What’s next? The Future With Bill Gates review: Has Tom Hanks really joined his secret lizard society? | Television

“In 2022, AI woke up.”

“We are building something – wisely or not – much smarter than ourselves.”

“Human collaboration is still needed. Fortunately. Hopefully.”

“What will we replace people’s sense of purpose with?”

“We now have to think about the worst possible scenario, because it is already more powerful than social media and we have already failed in that regard.”

In the first episode of this documentary series, What’s Next? The Future With Bill Gates, there’s no shortage of fear-inducing statements. Many of them are made by people who have had a lot to do with the invention of the technology, which isn’t all that reassuring. Experts, innovators, tech journalists, and, ahem, film director James Cameron (who’s there to offer an extended metaphor about not waiting for an iceberg to hit the planet to see how you’ll deal with it when you’re at the helm of the new AI ship) are interviewed by the Microsoft founder-turned-billionaire philanthropist.

Gates is a surprisingly charming and bitingly funny presence, especially in the second episode, which deals with the problem of misinformation that can now fly a thousand times around the world before the truth has even turned on its laptop. In this episode, he discovers that Tom Hanks is believed to have joined his secret lizard society, bent on world domination by implanting microchips in McDonald’s fries (the conspirators seem to want to lump all of America’s treasures into one giant theory, and you have to admire the work they’re doing).

Gates is an optimist. I agree that we would all feel better if we had lived through his life and had a lot of money in the bank. But the show is at pains to point out that Gates is working and investing to make that optimism well-founded. Each episode tackles a particular topic: the threat (or not) of artificial intelligence, maintaining truth in the internet age, the problem of the climate crisis, the vast inequalities caused by unbridled capitalism (Bernie Sanders calls his wealth “obscene” and it is the only time Gates’ smile falters), providing global health care, and eradicating disease.

People at the forefront of the technology that might save us in each case are interviewed, along with a celebrity or two (among them Cameron, Lady Gaga and, with crushing inevitability, Bono). One or two promising plans that Gates supports to solve the problem are cheerfully described (next-generation nuclear plants that won’t pollute or kill us!). Gates ends with an encouraging reflection in voiceover or in person, and the whole thing is beautifully lit.

If What’s Next? is meant to be advice against despair, however, it needs some more fleshing out. I’m glad for the new possibilities of nuclear power plants, but I’ve looked through my notes several times and concrete plans for limiting AI and preserving humanity’s sense of purpose seem remarkably thin. When some of the people most deeply involved are calling for regulation, and yet no regulation is forthcoming, what then? Many people seem to be standing around saying that they only intended AI to be used to detect cancer early or make online education available to all, not to replace human interaction or reduce us all to jobless chunks of meat roaming the fully automated planet looking for ways to fill the relentless minute. Yet there doesn’t seem to be any way to stop it.

In the fourth episode, Sanders points out that there are ways to solve income inequality, but Gates doesn’t seem too keen on the idea of ​​capping wealth. Senator Mitt Romney seems more pleasant company, with his bluster about the American dream, innovation and risk-taking attitudes. But again, it’s not at all clear how this helps the 38 million Americans who can’t afford the basic necessities of life while the 1% own 40% of all the country’s wealth. But Gates has gotten 300 members of the 1% to pledge to give away at least half their fortunes when they die. So all is well.

And what are we to make of Gates when he reveals that he never imagined the Internet would be used for anything other than the dissemination of facts and the dispersal of ignorance? He never foresaw business models based on engagement and thus fueled by outrage and rumour. He never thought that people would be able to offer a million different opinions instead of turning to the suddenly accessible but still reliably sourced facts now at hand. He never thought that democracy could be threatened, demolished, destabilised by the unprecedented ability of people to find their people – however weird, strange, violent or malevolent – ​​and organise themselves into forces to be reckoned with.

One has to ask: Was this optimism, stupidity, or the most world-changing blind spot in history? What’s next? It’s a good question. But sometimes, what was built into a system long before deserves even deeper scrutiny.