The loops that built your family's world are now breaking because of AI
One writer's grandfather was a soldier, a sailor and then a miner. His life and family were built on the solid structures of his time but now offer stark warnings for the impact of AI on jobs.
(Whatever Substack is doing with its own algorithm, I would say it has at least a good shot at generating some actual conversations again as a social platform. Not like the Old Internet or Old Twitter but better than the current algorithmic mess on the rest.)
Another Matthew reached out last week in the Substack chat with a recent post of his all about meaning, time, structures and relationships, which is the next major level or aspect of Human Loops we are going to look at.
The Old Loop
His grandfather was the central figure for the whole family, first a soldier in World War One, then the Merchant Navy, then a miner in the pits.
His participation in those economic, social and work structures of his time allowed him to channel that income into growing a large and happy family with many generations.
He had sufficient capacity for change and adaptation and could do so to new positions within his skill range and capability levels and the resulting income was enough to build his family over the years.
The family's story is a great example from past generations of previous structures, purposes and relationships that did all work together—multiple complex human loops accumulating resources, lived experiences, relationships and meaning over time in a constructive direction—for as long as they lasted.
“Thinkers like Estlund (2017) and De Stefano (2018)”, Matthew continues, “emphasize the importance of work for social integration and personal fulfilment, advocating for broader definitions that include care, civic, and voluntary activities”.
I would note here that Frankl’s logotherapy used three major buckets for approaching the meaning of life: 1) a creative project or work endeavour, 2) experiencing something or encountering someone, and 3) the attitude adopted towards unavoidable suffering.
Now his grandad tragically has dementia but their family is pulling round him to care for him in his old age: they are already finding new meaning in their shared approach to this new round of generational family suffering.
The AI Crunch
Now, as we were saying the other day, AI is coming for everyone and will impact multiple major aspects of how modern life as we have known it works: jobs, economies, relationships and even our inner meaning creation processes themselves.
Matthew asks, wondering about that change: “In a world where many feel they are what they do, what does it mean to be unemployed? Does it imply you are nothing?”
That’s it. This is why the impact of AI on a global scale is going to cut so deep. It’s not just going to be about the money and the jobs (although they will be urgent practical needs for millions).
This is what I was outlining for you the other day: it is going to hit economic structures, sources of family income, the state of relationships, including families, status and trust, and how we process and assign meaning to what we do and the memories we accrue in life, the stories we tell ourselves about what is happening in our lives and what they mean.
As Matthew points out, those of us who are a little older now can remember what happened to our parents or grandparents generations during, say, periods of de-industrialisation in the 1980s. And a large part of how we got to MAGA in the United Sates or Brexit in the UK is related to the economic deal across society, and indeed aross the world, being perceived as already not working for large sectors of it.
So we already know that these kinds of changes can bite hard and affect a lot of people in negative ways that last generations, however much the politicians and corporate spokespeople dress it up and smooth it over and explain it away.
What now happens when AI takes or mangles enough jobs to cause problems for family incomes across whole chunks of national economies?
The Loop Problem
Now a lot of people around the world—mums, dads, providers—are going to be forced to ask the question of how they create new income structures and meaning for themselves in the short-term, and also for their kids when they leave school in the next few years, as their kids move into those economies affected by AI and robots.
The thing is, you can’t just leap from the mines or a factory or 25 years as an accountant or a data worker to being an AI robotics superstar or some kind of enlightened human meaning guru (and how many of those does the world need?).
Similarly for all the young people who have just done college degrees or courses in anything creative like 3D animation or photography or copywriting or translation.
Hundreds of millions of ordinary, non-AI-expert people are still going to have real-world life problems to deal with and you will have to look for options that are realistic next steps from wherever you actually are, you will have to do so in time, and with whatever skills you already have or can quickly acquire.
That will affect the status, self-image, roles and stress levels of parents directly, for example, as well as the actual month-to-month logistics of housing, food and clothing. More real-world stress and demands then means more separation, divorce and family break-ups.
Structural impacts cause loops to spiral towards destruction instead of construction.
Lots of people talk about UBI (universal basic income) as the "obvious" solution but even if governments go for it on a big enough scale, how are they (ultimately we) supposed to pay for it all? Even more never-ending public debt and deficit spending?
At some point, the labour-capital-consumer equilibrium modern economies are based on falls apart, even if the credit-debt part holds that long, because if enough jobs go, there won't be enough people with enough spare money to buy all the stuff the AI and the robots are producing.
Second, even if over the next 10 or 20 years we can create social or economic gaps or pauses to work out what the new roles are supposed to be in among the robots and the AIs, there is going to be a giant crisis of meaning that will affect all of the key institutions since the Enlightenment and represent an ontological challenge to human creativity and meaning themselves.
For the first time ever, machines can create what we observe as original works.
Essentially, how do whole societies rebuild logistics and income structures for their actual families when a massive percentage of modern work is now threatened by AI, and what will that mean for people’s self-esteem and roles in life?
And let's remember that 99% of normal societies and markets around the world are not the enthusiastic tech VCs in San Francisco or the c-suite executives at the global AI companies racing to implement all of this.
There are no easy answers here but by understanding more complete structural dynamics—the old loops that provided stability, the coming new shock, how we constantly create meaning and the realistic constraints of our 'adjacent possible' options—we can at least begin to ask the right questions.
Human Loops For You:
Start Seeing Your Patterns: 15 core questions and four examples to help you start thinking about your own complex life situations (free pdf when you subscribe)
1-on-1 Calls & Coaching: work with Matthew directly to analyse your own complex personal or professional loops and situations. Limited availability.
Business Consulting & Reports (coming shortly): we can apply the framework to your brands, team dynamics or market landscapes together to identify critical threats and scenarios for change. Ideal for leadership teams and strategists.