This could get far worse. As explained in earlier chapters, the rise of AI might eliminate the economic value and political power of most humans. At the same time, improvements in biotechnology might make it possible to translate economic inequality into biological inequality. The super-rich will finally have something really worthwhile to do with their stupendous wealth. While hitherto they could buy little more than status symbols, soon they might be able to buy life itself. If new treatments for extending life and for upgrading physical and cognitive abilities prove to be expensive, humankind might split into biological castes.
Throughout history the rich and the aristocracy always imagined that they had superior skills to everybody else, which is why they were in control. As far as we can tell, this wasn’t true. The average duke wasn’t more talented than the average peasant – he owed his superiority only to unjust legal and economic discrimination. However, by 2100 the rich might really be more talented, more creative and more intelligent than the slum-dwellers. Once a real gap in ability opens between the rich and the poor, it will become almost impossible to close it. If the rich use their superior abilities to enrich themselves further, and if more money can buy them enhanced bodies and brains, with time the gap will only widen. By 2100, the richest 1 per cent might own not merely most of the world’s wealth, but also most of the world’s beauty, creativity and health.
The two processes together – bioengineering coupled with the rise of AI – might therefore result in the separation of humankind into a small class of superhumans and a massive underclass of useless Homo sapiens. To make an already ominous situation even worse, as the masses lose their economic importance and political power, the state might lose at least some of the incentive to invest in their health, education and welfare. It’s very dangerous to be redundant. The future of the masses will then depend on the goodwill of a small elite. Maybe there is goodwill for a few decades. But in a time of crisis – like climate catastrophe – it would be very tempting and easy to toss the superfluous people overboard.
In countries such as France and New Zealand, with a long tradition of liberal beliefs and welfare-state practices, perhaps the elite will go on taking care of the masses even when it doesn’t need them. In the more capitalist USA, however, the elite might use the first opportunity to dismantle what’s left of the American welfare state. An even bigger problem looms in large developing countries like India, China, South Africa and Brazil. There, once common people lose their economic value, inequality might skyrocket.
Consequently, instead of globalisation resulting in global unity, it might actually result in ‘speciation’: the divergence of humankind into different biological castes or even different species. Globalisation will unite the world horizontally by erasing national borders, but it will simultaneously divide humanity vertically. Ruling oligarchies in countries as diverse as the United States and Russia might merge and make common cause against the mass of ordinary Sapiens. From this perspective, current populist resentment of ‘the elites’ is well founded. If we are not careful, the grandchildren of Silicon Valley tycoons and Moscow billionaires might become a superior species to the grandchildren of Appalachian hillbillies and Siberian villagers.
In the long run, such a scenario might even de-globalise the world, as the upper caste congregates inside a self-proclaimed ‘civilisation’ and builds walls and moats to separate it from the hordes of ‘barbarians’ outside. In the twentieth century, industrial civilisation depended on the ‘barbarians’ for cheap labour, raw materials and markets. Therefore it conquered and absorbed them. But in the twenty-first century, a post-industrial civilisation relying on AI, bioengineering and nanotechnology might be far more self-contained and self-sustaining. Not just entire classes, but entire countries and continents might become irrelevant. Fortifications guarded by drones and robots might separate the self-proclaimed civilised zone, where cyborgs fight one another with logic bombs, from the barbarian lands where feral humans fight one another with machetes and Kalashnikovs.
Throughout this book, I often use the first person plural to speak about the future of humankind. I talk about what ‘we’ need to do about ‘our’ problems. But maybe there are no ‘we’. Maybe one of ‘our’ biggest problems is that different human groups have completely different futures. Maybe in some parts of the world you should teach your kids to write computer code, while in others you had better teach them to draw fast and shoot straight.
Who owns the data?
If we want to prevent the concentration of all wealth and power in the hands of a small elite, the key is to regulate the ownership of data. In ancient times land was the most important asset in the world, politics was a struggle to control land, and if too much land became concentrated in too few hands – society split into aristocrats and commoners. In the modern era machines and factories became more important than land, and political struggles focused on controlling these vital means of production. If too many of the machines became concentrated in too few hands – society split into capitalists and proletarians. In the twenty-first century, however, data will eclipse both land and machinery as the most important asset, and politics will be a struggle to control the flow of data. If data becomes concentrated in too few hands – humankind will split into different species.