Tag: future

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Predictions for the start of 2020

2019 was definitely an interesting year!

As Abraham Lincoln once said: “The best way to predict your future is to create it.”

It’s hard to imagine that we’re living in the year 2020. Though we’ve seen plenty of impressive technological advances, like artificial intelligence and phones that unlock by scanning our faces, it’s not quite the world of flying cars and robot butlers people once imagined we’d have by now.

As crazy as these all seem, the world is on track for some spectacular innovations in 2020. Privately operated space flights, self-driving taxis and increases in cyberwarfare would have all seemed like science fiction a few decades ago, but now they’re very real possibilities.

So, let’s have a look at some of the expectations for 2020:

Space Travel
Humans living on other planets is a staple in sci-fi, but it’s growing closer to reality thanks to private space travel initiatives.

As greater advances in space travel are made, the media’s interest will be revitalised. Those private companies will likely capitalise on that attention, which could lead to opportunities to bid on government contracts. Jobs will be created. Auxiliary innovations will be developed. And our chance to become a multiplanet species will (infinitesimally) increase.

Self-Driving Cars

Ride-hailing services are already part of everyday life, but self-driving cars are set to cause seismic changes to the industry. Once safety concerns are addressed, many passengers might find that they prefer being driven by a computer rather than a nosy human. And implementing a network of self-driving cars will be crucial in order for these platforms to finally make a profit.

Companies may adapt to self-driving cars as well. Autonomous transport obviates the need for large fleets of corporate cars. Transportation costs for employees could be drastically reduced. The company could get depreciating assets off the books. And energy efficiency would increase. It’s a win-win-win.

Cybersecurity

Cybersecurity continues to grow in importance as more of our information moves online. Unfortunately, we’ve seen how woefully unprepared even trusted sectors like finance and government can be when it comes to keeping data safe.

No one wants their credit card information appearing on a hacker’s forum, so cybersecurity is crucial for any company doing business online. Cyberattacks are becoming more sophisticated, but fortunately, innovation in countermeasures has surged forward as well. Going into the next year, the cybersecurity industry will likely grow, assisted by cutting-edge technology like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning.

We are amidst the 4th Industrial Revolution, and technology is evolving faster than ever. Companies and individuals that don’t keep up with some of the major tech trends run the risk of being left behind. Understanding the key trends will allow people and businesses to prepare and grasp opportunities.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) is one of the most transformative tech evolutions of our times. Most companies have started to explore how they can use AI to improve the customer experience and to streamline their business operations. This will continue in 2020, and while people will increasingly become used to working alongside AIs, designing and deploying our own AI-based systems will remain an expensive proposition for most businesses.

For this reason, much of the AI applications will continue to be done through providers of as-a-service platforms, which allow us to simply feed in our own data and pay for the algorithms or compute resources as we use them.

Currently, these platforms, provided by the likes of Amazon, Google, and Microsoft, tend to be somewhat broad in scope, with (often expensive) custom-engineering required to apply them to the specific tasks an organization may require. During 2020, we will see wider adoption and a growing pool of providers that are likely to start offering more tailored applications and services for specific or specialized tasks. This will mean no company will have any excuses left not to use AI.

The 5th generation of mobile internet connectivity is going to give us super-fast download and upload speeds as well as more stable connections. While 5G mobile data networks became available for the first time in 2019, they were mostly still expensive and limited to functioning in confined areas or major cities. 2020 is likely to be the year when 5G really starts to fly, with more affordable data plans as well as greatly improved coverage, meaning that everyone can join in the fun.

Super-fast data networks will not only give us the ability to stream movies and music at higher quality when we’re on the move. The greatly increased speeds mean that mobile networks will become more usable even than the wired networks running into our homes and businesses.

Companies must consider the business implications of having super-fast and stable internet access anywhere. The increased bandwidth will enable machines, robots, and autonomous vehicles to collect and transfer more data than ever, leading to advances in the area of the Internet of Things (IoT) and smart machinery.

Extended Reality (XR) is a catch-all term that covers several new and emerging technologies being used to create more immersive digital experiences. More specifically, it refers to virtual, augmented, and mixed reality. Virtual reality (VR) provides a fully digitally immersive experience where you enter a computer-generated world using headsets that blend out the real world.

Augmented reality (AR) overlays digital objects onto the real world via smartphone screens or displays (think Snapchat filters). Mixed reality (MR) is an extension of AR, that means users can interact with digital objects placed in the real world (think playing a holographic piano that you have placed into your room via an AR headset).

These technologies have been around for a few years now but have largely been confined to the world of entertainment – with Oculus Rift and Vive headsets providing the current state-of-the-art in videogames, and smartphone features such as camera filters and Pokemon Go-style games providing the most visible examples of AR.

With so many changes to our technology coming so fast, it can be hard to grasp the sheer scale of innovation underway. The list above highlights some of the more interesting developments, but is far from exhaustive. Whatever happens, 2020 will be an interesting year for major tech companies and budding entrepreneurs alike.

2020 will be a year of reckoning for those that have held on too long or tried to bootstrap their way through transforming their business.

Simply put, the distance between customer expectations and the reality on the ground is becoming so great that a slow and gradual transition is no longer possible. Incrementalism may feel good, but it masks the quiet deterioration of the business.

Whether CEOs in these companies start to use their balance sheet wisely, find new leaders, develop aggressive turnaround plans, or do all of the above, they and their leadership teams must aggressively get on track to preserve market share and market standing.

Purposeful Discussions cover

Finally, 2020 brings ‘Purposeful Discussions’ which is now my fifth book in a series of books that provide purpose driven outcomes in support of some of the most talked-about subjects in life today. This book demonstrates the relationship between communications (human 2 human), strategy and business development and life growth. It is important to understand that a number of the ideas, developments and techniques employed at the beginning as well as the top of business can be successfully made flexible to apply.

As Swami Vivekananda once said:

“Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life – think of it, dream of it, live on that idea. Let the brain, muscles, nerves, every part of your body, be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success.”

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New book: ‘Purposeful Discussions’

Purposeful Discussions cover

‘Purposeful Discussions’ has been written as a natural next step to ‘Meaningful Conversations’, across four of the most passionately debated subjects in business and life today: Communications, Strategy, Business Development and Life Growth.

In February 2014, I set out as an author with my first book, ‘Freedom after the Sharks’, to write a weekly blog across a variety of subjects and foremost about people in business, opinions, research and tips, advise on some revelations, past and present.

‘Purposeful Discussions’ is now my fifth book in a series of books that provide purpose-driven outcomes in support of some of the most talked-about subjects in life today.

This book demonstrates the relationship between communications (human 2 human), strategy and business development and life growth. It is important to understand that a number of the ideas, developments and techniques employed at the beginning as well as the top of business can be successfully made flexible to apply.

It provides a holistic overview of the essential leading methods in these areas and can be viewed as a hands-on guide or as one person described in an Amazon review from my last publication ‘Meaningful Conversations’: ‘What makes a book remarkable, useful and meaningful for professionals? Well, read (not only once) Geoff’s masterpiece and you will understand. This book is my “win book” from so many aspects ‘.

Each person, no matter their age, occupation or place in the world has a tremendous story to share. A vast tapestry of experiences, truths & pearls of wisdom lies in the vault of the mind, waiting to be unlocked.

It takes the slightest intuitive spark to get us talking about our inner lives, the details and dynamics of being human. We are all aware of how important technology is in our lives and keeping our individual worlds connected. we need to explore new and creative ways of listening, engaging, working together, learning, building community and being in conversation with the other.

We are more connected than ever through technology and at the same time the disconnect with ourselves, others and our environment is growing. We need Purposeful Discussions to help us reconnect, going beyond our egos and our fears to build strong relationships, communities, networks and organisations, so that through collaboration we can begin to co-create a more sustainable future.

Paperback-cover (click to enlarge)

Continuing, 21st-century technology is making a huge impact on how the world does business and how we behave as humans, while it affords limitless opportunities, it’s also easier than ever before to lose track, fall into traps and stray off course through lack of control.

I’ve identified communications, strategy, business development and life growth as four factors that are vitally important and interlink seamlessly, and are essential for success and profitability in the business process.

This book provides a holistic overview of the essential leading methods of techniques. It will provide you with a hands-on guide for business professionals and those in higher education.

Readers will gain insights into topical subjects, components of Communications, Strategy and Business Development and Life Growth, including a wide range of tips, models and techniques that will help to build strong and effective solutions in today’s business world.

The terms ‘Communications’, Strategy’ ‘Business Development and Life Growth’ have become overused during the last decade and have become devalued as a result. In this book, I aim to simplify these terms and to re-value management and leadership by addressing topics and subjects in each distinctive chapter.

As Richard Cohn once said:

‘Our lives are measured in choices we have made along the path we call living, each compass point, a possibility, each step, an opportunity, seemingly random, each decision moves us inexorably in a direction both unknown and yet somehow familiar for upon reflection, the strength we find in choosing, or the surrender of letting all unfold leads us to the place we started from when we made that first choice to be here again.’

The book, therefore, covers all the essential components of Communications, Strategy and Business Development and Life Growth, but ensures that they are described in an engaging, enjoyable way with clarity.

Synopsis

The book is divided into three key areas: the first ‘The Importance of Communication’, the second ‘The Role of Strategy’, the third ‘Company Growth and Planning’, to make it easy to find the topics and material you need.

Each component is easy to locate by the titles of the short story at the top of the pages. Each chapter within the three components relates strongly to each other but is also interrelated to all the other chapters.

Those with interest in certain topics may wish to start at their area of interest first, while those who prefer to read the book from the first page to the end will proceed as they started, there really is a topic for everyone in the book.

History has proven that some of the most passionate, successful people are those who have sacrificed many of their needs to push toward one all-encompassing goal.

We all have different advantages, some based on good fortune and some based on choices we have previously made. We can only ever start from where we are. If we have the strength to play our hands, instead of questioning why we don’t hold different cards, then we can decide at any time to work toward doing what we love.

The important thing is to remember that so much is still possible. We all deserve to enjoy the way we spend our days. If we’re willing to dream, work hard, learn, and navigate uncertainty, we all have the potential to do it.

Hardback-cover: (click to enlarge)

Business professionals and individuals in the great challenges of today’s business world have renewed responsibility for what business does best; innovate, invest and grow.

Many people wait until circumstances force change and transformation, that can be radical and painful, this book will arm you with the tips, advise and techniques to provide fresh thinking to your everyday environment and to innovate your circumstances for a better environment, we are all extraordinary people and have the ability to share and provide wealth creation and richness to our surroundings, the question is how much do we want to be extraordinary?

This book has been written not just for people in a company or organisation, it is about helping and supporting understanding across a wide variety of subjects to anyone in life; students, budding entrepreneurs, business people and aspiring individuals.

I do hope my book will provide you with a better lens to understand the opportunities and challenges ahead, that you have a better understanding to chart your course for change and fulfillment of your dreams, desires and aspirations.

For more information on the release of this book, do visit www.purposefuldiscussionsbook.com

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Exactly what is the future in Technology?

Technology forecasting is a completely unpredictable endeavour. No one wants to be a false prophet with a prediction so immediate that it can be easily proven incorrect in short order, but long-term predictions can be even harder. And yet even though people know predictions can be a waste of time, they still want to know: What’s next? Wishy-washy tech timelines only makes prognostication more difficult, as entrepreneurs and researchers stumble around in the dense fog of developing prototypes, performing clinical trials, courting investors, and other time-consuming steps required for marketable innovation. It’s easy to hit a wall at any point in the process, causing delays or even the termination of a project.

In the year 1820, a person could expect to live less than 35 years, 94% of the global population lived in extreme poverty, and less that 20% of the population was literate. Today, human life expectancy is over 70 years, less that 10% of the global population lives in extreme poverty, and over 80% of people are literate. These improvements are due mainly to advances in technology, beginning in the industrial age and continuing today in the information age.

A very good friend of mine is a global technologist, I brought together in January a very collective group of distinguished individuals for a dinner, I named the dinner ‘the great minds dinner’ This was a great opportunity to stimulate the subject of what technology is working in the world, what is technology is emerging, what technology is not working in the world and more importantly what needs to change in order to accommodate all the prototypes of technology that appear to stay in the lab or on the shelf.

It is clear currently that thought leaders and so-called world futurists on the subject of technology can dish out some exciting and downright scary visions for the future of machines and science that either enhance or replace activities and products near and dear to us.

Being beamed from one location to another by teleportation was supposed to be right around the corner/in our lifetime/just decades away, but it hasn’t become possible yet. Inventions like the VCR that were once high tech — and now aren’t — proved challenging for some: The VCR became obsolete before many of us learned how to program one. And who knew that working with atoms and molecules would become the future of technology? The futurists, of course.

Forecasting the future of technology is for dreamers who hope to innovate better tools — and for the mainstream people who hope to benefit from the new and improved. Many inventions are born in the lab and never make it into the consumer market, while others evolve beyond the pace of putting good regulations on their use.

There are many exciting new technologies that will continue to transform the world and improve human welfare.

Here is a very interesting infographic researched by the National Academy of Sciences from their Smart Things Living Report
(click to expand in new tab):

The world around us is changing. In labs and living rooms around the world, people are creating new technologies and finding new applications for existing and emerging technologies. The products and services available to everyone thus expand exponentially every year. In the next five years, then, you can expect massive growth in what we can do.

Beyond 2018: Dr Michio Kaku on the Future in the Next 5-10-20 Years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59Ejxp1tRss

Irrespective of all the possible forecasting in long range planning, I personally believe there are 3 imminent areas in particular will provide important developments in the next 5 years.

1. Augmented Reality Will Explode
Technology mavens have talked for years about virtual reality and the applications available. Augmented reality is related, but allows us to lay the virtual world over the real world. Games like Pokemon Go provide examples of how this works; you use technology to “see” virtual creatures and items in real spaces.

Beyond fun and games, this technology provides a wealth of planning potential. You can drive your car, and arrows will appear on your road, guiding you to the right path. You can create visual representations of organizing tasks, building endeavors, and almost anything else that you want to see before you start working. Manuals will virtually overlay real items to be joined together – everyone will actually be able to construct an Ikea bed. The technology is here; ways to use it are just beginning to emerge.

2. Mobile Apps Will Decline
At the same time, the ubiquitous world of mobile apps will begin to slip back. The ways in which we connect to the world often require us to work through a smartphone or tablet. The mobile app ties us to devices; you have no doubt seen rooms full of people who never make eye contact, only staring at small screens. The cost of developing sophisticated apps and the marketing efforts needed to place your App on the most expensive “real estate” in the world, does not always give a return on investment.

3. The Internet of Things Will Grow Exponentially
Availability and affordability of connected devices grow each year. We connect massive data networks to our homes, vehicles, and personal health monitors already. The ability to connect more devices, appliances, and objects to these networks means companies will know more about those they serve than ever before. Almost any device with electronic components can be configured for the IoT, and in the next five years, more will.

It should be abundantly clear now why analysis of the tech trends shaping the future might seem like science fiction. But researchers from UC-Berkeley to MIT are pulling the present sometimes step by step, sometimes by leaps and bounds into the future.

The next few decades will feel this disruption, often in startling ways. Indeed, while the technical hurdles to advancing these technologies are fascinating, we see people writing about that the ethical and social dimensions of the changes they bring are the most interesting and troubling.

You can clearly see how the allied sciences and complementary developments of these trends will reshape our world, our lives, and our work. Millions will find that the skills they bring to the table simply can’t compete with smart automation. Legions of
drivers, for instance, will soon find themselves unemployable.

And as AI continues to develop in tandem with robotics, the IoT, and big data, even the engineers and scientists who now design these systems will find themselves competing with their creations.

All of these developments I have touched on in this blog will require you to examine closely not only what is possible, but how privacy laws, intellectual property issues and the corporate ecosystems interact with those possibilities. Nevertheless, I am confident that within the lives of your grandchildren, now incurable illnesses will fall to bio, nano, and neurotech. And sure that ignorance will slowly become things children learn about rather than experience first-hand.

Finally, the technology I have discussed really are the shaping things to come, the technologies that will define life for decades.

Are you ready for the future? Ready to embrace the changes that are coming?

As Albert Einstein once said:

“It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity.”

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Predictions for the start of 2018!

2017 was definitely one interesting year, and as the Chinese say: ‘We live in interesting times’.

‘2018 will be a year of political turmoil and environmental crisis caused by dramatic and unprecedented weather’, says Craig Hamilton-Parker in a recent blog post.

A man who successfully predicted the unlikely victory of Donald Trump and the UK’s vote to leave the European Union has come up with a new round of prophecies for 2018.

Craig Hamilton-Parker has prophesied there will be a terrorist attack on a British motorway, revolution in North Korea which overthrows Kim Jong-Un’s regime, and a chemical weapons attack by drones on a European city.

On a less morbid note, Mr Parker also predicted Prince Harry would become engaged to Meghan Markle.

Christmas holiday’s are always a period for introspection and once my dreaded cold had calmed down, I started to reflect on some of the most influential push buttons of business and ‘leadership with technology and operating in the new business world came to mind’.

2017 has come to a close and businesses are preparing to enter 2018 with an instant bang.

What do entrepreneurs really expect heading into the new year?

A shift in IT spending: “A significant number of enterprises will begin to invest in a dedicated security operations center as part of the shift away from prevention towards detection and response … Hybrid security offerings combining on-premise and SaaS/Cloud solutions will become the dominant architecture with customers beginning to integrate these offerings starting in 2018.” – Prakash Nagpal, vice president of Infoblox.

The Cloud will fragment into microservices: “In 2018, technology companies are going to ditch the buzzword ‘cloud’ in favor of the next big trend in IT – ‘microservices’. This is where companies will increasingly look to scale by essentially breaking up their IT and thinking smaller and using more SDN and NFV type approaches. Enterprises should also take note fast – moving to smaller applications makes it much easier to scale and decreases risk, while increasing efficiencies.” – Craig Walker, CEO of business communication platform Dialpad

The rise of the sharing economy: “Digitization and the sharing economy will disrupt more industries. Already, retail (Amazon), automotive (Uber and Zipcar), and the server market (Google, Amazon) have been disrupted – and we have had two years without another major industry being disrupted. Given this, financial services and healthcare are ripe for disruption.” – Prakash Nagpal

Banking models will begin a radical shift: “Millennials want to bank wherever they want and whenever they want, which does not align with the traditional banking model. It’s predicted that digital banking will grow to more than 2 billion users by 2020. As a result of this shift, the traditional brick-and-mortar banking solution will be replaced with a technology first-mindset. In essence, your wallet will be your phone.” – Dave Mitchell, president of NYMBUS

Speed is key in modern banking: “The banking channel will strive for speed. Lending, banking services, statement processing and other banking channel players are scrambling to get online and get faster. We expect the scramble to continue as the industry seeks to eliminate middle men – like brokers – and better serve their customers.” – Vernon Tirey, co-founder and CEO of LeaseQ

Mobile banking means more mobile cyberattacks: “All are experiencing a big increase in attacks on their mobile banking and transactions. Expect that to continue. Approximately 80 percent of financial institutions’ customers are doing online banking, 50% are on mobile and that’s growing. More customers equals more opportunity for attacks.” – John Gunn, CMO of VASCO Data Security

Machine learning and Blockchain will grow more prominent: “Two of the most interesting IoT developments to emerge in 2017, with the most potential for innovation, were blockchain and machine learning. They likely won’t go straight to market in the new year – we’ll likely see more proofs of concept instead – but, we have seen some fascinating PoCs already.” – Mike Bell, EVP IoT & Devices at Canonical

Machine learning will become more responsive in customer service: “Machine learning will play a bigger role in sales and customer support in 2018. Lower costs and increased availability of speech analytics tools mean more businesses will record and monitor calls within their contact centers. Instead of simply guiding callers through prompts, speech analytics will help to categorize them and analyze responses in terms of what you say and how you say it. Insights like these will be used to guide agents, in real time, to get the best results from each interaction.” – Chad Hart, head of strategic products at Voxbone

AI implementation will help business capitalize on large troves of data: “Although discussions on the topic of data may not be new, until now most business have been focused on forming teams and building data pipelines, but the data itself has not produced much disruption. With the right people and tools in place, companies can now focus on using data to drive growth. Companies will look to incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) to gain a competitive edge.” – Jennifer Shin, founder and chief data scientist of 8 Path Solutions

IoT cyberattacks will become more common: “There will be an increase of random IoT hacks and attacks because the tools are easy to find and use, and also because of all the unsecured IoT devices – Gartner says there are 8 billion connected things in 2017 and expects 20 billion connected devices by 2020. Anyone can go onto the dark web and start using available malware code, not to mention the readily available services such as hacking, malware- and ransomware-as-a-service, which can all be hired for next to nothing. It’s very easy these days for someone with little knowledge to launch a sophisticated attack, and there’s clear financial incentive – in the last three years, business email compromise alone made $5.3 billion.” – Christian Vezine, CISO at VASCO Data Security

IoT devices will become more secure: “Expect to see at least 2 or 3 large-scale, botnet-style attacks on IoT-related hardware in 2018. To remedy this, the industrial space may pick up a trend from the consumer space, where device updates are downloaded automatically, and give the user little say in the process.” – Mike Bell

Industry will employ more low power wide area networking (LPWAN): “LPWAN technology can be unwired and run for a long time, with minimal power consumption. Its potential applications include heartbeat communications and predictive maintenance for industrial equipment like basement boilers, which can be otherwise difficult to reach … LPWAN provides better penetration and range in hard-to-reach areas, which opens the door for groundbreaking new industrial equipment use cases.” – Mike Bell

Economies are growing. Stock markets are climbing. Employment is healthy. These are all positive signs of the marketplace as a whole.
But the fate of individual companies has never been more uncertain, and the window of opportunity is closing for many companies unprepared or unable to adapt to new market realities.

Many factors are combining to define the fate of companies: Unmet customer expectations are resulting in churn; the lack of digital transformation gains is translating to loss of market share; industry lines that protected some are crumbling; and longstanding, durable business models are failing.

For some, it feels like a burning platform mandating bold action; for others, it will be the quiet but real deterioration of their business.
Customers demand what they demand. And when companies fail to deliver experience by experience or live up to their brand promise, customers will take flight.

Evolving customer expectations will challenge everybody — leaders, followers, and laggards. The across-the-board plateauing of CX (Customer Experience) quality reminds us that customers continuously re-evaluate experiences and reassess loyalties.

Leaders will adapt and, ultimately, thrive. Those slow to change will struggle. And the distance between the two will grow.

2018 will be a year of reckoning for those that have held on too long or tried to bootstrap their way through transforming their business.

Simply put, the distance between customer expectations and the reality on the ground is becoming so great that a slow and gradual transition is no longer possible. Incrementalism may feel good, but it masks the quiet deterioration of the business.

Whether CEOs in these companies start to use their balance sheet wisely, find new leaders, develop aggressive turnaround plans, or do all of the above, they and their leadership teams must aggressively get on track to preserve market share and market standing.

Finally, leaving you with a new year quote and thought by Melody Beattie:

“The new year stands before us, like a chapter in a book, waiting to be written. We can help write that story by setting goals.”

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Can you really fall in love with a Robot?

Our company has just started to work with a new client who has developed a humanised robot, which they describe as a ‘social robot’. It is clear by my work to date with this company that advances in robotics and AI are starting to gain some real momentum. In the coming decades, scientists predict robots will take over more and more jobs including white collar ones, and gain ubiquity in the home, school, and work spheres.

Due to this, roboticists and AI experts, social scientists, psychologists, and others are speculating what impact it will have on us and our world. Google and Oxford have teamed up to make a kill switch should AI initiate a robot apocalypse.

One way to overcome this is to imbue AI with emotions and empathy, to make them as human-like as possible, so much so that it may become difficult to tell robots and real people apart. In this vein, scientists have wondered if it might be possible for a human to fall in love with a robot, considering we are moving toward fashioning them after our own image. Spike Jonze’s Her and the movie Ex Machina touch on this.

Can you fall in love with a robot?
http://edition.cnn.com/videos/cnnmoney/2017/04/10/can-you-all-in-love-with-a-robot.cnn

Interesting enough both the film ‘Ex Machina’, in which a computer programmer falls in love with a droid, may not be as far-fetched as you think.

A new study has found that humans have the potential to emphasise with robots, even while knowing they do not have feelings.
It follows previous warnings from experts that humans could develop unhealthy relationships with robots, and even fall in love with them.

The discovery was made after researchers asked people to view images of human and humanoid robotic hands in painful situations, such as being cut by a knife. After studying their electrical brain signals, they found humans responded with similar immediate levels of empathy to both humans and robots.

After studying their electrical brain signals, they found humans responded with similar immediate levels of empathy to both humans and robots.

But the beginning phase of the so-called ‘top-down’ process of empathy was weaker toward robots.

The study was carried out by researchers at Toyohashi University of Technology and Kyoto University in Japan, and provides the first neurophysiological evidence of humans’ ability to empathise with robots.

These results suggest that we empathise with humanoid robots in a similar way to how we empathise with other humans.
Last month, a robot ethicist warned that AI sex dolls could ‘contribute to detrimental relationships between men and women, adults and children, men and men and women and women’

Scientists suggest that we’re unable to fully take the perspective of robots because their body and mind – if it exists – are very different from ours.

‘I think a future society including humans and robots should be good if humans and robots are prosocial,’ study co-author Michiteru Kitazaki told Inverse.

‘Empathy with robots as well as other humans may facilitate prosocial behaviors. Robots that help us or interact with us should be empathised by humans.’

Experts are already worried about the implication of humans developing feelings for robots.

The question we all need to ask is ‘do we fear a future of love with a real human to be a happy to substitute to a robot’ the idea that a real, living, breathing human could be replaced by something that is almost, but not exactly, the same thing, well, actually a robot.

By now you’ve probably heard the story of Tay, Microsoft’s social AI experiment that went from “friendly millennial girl” to genocidal misogynist in less than a day. At first, Tay’s story seems like a fun one for anyone who’s interested in cautionary sci-fi. What does it mean for the future of artificial intelligence if a bot can embody the worst aspects of digital culture after just 16 hours online?

If any AI is given the vastness of human creation to study at lightning speed, will it inevitably turn evil?

Will the future be a content creation battle for their souls?

Society is now driven by the social connections you hold, the likes and your preferences of relevancy, the movie Her is described with a complex nature, a man who is inconsolable since he and his wife separated. Theodore is a lonely man in the final stages of his divorce. When he’s not working as a letter writer, his down time is spent playing video games and occasionally hanging out with friends. He decides to purchase the new OS1, which is advertised as the world’s first artificially intelligent operating system, “It’s not just an operating system, it’s a consciousness,” the ad states. Theodore quickly finds himself drawn in with Samantha, the voice behind his OS1. As they start spending time together they grow closer and closer and eventually find themselves in love. Having fallen in love with his OS, Theodore finds himself dealing with feelings of both great joy and doubt. As an OS, Samantha has powerful intelligence that she uses to help Theodore in ways others hadn’t, but how does she help him deal with his inner conflict of being in love with an OS?

Though technically unfeasible by today’s AI standards, the broad premise of the movie is more realistic than most people may think. Indeed, in the past 10 years our lives have been transformed by technology and love is no exception. With Valentine’s Day around the corner, there’s no better time to examine some of the recent developments in this area.

Taobao, China’s version of Amazon, offers virtual girlfriends and boyfriends for around $2 (£1.20) per day. These are real humans, but they only relate with their paying customers via the phone – calls or text – in order to perform fairly unromantic tasks such as wake up calls, good night calls, and (perhaps the most useful service) “sympathetically listen to clients’ complaints”. If this is all you expect from a relationship, it at least comes at a cheap price.

Similar services already exist in India, where biwihotohaisi.com helps bachelors “practice” for married life with a virtual wife, and Japan, where “romance simulation games” are popular with men and women, even when they feature animated avatars rather than human partners.

In many of today’s most fascinating visions of future love, the body itself seems like a relic of the past. In Her, for example, we encounter a social landscape where love between humans and machines doesn’t require a physical body at all. Instead we watch as Theo shares his most personal moments with an AI who he never actually touches, but who conveys intimacy through talking, sharing messages, drawings, ideas and sexual fantasies. In our current social climate, where dating often means scrolling through photos and written bios rather than interacting with people in person, the idea that you could fall in love with your computer doesn’t seem so far-fetched. After all, we are already used to more disembodied forms of communication, and, as many older generations continue to lament, many young people today are more likely to text or sext than actually establish in-person kinds of intimacy.

AI is the perfect sounding board for these modern anxieties about human connection, and 20th- and 21st-century films are filled with dystopian landscapes that showcase the loneliness of a world where intimacy is something you can buy. In many of these films, from classics such as Fritz Lang’s Metropolis to more modern movies like Alex Garland’s Ex Machina, the creators and consumers of AI are male, while the AI themselves are female. The patriarchal underpinning of this is vividly explored in sci-fi such as The Stepford Wives and Cherry 2000, where we are ushered into worlds where compliant and submissive female robots are idealized by their male creators as the epitome of perfection, and always exist completely under their thumb. The female robots we meet in these films cook, clean, are unfailingly supportive and are always sexually available, in addition to being exceptionally beautiful. These sex-bots have also become both a mainstay of humor, from the sexy goofiness of 80s films such as Weird Science and Galaxina, to the cheeky and slightly more socially aware comedies in the 90s, with the frilly, busty fembots of Austen Powers and Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s charmingly dippy “Buffy-bot”

Serge Tisseron, a French Psychiatrist who studies the relationships between youth, the media and images and the effect of information and communication technology on young people, reminds that, despite signs of attachments from the robot, the relation can and will always be one way.

Serge insists on the importance of a reflection around the ethical issues to avoid the destruction of human relations. Because of their interactions with efficient, high-performing and helpful robots, humans could end up being disappointed with other humans altogether, especially on a professional level. Or, we could eventually abandon our responsibilities completely and rely solely on robots to take care of our loved ones. In the end, this could result in a serious withdrawal from the human world and could affect our ability to live in society.

A final thought is that no one knows what the future holds, if robots will manage to develop their conscience and emotions but in any case, there needs to be enough preparations for their development and integration to society.

A great quote by Colin Angle:

“In the smart home of the future, there should be a robot designed to talk to you. With enough display technology, connectivity, and voice recognition, this human-interface robot or head-of-household robot will serve as a portal to the digital domain. It becomes your interface to your robot-enabled home.”