Why Automation Is The Key To Reclaiming Our Humanity

Defining the “Robot” in the Mirror

What is a robot, really? It is simply a machine that does something for you automatically. By that definition, the robots have been here for decades—in our kitchens as toaster ovens and blenders, and in our hallways as vacuums. We don’t lose sleep worrying that our toaster might come alive and usurp our dominance while we sleep. Instead, these tools creep into our lives, automate physical labor, and buy us back our time.

What we are witnessing with the rise of natural language technology and AI is the next step in this long story. But this wave is different. All previous waves—from the steam engine to factory lines—freed human bodies from robotic physical labor. This current wave is doing something much more profound: it is freeing human minds from robotic mental labor.

The Four Waves of Liberation

Historically, humanity has evolved through four great waves of automation:

• Farm Workers: A few centuries ago, the majority of workers in what are now wealthy countries worked in agriculture; today, fewer than 5 percent do, a transformation that freed enormous numbers of people from agricultural labor.¹
• Production Workers: Factory lines shifted to machines, which disrupted cities but ultimately elevated the workforce.
• Transactional Workers: Switchboard operating and typing disappeared, opening the door for analytical and management roles.
• Knowledge Workers: This wave automates repetitive data analysis, report compiling, and administrative reporting.

At each inflection point, labor disruption has generated anxiety. Yet the statistical reality is that unemployment in advanced economies has persisted at remarkably stable average levels over the long run, generally averaging in the mid-single digits despite enormous technological and economic change.² The nature of jobs changes; the number of jobs does not.

The Comptroller’s Discovery

I remember when I first showed Arria’s reporting platform to our company comptroller. When she saw the software translate massive sets of financial data into a polished report in seconds, she panicked. She looked at me and said, “Oh no, I’m going to lose my job!”

But after she actually worked with the technology, her perspective shifted completely. She told me later that she had always hated the tedious, high-stress task of manually writing those reports, constantly terrified that a last-minute change would ruin her balance sheets or introduce a human error. With the robotic task of report drafting automated, she gained “superhuman confidence.” Suddenly, she was freed to spend her time on strategic analysis and projects that required her uniquely human expertise.

Reclaiming Our Wild and Precious Lives

Byron Reese suggests that we navigate this transition by asking ourselves three questions: What drudgery do I engage in that I can use technology to destroy? What new opportunities can technology give me that I didn’t have before? Where can I buy back my own time?³

When we use technology to automate the repetitive aspects of our work, we can finally step away from the keyboard. At the office, an advisor is freed from poring over massive spreadsheets and given space to build real relationships, nurture clients, and brainstorm creative solutions. At home, parents are spared the hours of kitchen-table math required to balance a budget, leaving them free to spend quality time with their families.

The skills most needed for our future workforce are things machines can never replicate: complex problem-solving, creativity, collaboration, empathy, intuitive thinking, emotional intelligence, and strong ethical values.

The robots are leaving. And as they go, they are leaving us free to do what we were always meant to do: to dream, to create, to discover, to heal, to live, and to love. In her famous poem, The Summer Day, Mary Oliver asks what we each plan to do with our “one wild and precious life?” Thanks to technology, your answers are limitless.