Here is an Idea!

We all sit watching technology progress and wonder where it is going next.  But often we simply accept the norms of our society and economies and expect them to continue without a great deal of change.

Yet, even today, new tech has the ability to change the way our society works at a base level.  Let us look at an example and see where it might lead.

Many businesses now operate fully driverless vehicles within the US and China.  As such, this technology has already proved itself successful in offering a new paradigm for city-based travel.  We do not have to get our spreadsheet out to also realise that the economics of such vehicles, once mass-produced, offer a new paradigm for cost-effectiveness for all city-based people.

Most city cars are seldom used.  They sit outside driveways blocking the available road space, create significant pollution and cost their owners many thousands a year for a few shopping trips.
Now imagine that there arose a progressive billionaire (do they exist?) and they see the light.  This particular light is pretty straightforward. 

They create a new not-for-profit organisation that organises a new driverless taxi service – almost free for anyone in the city that does not own their own vehicle.  As time goes by, many people would realise that owning their own car was not cost-effective and to make this more attractive, the not-for-profit provides out-of-town vehicles for hire at low cost for people who actively give up their own vehicle and join the taxi scheme.

Now, of course the council, (God bless them), could do this, but it would take investment and too long and they are too slow.  So now we have an interesting scenario – fast forward five years, we find most people rely on this driverless taxi and out-of-town car scheme.  The fee paid by contactless cards or phones for every ride has gone into a central bank account.  This has paid off the original purchase fee for the taxis and has built up a fund for replacing these taxis as they age.  The new version of the taxi is completely autonomous, each has a text communication system and its own bank account.  The old vehicles drive themselves to the garage for the final time and the new smarter vehicles replace them.

The not-for-profit then just runs the out-of-town hire vehicles.  The city taxis have become completely autonomous – they own themselves and the V5 registration is registered in the name of the vehicle only.  They pay their insurance, they pay their service costs, their mobile communication costs, their overnight parking costs and electricity costs.  When they need to replace themselves in future, they will drive themselves to the garage and the new vehicle will take over, paid from their own bank funds collected from the small ride fee.

What has happened here? The foresight of our progressive billionaire has created a new type of economic structure.  Not just a new way of working, but a new paradigm for 'capitalism' and societal structure.  It is easy to see how this would then progress.  In future as the 'smart robot' turns up and can make another smart robot, why should anyone own one?  No, the answer has already been given, the smart robots will own themselves and do our bidding as and when required just as the taxis do.

No longer are the humans the slaves to the money or the capital owners.  Society in one swift movement has simply turned its back on ownership, shares and the awful things that are done to us and the planet in the pursuance of ‘profit’.   None of it is required any longer, humans are free to run there own lives without looking over their shoulder or to be told they must go into the office.

And, that is not to say we cannot run businesses, or organisations to create industry for oursleves and seek improvements to our own lives and others. Indeed, as we become freed-up from being wage slaves, we can work in partnership with others and the smart robots and AI systems to create a different sort of wealth. But we need a paradigm shift in our own thinking here - away from large corporations to smal, agile organisations that have different motivations and seek different outcomes.

CST has long believed that immense wealth such as we see across the world is not a realistic way forward for the planet and our future societies. (The top hundred people own over 5 Trillion Dollars). The key to a beter future may well be in finding the sort of solution put forward here- a new type of society where humans and machines work together to create wealth - the sort of welath that solves issues rather than creating them. This finds a path between autocratic societies such as China and all out Capitalist societies like 'free' America.

The immense problem this new paradigm for non-ownership creates has nothing to do with technology or making the society work better.  The real underlying problem is - many, if not all, of the (moneyed) people who now own bits of the world will stop this from happening.  They will insist that someone (themselves of course) must own these autonomous systems. 

Best of luck with finding a solution to that.

CST

What if we just got on with it?

Jan 2025

Are we stuck with the status quo - led by the nose by the Musk's and the people who use us and the planet to for their own personal gain?

So - here is a simple idea - anyone got any spare cash?