In the US, especially, the idea of socialism is a problem for many people and many of these people have guns. I am more fearful for the next generation .. they will go through the modern equivalent of the industrial revolution ..

Something to think about.

I believe that we are all inter-dimensional energy-based entities (spirits) that interface with a physical avatar. In my view “spirituality” is accessing information available through our multi-dimensional senses that is not otherwise accessible via our nervous system.

Prayer is communication with the higher-level being (god) that created this physical world. I believe that this being is literally sire to our spirits and that we are his children.

A “miracle” is merely an event that cannot be explained by our current limited understanding of science.

As for the distinction between “mental” and “emotional” I use these terms in their colloquial sense to distinguish between LOGIC, and IRRATIONAL forms of thought. Computers are (as yet) incapable of emotion…most of the work in programming has been focused on LOGIC because the most profitable applications are logic based rather than emotional.

So, to follow the example, housing is expensive due to price fixing and manipulation of credit availability.

“People are still going to dive in the Great Barrier Reef, go skiing in Aspen, eat good food, go out to dance and do other experience related activities.”

“I don’t see computers taking over jobs in those sectors for a long time”

Hm I don’t get it: Why couldn’t human-level AGI’s (with better machine-bodies than today) run a restaurant, run a ski resort, safely operate a sailing vessel?
..Unless you’re thinking that robotic bodies (“physical presence”) won’t be ready for that for a long time?

I wouldn’t count on it.

Yes, the future belongs to the augmented and the AI…but it helps to clarify that, those who choose not to augment themselves, will not be left behind….because, as expressed before, they will have a world of abundance around them to enjoy. In a sense, they aren’t missing out on anything…it’s not that they are being ‘left behind’, there is this us vs them rift and so on….that’s something I feel is, unconsciously, made without being intended.

If people choose to augment themselves in the future, this is their own personal choice to made, probably stemming from their own personal philosophy and beliefs…if that’s what they choose, they will still have this new world around them, which still gives them plenty to love and live for….it’s just that, they are making the conscious decision not to augment themselves and “move on”. They aren’t gonna live on preservation farms or any ‘cages’….

Their seems to just be a lot of anxiety and attempts to create an “us vs them”, and I don’t see it that way – All of this can be eliminated if people simply augmented themselves (and their will be a lot of pressure to do so), but if they don’t, and such decisions should be respected, measures will have to be taken to accommodate them, and they can be more then comfortable given the abundant resources of the world to come.

My vision for the future are as followed:

1) Their will obviously be different sects of society depending on the level of augmentation…for those who choose not to augment themselves whatsoever, they are more then ‘taken care of’, and have plenty to love and live for…they simply do not wish to augment themselves for their own personal reasons, and thus, are accomodated in their own (inevitably temporary) sect of society until they die.
2) This sect of society comes to be because, naturally, the augmented still care and love those who don’t (probably now, on a level that the ‘naturals’ can’t even comprehend anymore)…..because they obviously are not Terminators who suddenly, with their mega-intelligence, wish to kill everyone not like them….they still have memories and emotional attachment (though now vastly augmented and beyond what they could have comprehended before) to their loved ones and obviously would not suddenly wish to kill them…that’s an irrational movie-style Darwinian fear….again, these are human beings, vastly more capable then they were before.
3) The sect of society made to accommodate the ‘naturals’ will not be this poorly run-down dystopian farm ripped straight from Hollywood where the ‘naturals’ are forced to live off of rations, and thus, unconciously pressured to augment themselves and some them stubbornly and pridefully don’t because they don’t want to ‘give in’ to their ‘captors’…..It will be a sect of society, undoubtedly vastly more comfortable and pleasant, then what people have today given the post-scarcity environment that people now live in.
4) the ‘pressure’ to augment is really only in the minds of the ‘naturals’. The augmented have absolutely nothing to fear from the ‘naturals’, given the sheer rift in capability (any luddite movies or John-Conner style “resistances” are all futile before they begin), but more importantly, because they still love them, now in a level they probably can’t even comprehend, as, shocker, they are human beings (though vastly more capable) who still are, in essence, the same people they were before….I imagine much of the ‘pressure’ the naturals have to augment is largely and irrationally perpetuated by themselves; indeed, their will be pressure to augment, so they can be as connected and capable as all the rest….but ultimately, the decision is theirs alone. Anything else, is just misguided and unnecessary anxiety created by the person.

A lot of the anxiety is rooted, in one sense, because of the idea that the ‘naturals’ will be lucky to get what they get, given how weak and feeble they are to everyone else….aside from, yet again, the choice to augment is theirs alone (and by all means, they should)….they will have plenty to be happy about, and the augmented are not these overlords watching them. Someone may say that I’m being overly-presumptious in assuming what more intelligent beings will feel, but I feel it’s inflated….we are not making Terminators – we are not making our own captors and those who don’t augment must pridefully resist as to not become like them, and those who give in, are weaklings with no spine….for goodness sake, what a masochistic vision of the future, humanity, and yourself. We are human beings on the verge of making ourselves even more capable and connected…we have plenty to live for, and those who choose not to go all the way for their own personal reasons, will still be accomodated and live the rest of their finite life in abundance unless they change their minds.

Is that to say that their won’t be ANY malevolent AI’s or augmented people in the future? Honestly, their probably will be….it’s not a sign that there is something wrong with augmentation or human-level (and beyond) AI on principle….but simply that, people are people, and their will be new threats and concerns in this new world (e.g. grey goo)….the good news is, for every augmented terrorist, their will vastly more people wanting to stop them with the same, or preferably even greater level of capability as part of the new status-quo, so it’s not like there is this vast difference in capability….the only exception is, those who don’t wish to augment, who will be protected and accomodated given their frailty…those who are augmented and malevolent probably won’t bother or care for such ‘weaklings’, but for the crazies who do, again, their will be defenses and measures made to protect them.

This could lead to a final pessismistic critique that, it’s ‘because’ the augmented are still humans, that that’s what everything comes down too…that it’s because they are human beings, it’s exactly why this fear and anxiety is birthed and we know just how bad human beings are right?….It’s hard to deal with that level of pessimism, but I still point to the happiness and capability created on an exponential rate, historically, and moving more in that direction, and, honestly, ask them to ask themselves why they have this outlook…for every crazy, their are vastly more wanting to right what’s wrong in our world. I can be labelled annoyingly optimistic and naive, but I suppose it’s better then being endlessly and annoyingly pessimistic.

The world of the future will not be a true Utopia anymore then our world is….but that being said, it certainly move further in that direction, just as it always has; a world where everyone is even more god-like and capable then we are, and though it will bring it’s own set of concerns and issues, it will be well worth it…of course, their will be disagreements on that, which is subjective.

And that’s it…yes, admittingly, this is my own personal outlook for the future, and people will accuse me of optimism (though given I said their will be dangers and threats, I’m not sure how fair that is) and not saying anything that’s grounded in reality…but I could easily counter those ‘pessimists’ and say they are just as overly-presumptuous in assuming what more intelligent beings would do, as I am. In any rate, it pays to remember that the future is something we create, and not something that just happens….so if any fears or anxiety is worthwhile, then obviously we need to make sure we make a future where we don’t have to worry about them (where the ‘naturals’ are “left behind” etc). It’s fine to talk about all sorts of different scenarios, utopian and dystopian, and argue their plausibility… but eventually, we have to collectively decide which road we want to take.

Of course this will be a good thing and people’s mind will change about having to have to work for a living. Work is not what makes us human, work is a temporary necessity to survive. People just don’t see it that way because the very fact that most of us need work to survive and so far machines were only replacing low level mostly physical work. By the end of the decade though, higher level jobs will start to be outsourced to machines. So those currently in power will start to lose their jobs and the reason to glorify modern slavery.

My guess is that, yes we will gradually lose ground on the employment market. Any lower unemployment figures will be very temporary and/or a miscalculation. Probably a “BIG” will be introduced within the next 10 or so years in the form of making unemployment benefits longer (eventually indefinite) and less based on how much you actually worked in the previous period. The reason being is that without the “middle class” buying power the economy would grind to a halt. It will probably happen in Europe first as they are more social minded but the US won’t be far behind.

We need to realize, soon, that future economy will need only a shrinking minority of persons, and find an alternative way to organize society. I think BIG (Basic Income Guarantee), no question asked, has to be part of any viable solution.

The thing that hard to forecast though is whether rich will mean anything as superabundance may result from accelerating technology.

So many industries including genomics and robots and A.I. are on exponential curves: it looks like ‘more of the same’ but in fact infrastructures are gearing up and technical competence becoming widespread.

Imagination or higher thought will initially give you an edge.

I can buy a new mobile phone that takes photos for $15- (£10)
Your DNA sequence will be under $100 this year – which guarantees you some level of immortality (you with no memories!)

you have to do things:

1. Survive.

2. Keep aware of new tech and get it

Even these may be passed if we can resurrect the dead.

There is a trend to be much better than our ancestors.

I should take the bookies bet than no-one will reach 150 in the next 100 years at the great odds they’re offering odds!

Victorians thought electricity would bring Utopia though not specifically how.

It is economic for the state to reprogramme sick people,& rejuvenate to full health old people.
t the dead
I think the state will find it psychologically pressurized to resurrect as well, but that’s harder to see.

So I agree Gabriel…abundance.

God protect us from Cock ups.

So even now, our definitions of things are changing; it’s happening in a subtle way that we don’t really notice or pay much attention too. I am in full agreement with you that, the notion of work and a job, will change to reflect a new way of living that enables a person to do what they want to do were they not forced down a certain road for the sake of having money and a good standard of living…this is what I mean by enabling more personal growth and liberty, and why also boredom, in principle, is a silly critique people have….we’re always dreaming and always thinking of ways to alleviate boredom, and when people have more opportunity to do the things they want to do, or would like to do, if money and practical issues were no longer a concern, then I can’t imagine this really being much of an issue…..and this is especially when our quality of life greatly expands with nano-tech, VR and the vast capabilities in store for us in the coming decades.

And ‘Emotional’ is just an element within the larger frame of ‘Mental’ so… you got a score of 50%. Maybe you could use some A.I. help A.S.A.P.?

The question of robots seems to be similar to the speculation; what would happen if everyone won a multi-million dollar lottery. Well? What would you do? How about your shiftless brother-in-law?

Even though I believe we will achieve human level machine intelligence within a couple of decades, the programs will be more like search engines today. The information you can get back will be determined by what you put in. I mean, even with the most pewerful search engine today you can’t search for all the girls that likes you…

You will be able to ask an AI in the future to write a report, build a design or be your chat buddy, but they will not have access to the physical world like we do, which will limit them.

People are still going to dive in the Great Barrier Reef, go skiing in Aspen, eat good food, go out to dance and do other experience related activities.

I don’t see computers taking over jobs in those sectors for a long time, even though we will eventually be able to get there, if that is what we desire at that point of time.

Physical
Mental
Emotional
Spiritual

We practically eliminated the need for physical labor in the first industrial revolution, and now we are also eliminating the need for mental effort…how can we build an economy based on emotional or spiritual endeavor?

Earth’s resources are extremely abundant…however we only harness a tiny fraction of those resources, and we use them in an exceedingly wasteful manner:

1) We squander the rarest and most precious forms of energy while ignoring the most abundant.
2) We feed off of the most expensive food, and produce it in the most polluting and destructive manner possible.
3) We rely the rarest and most precious forms of fresh water, and ignore more abundant sources.
4) We build on unstable geology, and cover good farmland.
5) We focus our efforts on extracting resources from the earth, and ignore the infinitely greater resources of space.

I am going to do some research and write more extensively about this on my blog: http://roadtoabundance.wordpress.com/