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If China, Russia and the U.S. are in a race for AI supremacy, the kind of manifestations of AI will be so significant, they could alter the entire future of human civilization.

THE EXPONENTIAL THREATFrom drones, to nanobots to 3D-printing, automation could lead to unparalleled changes to how we live and work. In spite of the increase in global GDP, most people’s quality of living is not likely to see the benefit as it will increasingly be funneled into the pockets of the 1%. Capitalism then, favors the development of an AI that’s fundamentally exploitative to the common global citizen.Just as we exchanged our personal data for convenience and the illusion of social connection online, we will barter convenience for a world a global police state where social credit systems and AI decide how much of a “human stipend” (basic income) we receive. Our poverty or the social privilege we are born into, may have a more obscure relationship to a global system where AI monitors every aspect of our lives.Eventually AI will itself be the CEOs, inventors, master engineers and creator of more efficient robots. That’s when we will know that AI has indeed replaced human beings. What will Google’s DeepMind be able to do with the full use of next-gen quantum computing and supercomputers?

Artificial Intelligence Will Replace HumansTo argue that AI and robots and 3D-printing and any other significant technology won’t impact and replace many human jobs, is incredibly irresponsible.That’s not to say humans won’t adapt, and even thrive in more creative, social and meaningful work!That AI replacing repetitive tasks is a good thing, can hardly be denied. But will it benefit all globally citizens equally? Will ethics, common sense and collective pragmatism and social inclusion prevail over profiteers?Will younger value systems such as decentralization and sustainable living thrive with the advances of artificial intelligence?Will human beings be able to find sufficient meaning in a life where many of them won’t have a designated occupation to fill their time?These are the question that futurists like me ponder, and you should too.

This is where actually watching “Westworld” matters. The pleasure of entertainment aside, the makers of the series have produced a powerful work of philosophy. It’s one thing to sit in a seminar and argue about what it would mean, morally, if robots were conscious. It’s quite another to witness the torments of such creatures, as portrayed by actors such as Evan Rachel Wood and Thandie Newton. You may still raise the question intellectually, but in your heart and your gut, you already know the answer.

But the prospect of building a place like “Westworld” is much more troubling, because the experience of harming a host isn’t merely similar to that of harming a person; it’s identical. We have no idea what repeatedly indulging such fantasies would do to us, ethically or psychologically — but there seems little reason to think that it would be good.

For the first time in our history, then, we run the risk of building machines that only monsters would use as they please.

The fear of automation is nonsense. We should embrace automation. Robots can cook our cheeseburgers, wash our cars, and accept and dispense cash better and faster than humans. But robots cannot take care of our children or seniors, they cannot entertain us, create works of art, write our books, or be our primary care physicians or psychologists. Leave the more physically taxing and repetitive drudgery work to the robots. Leave the infinite number of more satisfying and productive jobs for us humans.