“There’s nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it’s going to be a butterfly” – R Buckminster Fuller.
There has never been a more popular topic than “Man vs Machine” in this present age of information. While billions of dollars are being spent on research and advanced technological development and deep learning, some industries are beginning to raise questions and insecurities about the next big thing.
After the age of the enlightenment -- during the early modern era, the advancement in the technology continued like forest fire, particularly with the first and second industrial revolution which gave birth to several new technologies at the time. All aspect of human activities transitioned at a steady pace. The mode of transportation gradually evolved from foot to horse to carriage and to the horseless - automobile. When the automobile was introduced, people thought it was just a novelty for the rich that it’s just a delusional grandeur that’ll soon fade. But it didn’t take long for the invention to be replicated in mass production and commercialized for the public to afford it. People slowly bought into the idea as it proved faster and more efficient than the carriage – and affordable to buy and maintain. Slowly, people could see the change that was about to happen. Many carriage riders and horse keepers could easily adjust to the transition. And soon, the automobile replaced the horse. The world evolved to the horseless carriage. It changed peoples lives, it made people become wealthy. And now, the horse has become a novelty for the rich. Automobile was the new technology that transitioned the world from an agrarian age – transport system to an industrial age – transport system. People could at least see the changes that would shape lives in the future. But in this age of information, we can’t see the changes that’ll change our lives and future.
In Robert Kiyosaki’s books “Second chance” He talked about increasing unemployment. He said “One reason why unemployment is increasing, and high paying jobs are harder to find is because in the information Age, humans are being replaced much like horse was replaced by the automobile. In photography for example humans’ ones needed to process films into prints. I still remember taking my roll of exposed film to the local drug store, dropping it in a little paper bag and coming back a week later to pick up my pictures” The point I’m trying make to here is that the loss of jobs will continue to increase as the information age keep advancing and the sad thing is that people will not see the technology that’ll replace them, or the technology coming. A lot of people will be happily employed and suddenly they’ll be out of work tomorrow because of this unseen and unpredictable kind of technology that is coming.
As scary as it may sound there’s always some kind of way to plan and prepare for the unknown to be fortified when the survival battle calls.
Endeavour to gain more digital skills
Gaining digital literacy in this age is one of the key elements for interaction today, even children nowadays have now been taking coding lessons and doing homework on their computers. So, continuous learning of digital skills will be rewarding as there are many sections to explore therein Like graphics designing, SEO, digital marketing, learning programming language and software.
Encouraging entrepreneurship.
This is one of the sectors that can be explored. Being able to be a risk taker and business owner. Gain the ability to direct and organise people to achieve results. You can work on producing things that are highly needed or food. And work on compounding your gains to produce more and meet high demands.
Following your passion
Many people have this feeling of a higher calling or purpose in life. And it usually in areas where technology can not disrupt.
Integrate with the new technologies
Artificial intelligence and deep learning are some of the new innovations that’ll shape the future, some experts are speculating that it might disrupt virtually almost all the skilled labour- ranging from accountants to builders, factory operators, drivers, office support, production work, customer service etc. However, there are means of integrating with these technologies when there can be some areas of specialization the technologies are limited to.
Summary
The age of the information is gradually transitioning into a new age that can’t be seen nor predicted, but from the history, we are certain that it’s an age that’ll change the course of our lives and future positively or negatively depending on how we choose to prepare for it.
