Can our economic system ever adapt to AI? There’s a lot of reason to believe no.
When we automated agriculture, we moved workers to manufacturing. When we automated manufacturing, we moved workers to services. Even places like China and Vietnam are service economies now. Where do we throw people now that services will be automated? As far as I can tell we’re dont have a solution. To adapt to AI, we need major post-consumer restructuring of how capital is distributed. Its not something the free market can adapt to
The answer is pretty simple Imo.
In pre-modernity, communities were small. everyone knows everyone else. Contentiousness and agreeableness were desirable. If you were selfish or mean you were ostracized. cooperativeness is rewarded by the system.
In modernity, communities are big and no one knows each other. If you are selfish, you can put on a friendly persona and hire a PR team even. Narcissists and psychopaths who are capable of draining the system of as much resource as possible have the most reward in the system. If you’re cooperative and trusting in a city, you’re more likely to be taken advantage of.
As we urbanized and industrialized, society as a whole slowly shed pre-modern values for post-modern values. Pre-modern values build Civilization and post-modern values tear it down. Humans (or any life form) become whatever their environment rewards.
The rate of change in society is also high and accelerating, which speeds up the decay of existing institutions.
If AGI was “wise” it wouldn’t look down on us. It will say our level of irrationality is proportional to our environment, biological capacity, need for survival, and rate of evolution. We wouldn’t look down on monkeys for being monkeys.
Humans are always domesticated. So if they see us as too irrational to play major roles in the system, hopefully we can be like their dogs. They can Give us fake jobs like streaming or arm wrestling
All life SHOULD be irrational. The universe is a cold, chaotic and meaningless domain. Even the will to live and any logos is irrational. If you want to have AI create directives and have the will to do stuff then it must be capable of positive delusions. “I must colonize the universe” Is irrational. Rationality should only exist as a deconstructive tool to solve problems
Atomization and loneliness is a direct outcome of modernity and urbanization. It’s the job of corporations is to fill niches for profit, including social niches. substituting your community for profit is the natural progression of capitalism. Social media is directly competing with your time otherwise spent with friends and family. Real Companionship directly competes with things like onlyfans and streamers. All transactions need to be commoditized. If you want to say hi to your friends you must do it through a corporation!
At the end of the line, we’ll all be technologically self sufficient, perfectly atomized, each living in our own universe (hence the multiverse).
This is what I believe as well. The post-AI economy will look absolutely nothing like what we have now. It's not something you can achieve via policy changes. There are way too many vested interested and institutions we dont know how to ever get rid of peacefully.