First, I don't see "utopia" as likely; furthermore, I have a suspicion it may be impossible, given human nature.
Second, even the argument that society will be "better" demands much more reflection. The implied argument above is only a sketch. I don't find it convincing much less plausible. I'll call attention to four points (implied from above):
1. AI will replace humans in most or all professions
2. AI quality will be much higher than the previous human levels
3. A broad swath of people (using some notion of equity and fairness) will have enough money to live happily
4. "We'll spend much more time with family and friends"
Each of the four points are quite uncertain. Furthermore, even if `k` is true, `k+1` does not follow.
Who would like to flesh out some ways the sequence (1, 2, 3, 4) might happen?
Anyway speculating is fun but you're right its just speculating. My main point is we should always keep in mind this could turn out to be great .
_And_ if since we care about our AI-interdependent future, more of us (as in the people here on HN) need to wade into the gory details, including ethics and the current power structures. The "technology" (as in algorithms, data structures, hardware, etc) is arguably the "easy" part. There are plenty of existing incentives and structures to keep those _moving_. But moving in what direction? Even the notion of an "ethical compass" seems antiquated in light of current technology. We may have to reframe everything. This is a big challenge.
They get nothing but tents and shame.
Where are the examples of the middle voting against the extremes when times get really hard?
The Star Trek post-scarcity utopia scenario feels very unlikely; Mad Max-style scrapping for leftovers while Musk, Bezos, et. al. live behind walls feels infinitely more probable.
How do you implement UBI when a huge proportion of the political class is vehemently against it. Maybe we need to AI politicians, so they start to figure it out?
And remember, we are still a democracy. We get to vote. We control the army and the police and all institutions. If we decide that this capitalism isn't hot sh* anymore we can change it. What will the evil billionaires do? (this sounds like a good straight to DVD movie actually...hey GPT write me a script about this)
Yes, this is a big problem.
However... a lot of people would enjoy being teachers, albeit with significant improvements to the educational systems.
This is a prediction?
Given human nature and the diversity of people (w.r.t. rationality, religiosity, morality, capability, and so on), it is very much an open question about (a) how AI capabilities will develop; (b) how they will be paid for... (c) and by whom; (d) to whom will benefits accrue; (e) how will society change.
These are broad, sweeping questions. Plenty of fodder for imagination, hope, transformation, cynicism, backsliding, or even despair.
If I were to make a bet, on our current trajectory, I see some key factors in tension:
1. educational quality, in absolute terms, increasing _and_ being more equitable
2. educational quality, in relative terms, continuing to be very unequal and probably getting more so. As one example, who has the resources to direct computationally intensive AI experiments? There are (and probably will be for a long time) gatekeepers for these resources. People that mix in this circles have a huge advantage. This makes me wonder if "exclusivity leads to inequality" is a saying from some philosopher.
I doubt very much that this is a testable theory. I think it is primarily a normative one.
As nice as this would be, I think there's roughly 0% chance of it happening. Over the past few millenia humans have doubled productivity per capita a ridiculous number of times. None of those leaps led to an end of status seeking or a transition towards mostly leasure time for the masses.
Instead I expect more of the opposite from these developments. Power will get increasingly concentrated with people who have very little interest in the needs and wants of the plebs.
At least in OpenAI's case I think they take this thing very seriously (Sam Altman doesn't strike me as evil one bit, quite the opposite in fact https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEvbDq6BOVM). In fact most of the tech elites don't seem evil to me, if they only cared about money Zuckerberg and Gates wouldn't have pledged away all their wealth. Some of them are as you describe but I think most of them are actually somewhere in the progressive axis.
So far it hasn't worked out too well...
It's up to us. Indeed easier said than done in the current dysfunctional and polarized politics of ours but we can still do it.
For the philanthropy, I'll just note that these pledges don't involve literally transferring 99% of wealth out of their control. The vast majority of the pledged money goes to a trust the person controls, organizations they have some relation to, or just stay completely in their control for years with only vague non-binding commitments to eventually donate it. In return for this largess they get significant reputational and tax compensation.
I find it best to accept it will most likely replace all of us, from doctors to coders to even psychotherapists. Won't happen next year but 10-20 years is a very long time this thing keeps getting better. Eventually we won't be able to tell if its a machine or a brilliant superhuman. The bummer in all of this, in my view, isn't the loss of jobs; we'll find what to do. It's the transition period - the accounting wizard or the brilliant doctor losing their jobs and status and becoming kindergarten teachers or care takers or unemployed. Nothing in their upbringing or life experience prepared them for such a thing ... so that's probably gonna be rough for many people. But once most people went through the transition it won't be bad. Society I believe will be better off. We will stop being obsessed with money and status and spend much more time with family and friends. Entertainment will be insanely good and so will healthcare. Possibly medicine to make our moods better. It could be utopia.