> Because as I grow older, I find I am less and less equipped to keep up with the rate of change that we are undergoing. It also means a lot of uncertainty for the immediate future. If AI takes over my job, will I still be able to compete in some industry somewhere and provide for myself?
I understand this fear, and sympathise with it even though I have multiple income streams.
> I don't want much out of life, but I do want the ability to influence my own personal situation. If we wind up in the UBI-ified, dense urban housing future where AI does all the work and no one owns anything, how much real influence will I have over my life?
Why do you fear "dense" urban housing future? I think most people choose relatively dense environments because that's where all the stuff they want is, but rural areas are cheaper[0], and the kind of future where humans must live on UBI due to lack of economic opportunity is necessarily one where robots do the manual labor such as house building and civil engineering, not just the intellectual jobs like architecture and practicing real estate law.
Likewise, while I can see several possible futures where nobody owns stuff, the tech to make it happen is necessarily also good enough that any random philanthropist who owns just one tiny autofac would find it trivial to give everyone their own personal autofac — "my first wish is infinite wishes" except the magic gene doesn't say "no".
[0] The only reason I'm looking to get somewhere a bit more rural is that the sound insulation in my current place is failing, and I'm right by a busy junction with multiple emergency vehicles passing each day — and the more less built-up areas are the cheap ones. Still the biggest city in Europe, but I'll be surrounded by forest and lakes on most sides within 15 minutes' walk.
Because I hated living in Apartments when I lived in them. They are noisy and small, and I like quiet and space. For me, being closer to walk to stuff is not really appealing enough to deal with how awful the experience of living in dense housing is.
I strongly think that dense housing is only positive for people who don't spend much time at home.
> "my first wish is infinite wishes" except the magic gene doesn't say "no"
The problem with this is that we haven't actually solved resource scarcity, and until we do there is still going to be an upper limit to what you will be allowed to buy, controlled by the number printed on your UBI cheque. I am anticipating this number to be much lower than what I currently am capable of achieving in my career.
Of course this is the fear that my career won't exist in the future. Or simply that AI will eat enough jobs that I will be edged out by better human competition. I'm under no illusions that I'm near the top of my field, I am firmly in the middle of the pack at best.
> sound insulation in my current place is failing
The sound insulation in the apartments I've lived in was nonexistent. This is a big part of why I never want to do that again.
> Because I hated living in Apartments when I lived in them.
I meant more along the lines: why do you expect that to be the future, such that you have reason to fear it?
> The problem with this is that we haven't actually solved resource scarcity, and until we do there is still going to be an upper limit to what you will be allowed to buy
Yes, but the AI necessary to make human labour redundant is that tech. In the absence of that tech, humans could still get jobs doing whatever the stuff is that AI can't do.
> why do you expect that to be the future, such that you have reason to fear it?
Because if I don't have an income I don't expect to be able to afford anything bigger.
> In the absence of that tech, humans could still get jobs doing whatever the stuff is that AI can't do
Which will be manual tasks that I am aging out of being able to keep up with, or.. what? Stuff that traditionally doesn't pay as well as knowledge work, right? And may not pay much more than the UBI anyways?
> Because if I don't have an income I don't expect to be able to afford anything bigger.
A big rural place is cheaper than a tiny city place.
> Which will be manual tasks that I am aging out of being able to keep up with, or.. what?
Automation started with the manual stuff, well before computers were invented. Even for humanoid robots, their hardware is better than our bodies, and it's the software which keeps it from replacing specific workers, though telepresence is one way around that.
I understand this fear, and sympathise with it even though I have multiple income streams.
> I don't want much out of life, but I do want the ability to influence my own personal situation. If we wind up in the UBI-ified, dense urban housing future where AI does all the work and no one owns anything, how much real influence will I have over my life?
Why do you fear "dense" urban housing future? I think most people choose relatively dense environments because that's where all the stuff they want is, but rural areas are cheaper[0], and the kind of future where humans must live on UBI due to lack of economic opportunity is necessarily one where robots do the manual labor such as house building and civil engineering, not just the intellectual jobs like architecture and practicing real estate law.
Likewise, while I can see several possible futures where nobody owns stuff, the tech to make it happen is necessarily also good enough that any random philanthropist who owns just one tiny autofac would find it trivial to give everyone their own personal autofac — "my first wish is infinite wishes" except the magic gene doesn't say "no".
[0] The only reason I'm looking to get somewhere a bit more rural is that the sound insulation in my current place is failing, and I'm right by a busy junction with multiple emergency vehicles passing each day — and the more less built-up areas are the cheap ones. Still the biggest city in Europe, but I'll be surrounded by forest and lakes on most sides within 15 minutes' walk.