of the population, and we do it in a way that pollutes. With production capacity no longer limited by manpower, that should change.
This is the hopeful side of AI and robotics, which might be the most viable path to ending hunger and climate change without harming the global economy.
Will Capitalism Survive?
There are many risks associated with robotics and AI, among which is a massive disruption to our economic system and way of life. Will humans stop learning and working if they can live well without learning and working? It's hard to know what will happen.
It is possible that people will just work fewer hours and do more desirable work. Maybe we'll all be actors without having to live in our car on the way up?
But it is also possible that robots and AI will put a lot of people out of work, blue collar and white collar (including me), and that many won't find new work. How will we obtain goods and services? Will people just get a lucrative form of welfare and buy what they want, since robots and AI are producing plenty for everyone?
Maybe that works for awhile, but if everyone stops learning and stops working, could society and its economic system eventually implode or decay little by little?
Personally, I hope capitalism prevails and that people learn more, work fewer but consistent hours, enjoy longer vacations, more abundance, time with family... There is a path to a really good way of life where robots do a lot of work. There are also great dangers, too many to address in this article.
Let's Have a Conversation
I think it's time we started talking more about what's coming and how to prepare for it. Not every prediction everyone has, especially on timeframes, will end up being right, and I know it's a scary topic in some ways, but it's also really interesting the more you learn about it.
The AI and robotics revolution is happening, whether we like it or not, so why not make the best of it, let it inspire our imaginations, and enjoy the good parts while trying to minimize the risks and collateral damage?