Table of Contents
Throw away
A serial project asking Toshinao Sasaki about the future of technology and society.
The theme this time is what "growth" and "learning" mean in modern society.
What are your thoughts on "growth" and "learning" in today's rapidly changing work environment, with the use of AI and the promotion of digital transformation?
Toshinao Sasaki (hereinafter Sasaki): I think it is necessary to look at it from two perspectives: a macro perspective of society as a whole and a micro perspective of the individual. Regarding how to look at the former from the perspective of society as a whole, two parallel discussions are currently taking place.
One is the discussion about the labor shortage caused by the declining population and aging population, and to compensate for this, for example, by increasing the employment of elderly people and foreign workers.
The other is the discussion about jobs being taken away by AI. It's strange that these two discussions are being held in parallel for some reason and do not intersect.
If we link the discussion about the labor shortage with the discussion about jobs being taken away by AI, we would conclude that even if there are no people, we can just let AI do the work, but that is not the case.
Why are the topics that should be discussed together not being linked?
Sasaki: One of the reasons is the issue of generational change. This is a bit of an old story, but in the 1950s, there was a "container revolution" in which cargo ships were replaced by containers.
Before containers appeared, longshoremen were tasked with loading individual cargo onto cargo ships. However, with the arrival of containers, those jobs disappeared.
Then, in the 1960s, there were frequent demonstrations by longshoremen, but you don't see those kinds of demonstrations happening nowadays.
That's because those longshoremen retired from society, which means there was a change of generation.
In human society, jobs are always disappearing and appearing as technology evolves, but in the past, this cycle took time to be neatly replaced with the change of generations.
However, the problem with AI and robots is that technology evolves so quickly that people who had jobs yesterday are now losing their jobs today.
I think this is because the speed of technological evolution has increased, and the change between generations, which we were able to absorb in the process of technological evolution until now, can no longer be absorbed.
In the past, as technology evolved, there was a change in generations, but that's not the case today.
Sasaki: Yes. But this has happened in the past. I think the publishing industry is an easy example to understand. As e-commerce became widespread, magazine sales declined, and magazines disappeared. Editors and designers who had been working with paper began to work on websites, and before they knew it, they were working as web directors and web designers.
Still, I don't think it was a sudden change. I think it was a gradual change over the course of 5 to 10 years.
During that gradual time lag, people acquired new skills and adapted to the times, but in the age of generative AI, the time lag associated with the speed of evolution is short.
Because the time lag is short, it becomes difficult to reskill, which was possible in the past.
Sasaki: Yes. This brings us to the micro-talk I mentioned at the beginning, but there is no one in today's working generation who doesn't use the Internet or a computer.
In other words, it's not like people who have no affinity with digital should switch to digital.
The office automation of the early 1990s and the IT revolution of the 2000s changed the appearance of things without changing the essence of the contents. I think everyone has followed up to this point.
It was just a change in the form of the medium, such as converting what was previously done on paper to PDF, so I think that of course everyone in the current working generation understands it.
However, DX, which appeared in the late 2010s, is different from the office automation and IT revolutions of the past. DX is about digitizing the contents as well.
For example, in the case of taxis, where previously taxis were dispatched based on personal know-how and experience, DX is about dispatching taxis based on apps and systems, placing more emphasis on AI analysis data than personal know-how, and dispatching taxis according to AI instructions.
In that case, the idea is different from traditional IT in the first place. "The basis of the idea is digital, centered on AI and data."
I feel that in reality, many people do not understand this. DX is not something that can be done top-down by the president, like IT revolution.
No matter how much the president instructs his subordinates to DX, if the decision-making process of the company's management is the same as before, DX cannot be implemented.
DX will not progress unless the president changes his way of thinking. In other words, I think that whether you can keep up with this or not will make a difference in "learning" in the modern era.
You need to understand that if you can't keep up with this, you will lose your job in the DX era.
The time has come for management to change their way of thinking.
Sasaki: In human society, there are times when the technology that forms the foundation of society evolves. Examples of this are the invention of agriculture and the industrial revolution in the past.
In the early 2000s, it was said that the information and communications revolution was the same. However, I don't think that the information and communications revolution has had as much impact as the industrial revolution with the emergence of the steam engine, and in fact, I don't think it has changed anything in essence.
Rather, if there is such a thing as an information and communications revolution, I think that the current DX was the real thing. I don't think that the shift to IT is a revolution that deserves to be called an information and communications revolution.
I believe that the essence of DX is that AI is always present and that it works together with AI. If what is happening now is the real information and communications revolution, then I think it is an era of change comparable to the first industrial revolution when the steam engine was invented.
In that sense, old knowledge and know-how become useless in times like these. I was actually a newspaper reporter for a time, but the know-how I gained there is not useful at all in the present day.
There is no doubt that we are entering an era where old knowledge is no longer useful. In order to respond to this, we have no choice but to catch up on new knowledge and respond without relying on old knowledge, regardless of age.
This will be an era in which this will be further promoted in the future.
Sasaki: I think that "growth" and "learning" will become important for the younger generation in the future. I think that in the 2030s and 2040s, we will see an era in which AI and robots will become commonplace.
As I mentioned in Vol. 6 of this magazine about the potential of generative AI, when the time comes when AI can do everything, I think the role of humans will be to prioritize each problem, or to decide the order of solutions and goal setting.
When that happens, humans will need more advanced judgment and decision-making skills, so I think we will need to "learn" to develop people who can make such decisions, and I think that will lead to "growth."
In fact, humans have adapted to the increasingly complex society of the 21st century and are now able to do complex work.
So, even when the time comes when AI can do simple tasks and humans have to do complex tasks, I think humans will be able to adapt.
"Power is always evil," "The common sense of the people is always right," "The weak should be protected," "Artificial things are dangerous," "Natural origins are best"... Outdated values that continue to linger in Japanese society. A cutting-edge essay that dismantles the "myths" that run counter to the evolution of cutting-edge technology and serves as a guidepost for thinking about the future.
Toshinao Sasaki (Author) Tokuma Shoten (September 28, 2023)
◉ Toshinao Sasaki
Born in Hyogo Prefecture in 1961. Dropped out of Waseda University's School of Political Science and Economics. After working as a reporter for the Mainichi Shimbun and the editorial department of Monthly ASCII, he is now a freelance journalist. He has written many books, including "The Age of Curation" (Chikuma Shinsho), "The Layered World" (NHK Publishing Shinsho), "Homemade Meals Are the Best Treats" (Magazine House), and "And Life Becomes a Community" (Anonymous Studio).
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Sasaki Toshinao's thoughts on "Dialogue between AI and humans" Tech and Future Vol.3
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