So you know with nuclear war and ecological collapse it’s relatively easy because It’s obvious it’s threat to everybody. Nobody is going to win a nuclear war. But with technological disruption, it’s much more difficult because there are a lot some people corporations and governments think and with some good reason that they can win an AI arms race and they can control the world economy or the world political system with that so it’s much more difficult to convince them that everybody is on the same site and the really central issue is inequality. I’m not so worried about a country like the Netherlands I think you’ll be okay. I’m much more worried about countries like Venezuela about Brazil about India about Indonesia what will they be in 30 50 years when I mentioned the analogy with the Industrial Revolution of the 19th century when a few countries dominated and exploited everybody else it could be much much worse in the 21st century if you have just a few countries that dominate the new divine powers of AI biotechnology and even I you think about the Netherlands in Europe. Europe is hardly in the race at present it is at least with AI it’s really China versus the US and neither is a very good option as far as we can tell I mean the US at least until a few years ago at least said that it wants to be the leader of the world and to work for the benefit of everybody. Now it resigned its role of leader of the world and it openly says we don’t care anybody except ourselves and that’s not a leader you don’t follow a leader whose motto is me first. So I think there is an opportunity here. I think the opportunities is a wake-up call that’s especially for Europe that you can’t rely on the USA anymore and you should be maybe a third independent way but as things looking 2020 from the big 20 tech companies in the world. I don’t think that any is European.
So that’s really going back to the question about useless class, and again, I want to emphasize, it’s not a prophecy. It’s just a possibility. If we make the right decisions and right policies today, then we can prevent this kind of dystopian scenario from materializing. And this is the whole point of having discussions like this. If the future is inevitable, then what’s the point of talking about it? We can’t do anything. But the future is not inevitable. Every technological development in history, this was always the case in the past, and will also be in the future, that every technology can be used in several different ways. If you look at the 20th century, so you look at inventions like electricity and radio and trains and cars, you could use these inventions to build fascist regimes or communist dictatorships or liberal democracies. Electricity didn’t tell you what to do with it. And it’s the same with AI. The development in artificial intelligence and machine learning and biotechnology could lead to a dystopian scenario in which a tiny elite of superhumans controls all the resources and power, and most people are economically useless and politically powerless. It could happen. But it’s not inevitable. We can use the same technology to create a much, much better world than ever existed before. For example, that yes, people need to work less, but many jobs are not worth saving. What we need to protect is not the jobs, it’s the humans. If we can take care of human needs and humans will have more leisure time and more opportunity to explore themselves, to develop themselves, to engage in art or community activities or meditation or sports, instead of working so much, this is wonderful. We don’t need to, I mean, I’ve been talking a lot about the dangers of AI and algorithms, but this is simply because we are now flooded by all these promises that technology will make everything better. And we need to kind of balance it. But we should still remember that, yes, there are wonderful opportunities, also, in technology.