This week on Futuristic, Cam, Steve, and Tony Kynaston of the QAV Podcast tackle the burning question: Will AI and humanoid robots bring about a utopian future or massive unemployment? They dive into potential economic shifts, the state of media, Apple’s antitrust issues, and whether competition will drive tech adoption. Tune in for a lively two hour debate on the future job market and the possibility of a global AI Cold War.

00:00 Introduction and Nostalgic Sitcom References
01:06 Guest Introduction and AI Optimism
12:04 Ray Kurzweil’s Predictions and AGI Discussion
45:22 Australian Media vs. Meta
58:02 Big Tech and Antitrust Issues
01:01:25 The Impact of AI on Employment and Economy
01:20:24 Debating Utopian Futures
01:20:59 Economic Realities of Utopia
01:25:17 AI’s Role in Future Jobs
01:26:56 The Human Element in AI Integration
01:31:07 AI’s Impact on Professional Sectors
01:32:49 The Future of AI and Society
01:38:57 Regulatory and Economic Challenges
01:53:15 The AI Cold War
01:55:41 Final Thoughts and Reflections

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FUTURISTIC 27

[00:00:00 ] Cameron: you guys. Welcome back to a very special edition of Futuristic. That’s what they used to say on sitcoms in the

[00:00:16 ] Cameron: 80s, wasn’t it? If they were going to talk about AIDS or suicide or something, it was a very special edition of, uh, Different Strokes this week, where somebody got touched by a Catholic priest and we’re going to talk about the ramifications.

[00:00:32 ] Steve: See, I thought when different strokes came out that look, America’s not racist. It’s amazing. Look, a white rich guy stole two black children and put them in his

[00:00:40 ] Steve: penthouse apartment. Like, seriously? And I fell for that? What?

[00:00:46 ] Tony: I thought you were going to tell your joke about reverse exorcism then, Cameron.

[00:00:51 ] Cameron: Ha ha ha ha! My

[00:00:52 ] Cameron: joke? Why is it my joke?

[00:00:53 ] Tony: Oh was Taylor’s. It was one of the Reillys.

[00:00:55 ] Cameron: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s Taylor’s joke. Yeah, yeah. What’s a reverse exorcism, Steve?

[00:01:00 ] Steve: No idea.

[00:01:01 ] Cameron: When a demon pulls the priest out of a child. Yeah, uh, it’s episode 27 of Futuristic with myself, Cameron Reilly, Steve Sammartino and Tony Kynaston, the man from the QAV podcast, uh, who’s come on to, um, discuss, debate. Steve and I about our optimistic AI projections. How are you, Tony?

[00:01:31 ] Tony: good things, Cam. I don’t know about discuss or discuss. Yes.

[00:01:34 ] Tony: I don’t know about debate. I often agree with what you guys are saying and thanks for inviting me on. It’s a great show.

[00:01:39 ] Tony: It’s great to explore this area and you guys do a good job.

[00:01:43 ] Cameron: Thank you, Tony. How are you, Steve?

[00:01:45 ] Steve: Good.

[00:01:47 ] Cameron: What’s on your hat, Steve? I should have worn my Joe’s BBQ hat, but you’ve got a hat on. What’s that? Buck Fever. I thought that was, I thought you were going with the Pulp Fiction line there. My name is Buck.

[00:02:01 ] Steve: It’s a, it’s a local hat business called The Farm

[00:02:06 ] Steve: and all of them have some sort of an animal and a statement and I just like them and this is one and I get one every year for Christmas.

[00:02:14 ] Cameron: That’s nice. Well, let’s, uh, let’s talk about AI, um, before we do, Tony, the way we

[00:02:22 ] Cameron: normally start the show is we talk about one thing of note that we’ve done with AI or futuristic technology since our last episode. Uh, do you want to start?

[00:02:34 ] Tony: I’ll be very short, I’ve done nothing, but I’m just looking at Steve’s cap there, you sure it’s not a spoonerism, Steve? Buck fever?

[00:02:42 ] Steve: Could be.

[00:02:44 ] Cameron: Spoonerism.

[00:02:45 ] Tony: Yeah, swap the initials.

[00:02:47 ] Steve: Oh, no, it’s definitely not that.

[00:02:51 ] Cameron: Oh, there you go. You’ve, you’ve taken the show right, immediately, straight out of the gate, down to another level, Tony. Well done. Well done.

[00:02:59 ] Tony: not me, I’m not wearing the hat. It’s just where my mind, it’s just where my mind goes.

[00:03:04 ] Cameron: Lone

[00:03:05 ] Steve: If they’re all spoonerisms, that one doesn’t work, so.

[00:03:08 ] Tony: okay. It’s not the

[00:03:09 ] Steve: That botches that theory, doesn’t it?

[00:03:12 ] Tony: Well, possibly, yeah. Uh, no, I’ve done absolutely nothing with technology this week,

[00:03:17 ] Tony: Kev. I mean, apart from the fact that we live in an age where we’re talking to each other across vast distances and, and, uh, in real time with video, it’s pretty amazing, but otherwise, no.

[00:03:28 ] Cameron: What about you, Steve? Done anything impressive?

[00:03:30 ] Steve: well, I have something disappointing to announce. Weekly, almost daily, I put up what I believe are thought leading posts and ideas of things I’ve written and said on places like LinkedIn to generate work, and I get a few views. If I do something, it’s Incredibly poignant about the economic impact of AI.

[00:03:49 ] Steve: Five people read it. But this week, I went Mr. B style and went into the, let’s call it the game show side of AI. I put up a quiz. Guess which picture is AI generated and which one is an actual photo? Bam, 20, 000 views, which is the decline of modern society. Put up a pop quiz. People are in. Put up something thought leading that might change their economic or social circumstances.

[00:04:12 ] Steve: Crickets!

[00:04:13 ] Steve: up something that goes to the lowest common denominator of I’m smart, I can guess which one’s AI, and bam, 20, 000 views. That’s all I got to say.

[00:04:21 ] Steve: That was less than a minute. Check me later.

[00:04:24 ] Cameron: you gotta entertain, I guess is the lesson there, Steve. People wanna be entertained,

[00:04:28 ] Steve: Seems like

[00:04:29 ] Cameron: not educated, entertained, which is why we’ll all be getting our close off

[00:04:34 ] Steve: Entertainment is greater than education in 2024. Is that where we’re at? Wasn’t the internet the promise of all knowledge to

[00:04:40 ] Steve: all people?

[00:04:41 ] Cameron: yeah. Well, I’ll tell you what was entertaining was the, uh, US presidential debate, um, talking about the, the decline of decline of civilization, uh, that was entertaining for all the wrong reasons. Um, well, I, you know, I continued to do a lot of code, um, the, the. AI tool that everyone’s raving about from a coding perspective is Claude, again, Anthropic’s AI tool, Claude, 3.

[00:05:06 ] Cameron: 5 Sonnet is the current iteration of it. Um, a lot of people have had a lot of success, a lot of professional coders are saying they’re using Claude for their coding work. I’ve been playing with it a lot in the last week, trying to continue to automate our checklist process, Tony, uh, for QAV. And I have not had a lot of success with it.

[00:05:30 ] Cameron: It’s, uh, gets very confused when trying to write Python code to manage Excel spreadsheets. Leads me around in circles, so, you know, it’s this continuing thing of coding with AI, on one hand, is incredible and amazing because I can code shit and, you know, two years ago I couldn’t code to save my life. But it’s also really frustrating at times going around in circles.

[00:05:55 ] Cameron: So I continue to push through and part of m