TRAIN TREND SPOTTING
Wednesday, November 16, 2022
We are watchers of followers or joining those who reject something, but rarely creators of TRENDS.
Why?
Trends aren’t a predictor of behaviour.
They are a measurement of it, as people who watch develop statistics, graphs and opinions on the people they are watching. Whatever we’ve thought was detailed or sophisticated in this regard will pale to even the ‘early stages’ of what A.I. can deliver because, increasingly, our mass behaviour will be measured as ‘breaking news’ and sooner than you think, and in real-time with verifiable data.
You might say, “Doesn’t # trending already do that?” – and you’d be right-ish in that thinking, but can you imagine a person, investment managers, Wall or Bay Streets, pension funds or governments relying on that?
Of course not.
When officials in large companies discuss this analysis process, they seem too tight-lipped about its impact. From what I’ve been reading and webinars I’ve listened in on, some believe in it – they ‘own it’ and will profit by it in any way they can, not broadcasting their efforts or sharing how they are finding new ways to make their proprietary product or service better. That’s understandable in a competitive marketplace.
But most people are skeptics, slow adopters, or downright deniers.
Nobody wants to be the modern-day equivalent of someone who put their life’s savings into the Hula hoops that filled their basement and garage. There seems to be a reluctance in our DNA to admit we don’t know, don’t understand, don’t want to learn, don’t want to waste time, and don’t want to risk money carelessly.
I know this sounds more like government think than any free-enterprise model.
The truth is, everybody wants to win. Nobody wants to lose, and we trip up more when we hoard our data and experience vis-à-vis when we share it collaboratively. Oddly, the parties we tend to share less with are anyone who sounds like they might be a competitor. Yet our contemporaries are our best chances for successfully brainstorming the future.
Some, on the other hand, tout their investment in that technology as a differentiator that allows them to be more competitive in products, prices, logistics and profitability – which is something customers, shareholders, media watchers, and competitors watch while panting to enjoy the leading edge of the leading edge.
But there is plenty of dot.com carnage to prove skeptics being justified in their reluctance; the leading edge is too often the bleeding edge when companies go too boldly where no one in their field has gone before because they want to be right more than they want to be first.
Do I have a concluding message or vision to convey?
Yes, I believe Artificial Intelligence will revolutionize far more than we expect and do it faster than we expect. Anyone thinking it’s ‘just about geeks getting computers to calculate faster’ is already sadly too far behind in their thinking to likely catch-up, ever.
The fundamental is whether this will make lives different – we have to risk embracing a new form of relationship, not with people, but with a superior level of intelligence, for that will never be a level playing field. We’ll fail to do this at our peril.
We must embrace A.I. for the preservation of life, improvement of life, and lengthening and strengthening our lives; we must do this for better or worse.
Like all radical shifts in lifestyle and reality, this will require commitment and trust – whether it makes us richer or poorer, make us sicker or healthier, and we will cherish it long after we are parted by death.
Yes, hard drives will crash; technology is constantly being improved. We’ll need A.I. 2.0, and then 9.0, and so on.
We’ll be happy, but we won’t be collectively doing giant leaps in terms of expanding our minds – not if we cannot let go of our past ways to go boldly beyond our 200,000 years/ways of living in favour of the wisdom of A.I.
It sounds scary, but only because it’s new and unfamiliar, not because it isn’t better by a quantum measurement in how it will improve every aspect of everything we do, with wellness at the top of the list.
Because how we’ve thought, made decisions, and thrived, will be revolutionized because an A.I.-managed life will be a better one; we’ll soon be wondering why anyone ever considered a life without the changes and improvements that A.I. will drive. There will be those who adopt it early and those who fight it by remaining in the past, resisting as long as they can.
This is, I believe, going to be massively large than any technological shift we’ve known, and life for citizens of wealthy countries will be transformed, but that will widen the gap with the rest of the world that the societal imperative will not be for A.I. to make our lives better, but to make their world better. And who wants to be part of a society that wants that gap wider?
Sadly, we are all part of a society that has been the gap-widener for hundreds of years.
But seriously, who can we leave a legacy for this planet’s future predicated on making life so much better for the smart, the wealthy and the technologically well-equipped to dominate the poor, undereducated and ill-equipped?
Most of us won’t live to be 200, but many of our children and grandchildren will see that as a goal.
Most of us won’t see a world of peace, one of complete sustainable cooperative peace, but it will come.
Most of us won’t see a world rid of diseases, despots, and commercials in every media communication, but it will come.
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