Machine and Human Partnership in 2030

Back in the 90’s, nobody anticipated the pace with which the internet would spread across the globe and the impact it will create in every aspect of life. Yet, here we are, seeing the advances in technology that are impacting the way we think, communicate, work, and take decisions. Web, for example, has become an absolute necessity in most of our daily life. Even today, technologies like artificial intelligence, robotics, cloud computing, augmented reality, 5g, quantum computing etc. are still emerging and waiting to be leveraged to the fullest. The experts believe that through machines, humans are getting closer to solving some of the most complex problems that humanity is facing so far. Whether or not these technological inventions will change the world order and be able to solve the problems of humanity is uncertain, but it will have a huge impact on the way people live, eat, and think.

The intersection of technology with society has fueled two contrary viewpoints. One, leading to the impending doom of humankind where machines make humans redundant, and the other is considering technology as a sovereign remedy which is the answer to all problems. In this write-up, we will refrain from either of the extremes and promote a sensible and useful dialogue focused around the changing dynamics of the human-machine relationship. This will prepare us for the meaningful engagement with machines wherein humans and machines evolve in an intertwined fashion. Perhaps the very first example of the human-machine relationship is a hand axe, which was designed to strengthen human power.

Similarly vacuum cleaners, calculators, mobile and PCs are making our life easier. We have witnessed different phases of Mobile phones, which now have become a small supercomputer at your fingertip. However, bigger, and more efficient opportunities for human and machine partnership are in the making. From autonomous vehicles for e-commerce logistics and connected cars, from revolutionizing the travel and tourism industry with innovative ideas likes of SpaceX and hyperloop, from securing banking systems with bots and artificial intelligence which performs fraud detection, from innovative experimentation to improve user experience by leveraging extended reality (XR), (which includes augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR) and mixed reality (MR)) for marry the physical and digital world, from the usage of artificial intelligence to solve for price, inventory and delivery of e-commerce to drive higher customer satisfaction, etc. humans have been strengthening their partnership with machines in order to make the world a better place.

Though machines will bring lightning speed and accuracy to all tasks with ever-increasing processing power, it would be a misinterpretation of the fact that, machines, with equipped technologies, would make human work redundant by 2030. This decade will see a partnership that will make us more reliant on machines and has the potential to surpass the limitations. The partnership will not only help humankind to take critical decision without emotional biases, intuition and, preconceived notions, but also teach us to be better team player. Therefore, a healthy human-machine, or rather a human-led machine partnership can only be built with clear division in roles and responsibilities and tasks.

While machines can take more mundane and repetitive tasks, humans can take more exciting and creative jobs. No matter how advanced an AI algorithm is, it will not provide results unless trained intelligently with the correct data. IFTF and Dell Technologies partnered report ‘Future of Work’ forecasted three major shifts that could help build a better workforce and better learning system. The predicted key shifts are inclusive talents, empowered Workers, and AI fluency. So, there is no doubt that, this decade would bring opportunities capable of shaping our future. It will also bring new problems that will challenge humankind to think out of the box and foster a spirit of innovation by leveraging its strong partnership with machines.

By Anirban Nandi, Head of Analytics (Senior Director), Rakuten India