ARTISANS

The invention of machines has vastly improved our physical and intellectual abilities, profoundly altering our world and potentially leading to self-destruction. Currently, global machine power equates to 200 slaves per person. By 2050, Artificial General Intelligence might surpass the intellect of history’s greatest geniuses. Oil-powered machines have destabilized our planet, threatening our existence. History suggests we’re unprepared for AGI, but hope may lie in our artisan spirit, the one that, before machines, led us to know how to control our hands to make artifacts.

The spirit of Homo habilis that inhabits the artisan inspires patience, care, attention to detail, precision of gesture, responsibility towards the other user. It could save us from Homo Economicus, the irresponsible, pleasure- seeking consumer, that degenerate, moronic branch of the human species that proliferates like a cancer and devours us. I hope that the artisan within us will wake up and make each and every one of us responsible an benevolent creators of a harmonious and peaceful reality, each on our own scale.