Is AI taking over the world?

Some experts insist tech is changing our lives for the better; others aren’t so sure

Artificial intelligence is getting very good these days. So good that you may not be able to tell whether this article was written by a human being or by ChatGPT, Gemini, DeepSeek or one of the many other AI language models.

For the record, it was written by a real person, but with AI-assistance that will soon become obvious.

Many news articles, especially those based around statistics, such as certain sport results and financial reports, are being created entirely by AI.

AI is being used by broadcasters to convert television news stories into print versions, and by newspaper companies to provide audio versions of written material.

A lot of the artwork you see online and in print (including that above) is created by AI from text prompts, and even podcasts with human-sounding hosts are being assembled from web pages, videos, and online documents.

But it’s not just people in the creative sector that have to worry about technology taking their work away.

In fact, I asked ChatGPT to name some fields where AI was doing human jobs, and it came up with:

• Chatbots and virtual assistants

• Call centre automation

• Stock market predictions and trading

• Fraud detection

• Legal document review

• Data entry and bookkeeping

• Medical imaging analysis

• Virtual health assistants

• Quality control inspection

• Warehouse and delivery automation

• Music and art generation

• Video editing and deepfake creation.

But that’s just the start.

Billionaire Elon Musk told a tech conference last year that “probably, none of us will have a job” in the future.

“If you want to do a job that’s kind of like a hobby, you can do a job,” Musk said. “But otherwise, AI and the robots will provide any goods and services that you want.”

Geoffrey Hinton, an academic and former Google employee known as “the godfather of AI”, recently told British broadcaster LBC that the technology had many short-term benefits, but it also had the potential to evolve beyond human control.

The initial benefits included improving healthcare. Because of AI’s ability to access all relevant data, it would be like patients having access to a “doctor who’s seen a 100 million patients”.

Are we the last human generation to hold down real jobs?
Share your thoughts.

However, Hinton said AI could lead to significant job losses, particularly in clerical and routine jobs, comparing it to the Industrial Revolution, where machines made human strength irrelevant.

He also expressed concerns over the exploitation of AI by “bad actors”, using it for cyberattacks, bioterrorism, and corrupting elections.

Hinton is pessimistic about the long-term future, saying we “don’t yet know how to do effective regulation and effective safeguards”.

He adds, hardly reassuringly, that “nobody understands what’s going on, really”.

But we can guess the potential outcomes.

If AI and robots do take over all the jobs, what will humans do? And how will they acquire the money to do it?

Musk suggested some form of guaranteed income – but who decides who gets how much?

Would those who are currently rich get more than everyone else? How would social and financial advancement work if nobody is doing anything that would help them get ahead?

Or would it not matter, because robots have determined that we are no longer necessary?