“A society where people can do what they want to do to the fullest”

When and how can we make this ideal society in the future that we all take for granted?

In this interview, we hear the thoughts of Keita. He is in his third year of university. He told us about his ideal society. First of all, I would like to introduce his profile and explain what he is currently doing. 

He is in his third year at a private university in Tokyo and is majoring in literature and archeology. 

He is also taking a teaching course. 

He plans to obtain a teaching license and continue to graduate school. 

In the future, he would like to work in a specialized academic field rather than in an office. 

Family structure: Family of five, parents and two younger brothers. Living at home. 

Personality: A person with unique values and who is honest about himself, although sometimes he is lazy. 

How he interacts with AI: He uses Siri and robots, but cannot make full use of them.

The ideal society, AI, and robots in 2050 

His image of an ideal society in 2050 would be “A society where people can do what they want to do to the fullest”. This is a commonly held idea, but it is very difficult for everyone to realize. Then we asked him what kind of AI robot he would like to see as part of that society. Here is is idea:

・Follows you everywhere

・Helps with all aspects of research such as compiling data, and simple tasks, such as   

   carrying luggage

・Does not move much independently

・Can search for materials on the go

He designed a robot with these features. In addition, he told us that even if this robot had greater knowledge and deeper insight into research than he did, he would not like it to share that knowledge with him. This is because it would reduce his own enjoyment and value of the study by half.  

He also depicted his ideal society as follows:

In this society, a robot like the one he drew will follow each of us to our workplaces, both domestic and international, to provide us with support. 

In addition, it would be desirable for supplies and materials to be delivered by auto piloted drones across borders. This is because he is planning to conduct research overseas in the future. 

Furthermore, the field of education is also of great importance to Keita. In his drawing, the classroom features both a teacher and AI. AI plays a supplementary role to the teacher. For example, AI is tasked with the function of collecting student data and matching it to the curriculum, teaching materials, and teaching methods. 

The ideal relationship between AI, humans, and our future

In the interview, he talked about his ideal society and his own role within it. He looked at this issue from the joint perspectives of academia and education. He believes that the coexistence of humans with AI and robots that exceed human capabilities is indispensable to realizing the ideal society.  

But at the same time, my own view is that we should use AI and robots with care. This means not to consider AI as being on the same level as humans. We need to bear in mind that it is us who control AI and robots. 

Also, as part of introducing AI into more educational contexts, we will need to introduce new education courses to improve human literacy in the latest technology. There also needs to be security reinforcement on data in order to protect privacy more thoroughly than at present. 

We thus have to establish a system that  resolves all these concerns to enable AI to become more accessible. Then we can live in harmony with AI. The ideal will become reality.