The rapid development of artificial intelligence (AI) is not only disrupting traditional notions of work. It also changes the essence of human identity. If previous technological developments have changed the behavior and appearance of people, then AI will cause fundamental changes in key socio-political views of man, including that on the nature and role of the state.
During the Industrial Revolution in the 19th century, mechanical power, derived primarily from the use of coal as fuel, replaced human and animal power as the energy source for transforming nature and producing industrial and consumer goods. As this revolution progressed in the 20th century, hard manual labor remained the domain of only a shrinking group of occupations.
To get an idea of much of the work of the pre-industrial era, look at the roofers who are still exhausted and worn out today from working in inclement weather and in uncomfortable positions that affect their physical health. They still, in the 21st century, have what was once a shared experience. In the early 20th century, workers in the automotive industry bent over their tools, lifted heavy objects, and expended a lot of energy. Their early 21st-century counterparts monitor monitors and watch robots take over heavy physical operations. With the disappearance of the sweat economy, workers are weaker, but also healthier. Those who want to maintain their physical strength now go to gyms.
The information technology revolution has become the next step in the development of humanity. As machines have taken over more of the mental tasks, computers now operate robots that do the physical work. By eliminating mental work (such as the complex arithmetic previously used by salespeople), an old trend continued: many people stopped thinking at work and spent their energy on crosswords, sudoku, or the Wordle game.
Today's revolution goes much further because it affects how collective activity is conceptualized. This change is perhaps most pronounced in the military, but it also has implications for participation in political life and even for our understanding of legitimate government.
The twentieth century was remembered for the most destructive wars in human history, and this was a new impetus for democratization. Because soldiers and their families were to be rewarded for their sacrifices, both world wars led to greater suffrage. Classical political liberalism included the idea that people should not be expected to give their lives for a particular political order if their vote does not count in that establishment.
Technology shows a way to speed up this process. Around the world, educated urban populations are less and less expected to participate in cruel human activities. Consider the example of Russia. To wage his war in Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin relies on semi-independent mercenary groups, the population of the country's peripheral regions, and even prisoners, because he knows that the population of Moscow and St. Petersburg is physically and, more importantly, psychologically unfit for that task.
This, of course, is not a new problem. Before World War I, military leaders in major European countries wondered how they would field large armies on the battlefield, given that modern industrial life had rendered many conscripts physically unfit for military service. Today, military planners still have the same concerns. In 2017, the Pentagon estimated that 71 percent of young Americans (ages 17 to 24) were unfit for military service, and that percentage has since risen to 77 percent. But they have technology that previous generations could hardly imagine. Warfare is being taken over by unmanned devices such as drones, just as industrial and office jobs emerged in earlier eras.
To understand the political implications of automating war, let's just consider how society as a whole has changed in the modern era. In medieval society, people were usually divided into three classes: oratores (orators), bellatores (warriors), laboratores (workers) - those who behaved as idlers or prayed (priesthood), those who fought (aristocracy), and the rest, those who performed some "job" in the form of physical labor.
It was precisely thanks to military prowess that the aristocracy was initially able to lay claim to enormous political power. But after the aristocrats stopped fighting and retired to a free courtly existence, the legitimacy of their rule evaporated in a cloud of ghosts. With the advent of mass armies, after the era of the French Revolution, war became a more democratic affair, as did politics. But now, when war is waged by technology, power is once again fleeing from the people.
What will happen to the remaining social groups? Just as the industrial revolution reduced society's need for "workers" (laboratores), the artificial intelligence revolution makes human participation in the military anachronistic. As was already the case with the "workers", the class of "warriors" (bellatores) is filled with machines. There remains a group of "speakers" (oratores), who perform work that is still distinctly immanent to man.
Could they also fall victim to the creeping redundancy and eventual existential annihilation of technology? Fearing this, some critics and tech company bosses are calling for the development of artificial intelligence to be put on "pause". But technological progress never stopped just because someone wanted it to.
The author is a professor of history and international affairs at Princeton University
Copyright: Project Syndicate, 2023. (translation: NR)
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