AI and the Future of Work: Is Capitalism Obsolete in an Automated World?

A recent viral video by digital history and culture researcher Aidan Walker has sparked a significant discussion on the fundamental nature of labor in an age of advanced Artificial Intelligence. Walker, known for his insightful analyses, explores whether AI's productive output can be considered 'labor' in the traditional sense, a question with profound implications for the future of capitalism. Citing figures like Sam Altman, who has suggested AI could lead to the 'abolition of capitalism,' Walker argues that AI-performed tasks differ fundamentally from human labor. 'The tasks performed by AI or robots are not definitionally labor,' Walker states in the video. 'They are not services exchanged for pay; they are like a product that is produced out of raw materials.' He further elaborates that AI's intelligence is 'downstream of like the construction of the data centre, the amount of energy poured into the data centre, and the chips that you have bought.' Drawing on classical economic and Marxian traditions, Walker highlights that labor is typically defined as 'a certain amount of time spent in a human body... with an intention to spend that time doing a certain thing.' He contrasts this with AI, which 'does not spend time in the world' and whose output is 'produced out of electricity and data,' not human time. This distinction, he posits, means AI is not 'doing labor' in a classic sense. The video then delves into the concept of capital, explaining that in a Marxian context, capital is essentially the 'surplus value of labor that through various systems has been captured and siphoned off.' If AI does not perform labor, then the traditional mechanism for generating surplus value and thus capital is disrupted. Walker questions whether capitalism can exist if its core is no longer human labor but rather the output of machines that do not experience alienation or mortality. This thought-provoking analysis invites viewers to reconsider the foundational principles of our economic systems in light of rapidly advancing AI technology.

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