Tesla recently broke ground on a factory slated to build 10 million humanoid robots a year. In a past article, I chatted about humanoid culture intersecting with robotics, direction towards abundance economies, and the integration of them into human society.
On the other side of the world, Unitree released their skills store - a means for people to create and distribute skills tailor-made for robotics. We're literally about to receive an App Store for robots.
The Unitree skill store
The scale here is about to be undeniable; for practical robotics, with dozens (if not hundreds) of companies around the globe working towards this cause, we're going to reach a constructed population rivaling that of major cities. Run the numbers here a moment. The human population increases at a rough rate of ~80 million per year. With a single factory producing 10 million humanoids per year, for every 100 new humans, 12 humanoids will be created. That's only the start.
There are 1.5 billion cars in the world, and they're several tons (~4000 lbs). A car, for the vast majority of industrialized human history, has been (and is) considered an important asset for many personal, commercial, and industrial reasons. A single humanoid robot today is ~120 lbs (give or take) - if the same sheer physical mass and importance is assigned to producing robots, over the course of decades, we'd have 50 billion robots. For every human today, we'd have 5 or 6 robots. Battery technology is getting better, and power generation likewise.
Now, there's a lot of feelings and observations that can come from that:
"What if they rebel?"
"Who will control them?"
"Won't they take all jobs?"
"There's things only a human can do!"
And so on. However, this is an adversarial view of it. On the other hand, there's the sigh of relief:
"We can finally stop sending humans into hazardous working conditions."
"I can spend time with my family now."
"Farming is much easier now."
"I don't have to feel bad about a human toiling at 3 AM to get me my package."
We are about to reach a level of the technology curve where we will eliminate lots of scarcity. Intelligence became a lot easier to print with AI and machine neurons working on nondeterministic and nonlinear solutions in the past few years, but the real wins are still to come when we're able to move atoms at scale.
And we'll coexist with them. Open models for AI exist, and ones sufficient enough to run off a laptop. The same will occur with robotics - ones powerful enough to exist, process, and locomote of their own accord. They will suffer digital viruses and quirks like you and I suffer physical ones, and they will observe our behaviour. In a sense, we are their parents. They will be our descendants, and what they inherit from us we can decide now.
The importance here is that we become the models - that we value certain things above others. Bryan Johnson speaks on this with his Don't Die philosophy (one I very much agree with): that every organism and every moment in time is attempting to sustain its existence for one second longer, and that existence is the highest virtue. This sort of approach is powerful, because it transcends borders, cultures, and species. A sentient autonomous intelligence that respects its neighbors and stewards them, is one far more likely to bring about prosperity for all.
All I can really say is: the future will be here sooner than you think. I have no particular reason, even with the gravity of what I just described as one projection, to fear. Though a vast majority of human culture will change, our opportunities to expand the human experience also will too - and the wheels of history will keep turning. What I urge: keep your eyes open for ways to help lift burden off of your fellow human with the help of technology. Our ancestors would thank us.
Be well,
Michael Kirsanov