Bill Gates: Within 10 years, humans won’t be needed ‘for most things’ 🐂💩

We have GOT to stop believing billionaires just cuz they're rich!

So, Bill Gates has joined his billionaire brethren in denouncing the value of human beings despite the fact that Microsoft employs 228,000 people globally and his foundation cannot get by without at least 2,000 staff. Makes you wonder why the foundation is so focused on saving children's lives when they have no value, eh?

Earlier this year I wrote about the laughable claims of Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei who announced at Davos, “It is my guess that by 2026 or 2027, we will have AI systems that are broadly better than almost all humans at almost all things.”

(Mis)Anthropic CEO claims AI will be "better than almost all humans at almost all things"

This blatant misanthropy is not only dangerous and demoralising, especially for young people, but it's also an outright lie of the type tech bros seem to enjoy spouting on the regular:

Daniel Oberhaus, CC BY 4.0 │Trevor Cokley, Public domain │ Anurag R Dubey, CC BY-SA 4.0, all via Wikimedia Commons

Gates took aim at doctors and teachers during his interview with hard-hitting journalist Jimmy Fallon on NBC's 'The Tonight Show' in February, claiming that, “with AI, over the next decade, that will become free, commonplace — great medical advice, great tutoring."

Okay big man, let's get into it.

Great medical advice is available right now, free, from www.nhs.uk and www.webmd.com, in fact the latter has been available online since 1998. So, does that mean humans no longer require a doctor? Of course not. Because doctor's aren't simply encyclopedias of knowledge, they are sources of care and comfort and reassurance. They know your medical history, your family history, your local pharmacist and other specialists. They can make recommendations and referrals. They can legally write prescriptions!

And what about teachers? Well, as we witnessed during the pandemic, remote learning was an unmitigated disaster and despite the fact that anyone can watch free lectures online from the likes of Harvard, MIT, Oxford and Cambridge, how many actually do? Since 1969 the Open University has been accessible in 153 countries worldwide and yet it has only issued 2.3 million degrees, that's just 43,000 per year globally - less than University College London alone last year.

Universities provide so much more than education; they are a transition into adulthood, they are where lifelong friendships are made, life partners are met, where ideas breed and minds collide to develop concepts greater than the sum of their parts. Yes they have been turned into businesses that cripple young people with debt before they have even started out, but if AI has any part to play here its not in replacing institutions and lecturers but reducing admin and running costs.

But let's wind the clock back to before AI, before the Internet or even television, all the way back to the OG internet - books. Right now, anyone in a developed country can hop on a bus to their local library and access the greatest works of literature know to man, but how many do? It's industries, like the one Gates helped pioneer, that are now focused almost entirely on ensuring that people don't read books, in fact that they don't even have the attention spans to read a book. Reading a book today is anathema to the tech industry because they can’t track you doing it or serve you an ad between pages.

The fact is that so much knowledge is free already but it doesn't compel the learner to be anywhere at any particular time, to apply their learning, to engage with other people's ideas or contribute to a common body of work that makes collaboration possible. People matter. Tangibility matters. Reality matters.

Gates is a genius in his field but even he and his company have made catastrophic errors of judgment in tech, remember Microsoft Zune? Windows Phone? And now Skype? All massive flops, and I'm still waiting for the shoe to drop on Hololens! (When will these tech bros learn that we didn't enjoy wearing masks during the pandemic so why would we enjoy wearing whole-of-head helmets for fun?).

Studies show that EdTech is harming children’s focus, literacy, handwriting, and reading skills. The OECD found students using screens frequently in school actually perform worse, not better (though a new study part funded by mobile phone company Vodafone attempts to dispute these findings 🤨). And Sweden has already reversed ferret, kicking tech out of classrooms and returning to books, paper, and pens. Why? Well, actress and activist Sophie Winkleman a.k.a. Lady Frederick Windsor a.k.a. Big Suze (IYKYK), puts it damn near perfectly in this clip from her speech at her Alliance for Responsible Citizenship in February.

safescreenscampaign

A post shared by @safescreenscampaign

AI does not mean humans are not needed, especially in fields where care, comfort, tact, touch, motivation, inspiration, insight, or discipline are required. Can it enable a doctor to diagnose more accurately? Yes. Can it empower a teacher to create more compelling lesson plans? Yes. Can it replace the role they play in the lives of the people and communities they serve? Absolutely not. How is a machine going to break life-changing news to a patient or spot signs of trauma in a student? Tech companies are trying to replace the best of us with the worst possible solution not in the name of equity or even efficiency but power and profitability. Don’t let them. Refuse to use the self-checkout or order from the QR code, demand to talk to a human - and be extra specially nice to them when you do.

---

To Do List

My recommendations for new things to read, watch, look at, listen to and do:

There were a couple of outstanding articles in the New York Times this week that I would highly recommend getting stuck into - the titles are pretty self explanatory:

• The Gen X Career Meltdown: Just when they should be at their peak, experienced workers in creative fields find that their skills are all but obsolete.

• The Tech Fantasy That Powers A.I. Is Running on Fumes

And I’ve just registered for an event in Singapore on 30th April entitled ‘AIGents of Change: Authenticity, Image & Storytelling In The Age Of AI’, which I believe is free (I mean, they haven’t asked me for any money yet!). Get your tickets at: https://lu.ma/f5efxnge.

Finally my favourite Japanese punk/emo noiseniks just brought out a new E.P. here:

That’ll do ya! Cheers, Nx