American billionaire Elon Musk stated that artificial intelligence could potentially eliminate almost all jobs, during a speech at the VivaTech 2024 conference in Paris.
Musk said, “It is possible that none of us will have a job,” and before alarming the public about losing their jobs due to AI, Musk pointed out that jobs requiring creativity and emotional intelligence may remain protected.
Musk added that robots and AI technologies will provide all the goods and services that humans need, and there will be no shortage of those resources, potentially eliminating the need for most jobs, he said.
These statements echo what Musk said when meeting with UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak last March, where he also mentioned that AI will replace humans in all jobs in the future, explaining that working in a job will be optional if individuals seek personal fulfillment, asserting that AI will be capable of doing everything.
Musk suggested that AI dominance could lead to a kind of prosperity, meaning that governments may lean towards providing citizens with a high universal income instead of a basic universal income. The basic universal income is a social security program that gives all adult citizens a fixed amount of income regularly without the need to work, without specifying how to achieve that.
Last month, Musk expressed concern about the superintelligent AI that will have intelligence surpassing any human on Earth, suggesting it may emerge by next year.
Musk said that the increasing demand for energy and the shortage of AI training chips may limit its capabilities in the near future.
Musk posed an existential question, asking, “If computers and robots can do everything better than you, will your life have meaning?” and answered that he expects humans to have a purpose, which is to “give meaning to artificial intelligence.”
