How will things change when Tesla starts producing their Optimus humanoid robot (perhaps in 2026)? It is designed to do physical labor but at a cost of only $20-30k per year. Maybe concrete will take the same amount of time to cure, but with many robots, you can pour a lot more concrete at a significantly reduced cost.
Would you see the bifurcation already in the US, and this coming wave of AI as an amplifier? It looks like the fork happened long ago, when some decided technology was the way forward for everything, and the others either rejecting technology, or adopting the “precaution principle”. It looks like the coming AI is strongly amplifying the existing divide. So wondering whether there is not something to learn from the past, without forgetting the sheer speed of AI does bring something very new, beyond us.
What about when AI can help design machines that can self replicate? The machines could grow exponentially and thus not be constrained to many of the physical limitations you refer to. The constraint becomes energy. (enter fusion)
Another constraint is materials. Very real physical constraint. In fact reports from the 70s show that anything that requires physical materials (basically atoms) cannot grow exponentially, even temporarily, because if supply bottlenecks and, well, finite resources on Earth (and some say we can then mine asteroids and the Moon, but then yes, energy is the barrier).
Rob, this is a thought-provoking write-up.
How did you pick the end of 2024?
How will things change when Tesla starts producing their Optimus humanoid robot (perhaps in 2026)? It is designed to do physical labor but at a cost of only $20-30k per year. Maybe concrete will take the same amount of time to cure, but with many robots, you can pour a lot more concrete at a significantly reduced cost.
Would you see the bifurcation already in the US, and this coming wave of AI as an amplifier? It looks like the fork happened long ago, when some decided technology was the way forward for everything, and the others either rejecting technology, or adopting the “precaution principle”. It looks like the coming AI is strongly amplifying the existing divide. So wondering whether there is not something to learn from the past, without forgetting the sheer speed of AI does bring something very new, beyond us.
What about when AI can help design machines that can self replicate? The machines could grow exponentially and thus not be constrained to many of the physical limitations you refer to. The constraint becomes energy. (enter fusion)
Another constraint is materials. Very real physical constraint. In fact reports from the 70s show that anything that requires physical materials (basically atoms) cannot grow exponentially, even temporarily, because if supply bottlenecks and, well, finite resources on Earth (and some say we can then mine asteroids and the Moon, but then yes, energy is the barrier).