Yesterday, I let you know about the "Generative AI For Workplace Productivity & Creativity" workshop. It's a three hour workshop taking place over two 90 min Zoom sessions, Tuesday 26th Nov and Tuesday 3rd Dec.

Well, registration is now open.

I've been delivering this material on the use of generative AI to businesses and education & training groups for the past year and I've now distilled the contents down into a 3 hour beginners workshop.

Watch This Introduction 👇

🚨 If you want to get up to speed on Generative AI...

🚨 If you want to get more productive and creative...

🚨 If you want to know the strengths and limitations of Gen AI...

🚨 And if you want to get hands-on with tools like ChatGPT and Copilot, then this Generative AI workshop is for you

We'll look at the pros, cons, promises and dangers of AI. We'll test ChatGPT for understanding, learn how to structure prompts, do image creation and image look-up. We'll create audio and video, examine spreadsheets and get insights from PDF documents...

❌ You don't need to know code...

❌ You don't need to become a data scientist...

❌ You need no prior experience...

❌ Not do you need to work in IT.

✅ You just need yourself...

✅ Your computer...

✅ A ChatGPT+ account

✅ and lots of enthusiasm to learn.

We're starting from the ground up, and developing fundamental digital skills.

Go to the registration page for more info and to register.

I hope to see you there.

Regards, Larry

Find out more

In the famous 1971 Foucault Chomsky discussion on Power and Justice, Chomsky stated that if one of the fundamentals of human nature was the freedom to create without the constraints of hierarchical systems, then a decent society must ensure this is realised. That is to say, we must strive to overcome the power systems that limit our freedoms and force us to become cogs in the machine of industry. A worthy ideal, I’m sure you’ll agree. However, the present would prove that we have largely capitulated to the demands of the machine.

Instead of pursuing a life of freedom and creative expression in things of our own interest and design, we have tacitly agreed to work our bollocks off in the fulfilment of someone else’s interest. To boot, spend on frivolous, non-complex things, all we have earned in exchange. A means to medicate ourselves against the numbness of the work, you might say. And don’t worry about not having enough income to buy this plastic useless shit, you can borrow from your future labouring self via a high interest loan. Of course, this merely ensures our ongoing enslavement.

My wife’s friend and her partner recently secured their first mortgage (as if the bank was doing them a favour). They are in their thirties and, after many years of saving, finally managed to get together the necessary deposit. The only problem is that, unlike my wife and I, they will be in their seventies before that mortgage is repaid. A forty-year mortgage - Death Grip is right. They could, in fact, be dead before they own the house, and I’m sure the bank has a clause in there somewhere to ensure they are not left with any loss. It seems remarkable to my socialist-oriented brain that someone or something should be allowed to profit from people seeking to build their own homes. I know it’s the way things are, but surely it’s a basic human right to have a secure place to live without having to give up one’s freedom. Why should a corporation, or anyone else for that matter, be allowed to profit from this? What’s the alternative - live in a hotel on state benefit? Looks like it.

There was a time in European history when charging interest was considered immoral. How things have changed. Everything is to be owned, and everything is for sale. It seems we swallowed this you-can-have-everything-you-want-now promise hook, line, and sinker. They know that our behaviour is largely driven by fear and desire, and they successfully tapped into that. So, who are they?

They are the corporate public relations people, advertisers, marketers, etc., and they know you and me better than we know ourselves. It arguably all started with Edward Bernays, the father of modern PR, and his realisation that, given the right message, people could be nudged in a given direction and coerced into action. This was nothing new but he had articulated and documented it in a way that hadn’t been done before. He called it propaganda, although it wasn’t such a dirty word back then. This Bernays fucker is at least an essay in itself…or, I’m sure, a book.

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In addition to the corporate marketing machine, we have the education system, essentially a conveyor belt, from which is spat enthusiastic young people schooled to fit the industry mould. They are not taught how to create their own thing. Instead, they are discouraged or, at best, kept in the dark about self-sufficiency. In fact, the implicit message of education is that they must develop themselves in such a way as to be attractive to one corporation or another. The dream they are taught to dream is that of a job that will provide for their future. But this is not their dream at all, but the dream of someone else.

As the implicit story goes, the future of work is bright for those who make themselves employable. Until such time, that is, when the market decides there is not work enough for them. For everyone else, you either have to figure it out on your own, or you are destined to live on the breadline. Of course, I do not refer to the children of the political, corporate and financial elite here. Their education remains secure behind breathtaking fees and the meeting of tight entrance criteria. Can’t have the peasants infiltrating their ranks.

When we talk about the future of work, we usually refer to how technology will shape the workplace of the future, its impact on jobs and the economy, social justice and fairness regarding work, and, essentially, keeping people working. We hardly ever, if at all, address the legitimacy of the Capitalist system within which we work. The most important thing for the left and the right in this conversation is that people continue to work and earn enough to keep things turning, and we remain cogs in the machine. They insist, and we accept, that the market will regulate itself, and in doing so, there will be peaks and troughs in employment. The human cost, well, unintentional we are assured. It’s just how the world works - literally.

In this section of Sunday Letters, we will discuss how the world of work is changing due to technology, but we will also address the larger issue. That is, changing the system within which we work. We will stress working for oneself as a solution—a business of one. It’s what I do and have done for many years. It is a legitimate solution to the problem of waged slavery, and it can provide a good income once we’re clued in. There are advantages and disadvantages, and some have argued that most people are just not built for it. But I intend to argue against this pessimism on the premise that not being built for self-employment is simply a case of schooling, as mentioned above.

In sum, The Future of Work will speculate how the workplace will change in the near future and also how people’s attitudes and relationships with work will change. Change is this latter respect, in fact, is vital if we are to take command of our working lives and become free and independent of hierarchical dictatorial systems of work. The alternative is that we become stuck with the current system, and people will continue to be sick and broken emotionally, psychologically, and financially.

The Future of Work is a weekly issue from The Sunday Letters Journal that takes a look at current research, commentary and analysis on how our working lives are changing due to advances in technology. If you are a paying subscriber, you’ll get access to research papers, essays and articles that you may not otherwise through paywalled sources. Prepare for the future of work. Get each issue every Friday.

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Contents

1. A poll

2. The AI Goldrush

3. A deepening of the division of Labour

4. Your job is (probably) safe from AI

5. What are the Dangers of AI?

6. Stanford One Hundred-Year Study on AI

A Poll

Tell me what you think…will AI take your job? Post a comment and let me know your further thoughts on this. (Can’t access comments? Support Sunday Letters to open this feature)

It may be too late, at least where big gains are concerned. AI is taking off not necessarily because there is business, work, and broader life-changing technology behind it, but because of FOMO. So says Steve Sosnick, chief strategist at Interactive Brokers. “[AI] is the hot sexy topic right now”, Sosnick says. It’s a modern-day gold rush, and investors are rushing in hard. Nvidia’s stellar market performance in the last few months (and particularly yesterday) is a case in point.

What’s that saying again, the one about fools and rushing in or something like that? No doubt there will be money made, but a lot of money will also be lost. Such is the phenomenon of the fear of missing out on a supposedly good thing. Still, I’m raging about the decision I took to sell Nvidia a few weeks ago. Ah well…

Jobs will be lost, too, as AI-powered technology takes over people's roles. It’s already happening. But perhaps instead of robots taking your job, you keep it and be required to behave more robotically. So says Charlie Warzel at The Atlantic. It is a deepening of the division of Labour, only now, it’s not about dividing up the physical work as Fred Taylor had envisaged over 120 years ago; it is now about dividing up the mental and psychological Labour.

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The Future of Work is a weekly issue from The Sunday Letters Journal that takes a look at current research, commentary and analysis on how our working lives are changing due to advances in technology. If you are a paying subscriber, you’ll get access to research papers, essays and articles that you may not otherwise through paywalled sources. Prepare for the future of work. Get each issue every Friday.

Become a Supporter

We are more than our cognitive function, more than the chatter in our heads, more than the need to collect things and obtain success. But this “more” is not more per se. Instead, it is quality, rather than quantity. But if we look at human behaviour and motivation, we might be convinced otherwise. The natural world and all that lives in it are seen as mere inputs in the pursuit of outputs. From the dawn of the industrial revolution, and arguably long before it, human beings have been treated as means to commercial ends components in a hydraulic system.

Today, despite physical working conditions having undoubtedly improved, this seems to be still largely the case. Psychologically and emotionally, work remains an assault on the person for many. In spite of our best efforts, the contemporary workplace appears to make us sick. And the advancement of AI and associated technologies might fast-track our movement along this trajectory. However, there is also the opportunity for it to make things better

We are more than the collection and processing of data. Why not let the machines do that and let us pursue more eudaimonic ends? I’m not sure we have the capacity, though, given how we have been conditioned by the world of work. We should try nonetheless.

In This Issue

• The Reality of AI

• AI Implications For The Future of Work (PDF)

• Documentary: The Future of Work

• Dystopia or Utopia: Which Way Will We Go?

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The following briefly introduces the topic, The Future of Work. The Future of Work section in Sunday Letters is reserved for paying supporters and reports on the current trends, research and commentary on the subject. By using the same technology I will write about, ironically enough, I will be scanning the internet to bring you the latest news and research on how technology is changing our world. It matters because technology has become ubiquitous in life, and arguably, it already consumes us in both work and broader contexts. We actively use it for things like finding directions, planning our day, ordering a pizza, or even writing an article. Still, it also operates passively in the background shaping our thinking, attitudes and beliefs. Our entire sense of being, and even more so for younger generations, appears inseparable from it.

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We only have to look at the gulf in proficiency and application of technology between our parents and our children. Some older generations barely grasp how to use a touch screen. In contrast, our children are almost entirely technologically literate right out of the cot. Mobile devices have replaced pacifiers (dummies or soothers) as the parental tool of choice for keeping our kids quiet, which worries me. New parents appear to accept these technologies with little or no question about their negative impact. Our world is changing increasingly rapidly, and technology, in the hands of those who pursue power and control, is the driver. And like hand-in-glove, we adopt these new ways of living.

By its very nature, industry is competitive, and whatever organisation gets ahead of the rest in the AI race will essentially rule the market and perhaps the world. And it’s becoming increasingly likely that governments may no longer hold a veto. This technology race has an inherent risk, given that we don’t always know how things will change. The approach has always been to roll it out and see what happens…we can fix things later. But this may not be a wise approach this time, given that we really don’t know what’s inside the AI box. Its creators don’t know how it learns and may be unable to stop it once it gets going.

Technological Complexity operates exponentially, and predicting the outcomes of higher-order complex systems is impossible. This is due to the number of independent variables in the system and their corresponding interdependence. We’re not dealing with simple hydraulic models of reality any longer. For example, building a new contraption one hundred years ago would have brought about a resultant but limited negative impact on jobs. Take the trade of the Cooper; aluminium kegs, in this case, did away with a centuries-old trade, but the negative implications arguably didn’t extend much further than the trade itself. Today’s advancements in technology, however, are likely to have a much broader and more profound effect.

We must find stability and certainty before technological advancement gets too far ahead of us. The problem is that powerful organisations are pushing forward, and human cognition and our problem-solving ability are more limited than the rate of change. AI language models, for example, operate and learn much faster than humans. Although their capacity is limited at present, some suggest their rate of development poses a significant risk. The Future of Life Institute wants the industry a pause on AI projects. But I’m not sure that the slow-down will come quickly enough, or even at all, and my position is more pessimistic than optimistic.

There will undoubtedly be benefits to humanity in this AI technological revolution, but the downside might well be harsh and painful for many. We’ve got to remember that the first ones out of the war zone, the first ones into the bunker, will be the ones with the most power and influence. Ordinary people and the poorest of those will suffer the most.

What Is The Future of Work?

The Future of Work refers to the changing nature of work and employment as advances in technology, automation, and artificial intelligence promise to deliver increased efficiencies to our lives. Although, this sounds more like a sales pitch than a reality. It includes predictions and discussions on how these changes will affect society and the welfare of people, industries, job markets, and the skills needed for employment now and in the future. No corner of our world will be left unaffected, and change is already happening. Our local pharmacy, for example, uses a robot to retrieve prescription medicine from the shelves. “Chip” is a bit of a celebrity, with local kids regularly visiting the pharmacy to see him in action. That’s one less local person employed. But on the positive side, Chip doesn’t need breaks, won’t be out sick, won’t be late for work, and has reduced errors in fulfilling prescriptions to practically zero.

The development of AI, robotics and automation is a natural progression from the division of labour; the splitting of complex productive tasks into several specialised, more straightforward tasks made famous through early advances in industrialisation. Frederick Taylor and Henry Ford were two of its earliest advocates. Some experts predict that with continued simplification of complex tasks, automation will lead to increased job loss, decreased income and deepening social inequality. Others believe it will lead to new opportunities and increased innovation and productivity. Whatever the actual outcome, society needs to prepare. With no work available, what will millions of people do with their time? How will they earn? How will they live, survive, and even thrive? Our relationship with work used to be vocational, but through Capitalism, it has become transactional. Even so, we derive our sense of worth, value and social contribution from our work; what would millions do without it?

I’m pointing at a catastrophic scenario, but the future of work doesn’t need to play out this way. You and I don’t need to sit and wait for it to happen, either. That’s where the concept of commanding one’s own work and teaching it to others comes in. It starts with you and me.

Future of Work Topics

Articles and essays on the future of work will go out on Fridays, and some of the key topics that we will discuss will include the following:

• Automation: Advances in technology and automation are leading to increasing numbers of jobs being replaced by machines and software. This will likely impact the job market significantly and could lead to significant job displacement in certain industries. However, it is also possible that automation will lead to new job opportunities and increased productivity.

• Artificial Intelligence: Artificial Intelligence and machine learning are rapidly advancing and are expected to impact people's future working lives significantly. AI is already used to automate many tasks, most notably in organisations such as Amazon, and will continue to augment human capabilities. This will profoundly impact the job market, economy, and society.

• Remote work: The COVID pandemic accelerated the trend towards remote work, and many companies will likely continue to allow employees to work from home. However, this has led to a blurring of the line between personal and working life. The way we live and work will continue to change as a result, but it may also present new opportunities for people who live in areas with a high cost of living.

• The Gig Economy: The gig economy is a labour market that relies heavily on temporary and part-time workers rather than permanently employed staff. Gig workers are said to gain flexibility and independence from this kind of work, but they sacrifice job security. There are also pros and cons for organisations, but essentially, it’s to their advantage. We’ll look at how this situation may change in the future.

• Skills & Learning: As the nature of work changes, many of us will need to develop new skills to remain employable or work for ourselves. This will include new technical skills and soft skills such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and creativity. As such, how we educate our children will need to change drastically.

• Good Work: As The Institute For The Future of Work outlines, Good Work is central to personal and collective well-being and flourishing. Research suggests good work is major to meeting socioeconomic challenges and building strong, resilient communities. Good work is more than employment. It promotes dignity, autonomy, and equality; work with fair pay and conditions, where people are inadequately supported to develop their talents and have a sense of community.

• Alternative Futures of Work: It won’t be all bad, and rather than presenting a dystopian future, future of work content will also cover future possibilities with a rosier look. We will explore how technological advances can help us reverse the damage to the environment, clean up our act, and develop a more socially oriented perspective on work.

The Future of Work will be published on Fridays, and if you’re already subscribed to Sunday Letters, each issue will land in your inbox. Each piece will include some commentary from me and links to resources, research papers, news and other material on the future of work. I hope to see you here.

Essays in the Future Work section of Sunday Letters may have been previously published and are edited and short-listed for inclusion in the upcoming anthology with the working title “The Slavery of Work”. The book’s essential theme is, as the title suggests, the imposition of work on the freedom and liberty of human beings and what we can do to change things. It is the pursuit of an answer to the question of commanding our own daily work. Supporters of Sunday Letters will receive a free digital and print copy of the book upon release.

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As I consider the variety of work I do–work for which I receive payment and not work I do for enjoyment and work, I’d rather not do–it strikes me that most of what feels off about it comes from having to do it. It is the sensation that someone is looking over my shoulder, waiting impatiently for me to fulfil a prior obligation. Under the critical eye of a headmaster, priest, or overbearing matriarch, I have capitulated. And as this sensation of external pressure weighs on my consciousness, I wonder, was it always this way? Have the majority of human beings always worked on command?

It seems to me, and I’ve written on this many times before, that with the advent of industrialisation came the widespread imperative to work on the say-so of others. I accept that work may have always involved an arrangement of sorts between a relatively flush party and another willing to work for some form of payment. However, unlike the patronage arrangements of the Enlightenment period, for example, where artists and craftspeople worked by their own design, in today’s work, we do as we’re told. Even under the patronage of another, there is a sense of obligation, and perhaps most workers have never been free to direct their own work.

Philosopher Wilhelm von Humboldt is noted to have said of human beings and their work, “Whatever does not spring from a man’s free choice, or is only the result of instruction and guidance, does not enter into his very being, but remains alien to his true nature; he does not perform it with truly human energies, but merely with mechanical exactness…we may admire what he does, but we despise what he is.”

Perhaps this is our lot.

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