I think you're both right and wrong. You're right that capitalism has become a paperclip machine, but capitalism also wants AI so it can cheaply and at scale replace the human components of the machine with something that has more work capacity for fewer demands.
The problem is that the people in power will want to maintain the status quo. So the end of human labor won't naturally result in UBI – or any kind of welfare – to compensate for the loss of income, let alone afford any social mobility. But wealthy people will be able to leverage AGI to defend themselves from any uprising by the plebs.
We're too busy trying to make humans irrelevant, but not asking what exactly we do as a species of 10+ billion individuals do afterwards. There's some excited discussions about a rebirth of culture, but I'm not sure what that means when machines can do anything humans can do but better. Perhaps we just tinker around with our hobbies until we die? I honestly don't think it will play out well for us.
The problem is that the "we" who are busy trying to make humans irrelevant seem to be completely unconcerned with the effects on the "we" who will be superfluous afterwards.
Machines can’t have fun for us. They can’t dance to a beat, they can’t experience altered states of mind. They can’t create a sense of belonging through culture and ritual. Yes we have lost a lot in the last 100 years but there are still pockets of resistance that carry old knowledge that “we the people” will be glad of in the coming century.
It's a similar story around extant ancient/indigenous cultures. And similarly we've seen apathy from elites, especially when indigenous rights get in the way of resource extraction or generating wealth in any way, and also witnessed condescension towards indigenous peoples by large segments of the world population. That's not to detract from the many defenders of indigenous rights, but if we look a the state of how older cultures, designated as 'obsolete' by wider society have been treated, I don't humans will fare well when silicon takes over.
> They can’t dance to a beat, they can’t experience altered states of mind.
I think the key is ensuring that “we” get to choose what society looks like in the AGI era. In the world today, even marginalized people have power. Look what happened to Assad. Look at the US - whether you believe they made the right decision or not, working class people were key to Trump’s victory, who may well institute tariffs as a way to protect working class jobs by insulating American industry from global competition. I’m not saying that will be successful, I’m saying that working class people got mad and a political change resulted.
Similarly I don’t see a world where AGI takes all the jobs and people do not respond by getting pissed off. My fear is that AGI is coupled with oppressive power structures to foreclose the possibility of a revolt. Opaque bureaucracy, total surveillance, fascist or authoritarian leaders, AI-controlled critical infrastructure, diminished and bankrupted free press, AI fake news, toxic social media…it could add up to a very dystopian outcome.
Democracies could thrive in the AGI era but we need to take many more steps to ensure we protect our societies and keep the interests of citizens paramount. One example is suggested by Harari in his most recent book, namely to ban AI bots from social media on the grounds that we should not permit AI agents to pretend to be citizens in the discussions of the public square.
> I think the key is ensuring that “we” get to choose what society looks like in the AGI era. In the world today, even marginalized people have power.
That's a bold assumption. Much of that assumption is predicated on the ability for the masses to revolt.
> Look what happened to Assad.
Wait for what will come after. Look at all the Arab Spring revolutions, and you see in their wake a number of dictatorships.
Anyhow, I'm not saying this is 100% how it's going to play out, but I definitely wouldn't bet against it. Holding all the keys and having all the resources are the wealthy, and the wealthy have no motivation to voluntarily just give up their position in society. And when humans have no value to leverage/be extracted in order to generate more wealth, their will be no way for the vast majority of people to become wealthy. Raw materials will still be valuable however, but, of course, these are controlled by the wealthy. And if those in power wish to gatekeep access to AGI, they can leverage their wealth and resources to automate a military and thus protect the raw materials that keep them in power.
People give communism a bad rap, but the soviets had maybe a quarter the resources, a much smaller population and logistical problems from geography and kept up with the US for decades, outpacing in several areas.
It seems to me that given how AI is likely to continuously increase capitalism's efficiency, your argument actually supports the claim you're trying to dispute.
Capitalism is not efficient, it's grabby. Read Bullshit Jobs. Moreover, capitalism isn't interested in efficiency, it's interested in grabbing more stuff. It's relatively effiicient at centralising power and resources into the pockets of shareholders, but that's probably not what you meant.
I think this is borne out even moreso in recent years, as environmental degradation continues, and we watch as capitalist systems are unable to do anything but continue to efficiently funnel money into the pockets of shareholders.
The word "efficient" can only plausibly be applied to overly simplified models in fantastical economic theories which don't reflect reality.
The kind of AI offered by companies like OpenAI may very well be an effective tool at grabbing more stuff though, sure. Or, rather, at convincing everyone they simply must move to this new area, that they control, effectively grabbing that newly created space.
