Economists and researchers gathered Thursday afternoon in Sacramento to discuss where tech could take the world generally and California specifically.
The forum, Driving or Driven? California and the World of the Future, included an international expert, a state economist and a private-sector researcher. Each presented their version of hot topics for California's future.
The meeting’s two takeaways: injecting humanity into technology and preparing the workforce for more technology in new and sometimes unexpected forms.
The speakers said that technology cannot be neutral and helpful without humans exerting autonomous control over it.
“Tech is only neutral if you choose how to use it,” California’s Chief Economist and Department of Finance representative Irena Asmundson.
For example, a previously informed user cannot give informed consent if they cannot keep up with how Terms and Conditions change, said Nicholas Davis, head of society and innovation at the World Economic Forum.
Ethical issues, such as how artificial intelligence uses skin color categories in facial recognition are also becoming more prominent, said Rachel Hatch, research director of the 10-Year Forecast at the Institute for the Future.
“Systems start to build on themselves” she said. Things get “baked in, but this is the window” to change it.
Social media giants like Facebook have expanded to more than 100 times the amount of users it has per employee, Davis said. Davis also questioned at what point an employee cannot keep up. Even with more efficiency and more productivity, any system improvement or change will cause a bottleneck somewhere else while users adapt.
Nevertheless, users and government must still find ways to adapt, the three panelists agreed.
Despite fear about automation ending the need for human labor, Asmundson is hopeful new industries will create new jobs.
“There’s going to be more than enough work for everyone. It’s just going to be if people who want the work done can pay for it,” Asmundson said.
Asmundson said she believes more communities will be built on technology, usually on the Web, and that a human moderator would be needed for that.
“You can’t apply for a job like that now, but the pendulum swings,” Asmundson said.
But you can apply for a job with robots working around the office, as with Hatch’s job. Her office has three robots representing her coworkers while they work remotely.
“You’re not even being replaced by a robot, you’re being augmented,” Hatch said. She said this can be jarring, but employees will have to get used to it over time.
More tech and tech systems are coming to represent people, based on identity or pseudonymous identities as with blockchain systems.
Hatch mentioned that she thinks there will be a need for more governance around blockchain transactions such as Bitcoin.
Future governance will have to look at transactions within systems, all three agreed.
Adaptive and agile governance will be important so there is no need to “burn this down and start again,” Davis said.
“How do you put the values into these systems?” Davis asked.
