Becoming Human Again: A Positive Future with AI
Artificial intelligence (AI) is often seen as an existential threat or a means to get more work out of employees. This essay offers a different perspective. By looking at the industrial past, exploring utopian science fiction, and examining how AI is changing work, we can imagine a future where machines free us rather than control us. The word "robot" comes from the Czech robota, meaning forced labour. During the first industrial revolution, our ancestors were effectively turned into robots, working long hours in dangerous conditions. Now, we are on the verge of another transformation: machines are ready to take back the dehumanising work they once imposed on us. The question is whether we will seize this moment to become more human.
From Robota to Robots: When Work Made People Machines
The industrial revolution brought steam-powered looms, factories, and assembly lines. Families moved from the countryside to cities. They faced long hours and dangerous conditions. Women and children earned very little. In the next century, Frederick Winslow Taylor's "scientific management" sought to improve every action. Workers were studied like machine parts. They had to follow the "one best way" found through time-and-motion studies.Metaphors like "a well-oiled machine" remind us how employers saw people as interchangeable parts. The word "robot" itself was coined in a 1920 Czech play and comes from robota—drudgery or forced labour. As assembly lines spread, mechanisation replaced tasks like welding and painting; human workers initially supervised these machines, but robots gradually took over.
The twentieth century brought both prosperity and anxiety. Manufacturing efficiency reduced costs and increased output, but cities became crowded and polluted. A third of modern jobs could be automated by the mid-2030s, echoing earlier fears of mechanisation. From a historical perspective, the mechanistic view of people as _resources_ is what AI now offers to relieve.
Utopian Visions: Science-Fiction's Better AI
Science-fiction authors often imagine futures where smart machines go beyond being oppressors. Isaac Asimov's I, Robot introduced the Three Laws of Robotics, portraying robots as ethical helpers rather than monsters. In "The Last Question," a superintelligent AI becomes a kind cosmic force, continuing humanity's legacy. This shift from fear to cooperation also appears in more contemporary novels.
Iain M. Banks' Culture series envisions a post-scarcity civilisation run by benevolent AIs known as _Minds_. In interviews, Banks described the Culture as "a society basically on the side of the angels". People pursue hobbies and creativity for their own sake, knowing that a Mind could always do it better. With no money and no need for professions, creativity becomes an amateur pursuit. Living in the Culture is like being in a never-ending Renaissance. Banks considered this utopia achievable only after humanity confronts its "stupidities" and develops AI, allowing the machines to be themselves.
Greg Egan's Diaspora imagines digital citizens. These genderless beings have consciousnesses free from physical bodies. They pursue mathematics, art, and relationships for centuries. Resources are plentiful because digital minds need little. Citizens choose fulfilling projects instead of fighting for survival.
Similarly, John Varley's Steel Beach shows a lunar society without scarcity. Here, AI companions serve as "engaged and enthusiastic advocates." The Luna Central Computer acts as a smart, unobtrusive servant. It manages air, water, and transport systems. Citizens connect through brain-links, while the AI monitors their health. It creatively intervenes to promote wellbeing. People have a legal right to fulfilling jobs if they wish. Yet, artificial intelligence remains everyone’s closest companion.
Marshall Brain's novella Manna contrasts a bleak United States—where automation leaves workers poor—with a hopeful project in Australia. There, universal basic income and advanced automation ensure everyone can access goods. Implanted AI helps free people from mundane tasks. Citizens live communally and view technology as a partner, not an oppressor.
Not all science fiction is optimistic, of course. Works like "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" and "Neuromancer" depict worlds where empathy and personhood are contested. However, as Paulo Furtado notes, some novels hint at utopian potential: in Speaker for the Dead, the AI Jane facilitates understanding across species, suggesting a role for machines as partners, while other stories portray AI variously as tool, peer, or god-like power. Across these narratives, a common theme emerges: AI serves as a catalyst for self-reflection, forcing us to define what makes us human and inviting us to imagine better societies.
Freeing Humans to Be Human: Lessons from Real-World AI
History shows that machines replace repetitive and dangerous tasks. Robots now handle welding, painting, and other hazardous jobs. This trend is continuing with AI. A California Management Review article suggests that AI should take on data-heavy tasks. This way, people can focus on building trust, offering emotional support, and creating personalised plans. By offloading routine work, AI can enhance human compassion, creativity, and connection. The article calls for designing AI systems that prioritise humans. It also emphasises the need for lifelong learning and visionary leadership, so AI can become an ally, not a threat.
Modern leadership thinkers agree with this view. At MIT Sloan, Paul McDonagh-Smith reminds us that generative AI and extended reality should "augment, expand, and extend the human experience rather than replicate or replace it." Success relies on using human skills—creativity, curiosity, compassion—and bringing together humans and machines. He argues that we must "put more of the human into our robots", and boost our "creativity quotient" to maximize the power of AI.
The World Economic Forum notes that AI's adoption in the workplace is accelerating. More than half of executives think AI will have a bigger impact than the internet. Still, 65% see human skills like decision-making, intuition, and creativity as vital. Human-centric AI aims to pair people with machines. AI handles routine tasks, letting humans focus on empathy, creativity, and critical thinking. This partnership changes roles; AI becomes a trusted collaborator, not a rival. Teams grow more agile and diverse, with AI helping in coordination and knowledge sharing. Ongoing learning and inclusive reskilling ensure people build both technical skills and human strengths.
In short, the best future is not one where machines replace us but where humans with AI replace humans without AI. Pairing robots with human workers can reduce production cycle times by up to 85%, and human-aware robots enable faster, cheaper, and safer manufacturing. Such collaborations combine the strength and speed of robots with human creativity and judgment.
Imagining Universal High Income and Purpose
As automation advances, some thinkers propose universal basic income as a stabilizing mechanism. Elon Musk has even suggested a more radical idea: universal high income.In a "positive AI future," he predicted that scarcity would mostly vanish. People would earn high incomes instead of just basic support. However, he raised deeper questions: if our material needs are met, where will we find meaning if work is optional? The Tax Project Institute notes that this scenario suggests an economic shift. Machine productivity would be so high and widely used that the main challenge changes from producing enough to ensuring fair access without harming society.
Science-fiction utopias offer clues to this dilemma. In the Culture, people chase a variety of hobbies, relationships, and experiences just because they want to. In Diaspora and Steel Beach, digital citizens and lunar residents explore art, maths, and companionship over centuries. These stories show that meaning comes from exploration, creativity, and connection, not just economic need. Marshall Brain's Australian utopia in Manna depicts people thriving when universal income and AI implants free them from boring jobs. The challenge is cultural: if we are freed from survival work, we must build values and institutions that promote growth, empathy, and play.
Designing Our Post-Work Future
The industrial revolution taught us that efficiency without humanity leads to exploitation. The coming AI revolution offers a chance to correct that mistake. Rather than using AI merely to cut costs, we can design systems that amplify our uniquely human capacities. Futuristic novels from Asimov to Banks to Egan show us that benevolent AI can be caretakers and partners; they invite us to imagine societies where abundance and purpose coexist. Real-world research demonstrates that AI can relieve drudgery, enabling humans to focus on trust, empathy, and creativity. Leaders must therefore foster cultures of continuous learning, reskill their workforces, and design human-centric AI so that machines augment rather than replace us.
The robot, once synonymous with forced labour, might soon liberate us from the grind of "robota". If we embrace cooperation and design AI ethically, we can reclaim our full humanity—spending our days creating art, caring for one another, exploring the universe, and asking the big questions that machines cannot answer. The future is not predetermined; it will be written by the choices we make today.
This article is written in collaboration with my AI-Minions
