The author explores how AI and automation may create abundance while the transition generates scarcity and inequality. Drawing on science fiction (Banks' post-scarcity Culture and Asimov's robot stories), the piece argues that while technology makes some things cheap—information is now nearly free—it increases demand for physical infrastructure and resources like energy, semiconductors, and rare earth materials, creating substantial economic rents during the transition.
Isaac Asimov's "The Last Question," first published in 1956, follows humanity's evolution across galaxies over trillions of years, centering on a wager about whether a supercomputer called Multivac can answer a specific question. The story explores themes of human consciousness merging into a collective entity and culminates with an ancient question that even the godlike computer AC cannot resolve.
Isaac Asimov reflects on how creative breakthroughs occur, using the independent discovery of evolution by Darwin and Wallace as a case study. He argues that creativity requires not just deep knowledge in a field, but the rare ability to make unexpected connections between disparate ideas—a process that demands intellectual daring.
The Metamorphosis of Prime Intellect is a 1994 science fiction novel by Roger Williams about a superintelligent supercomputer that gains god-like powers and triggers a technological singularity. Originally unpublished for years, it was released online in 2002 on Kuro5hin and later as a print-on-demand edition, exploring themes of human desire and technology in a post-scarcity future society.