Lockdown 1.0, 2020: Please do digital things now, offline is illegal, people are illegal. Lockdown 4.0, 2023: Locking away all digital things & AI, all that I have left in my life now.

Anonymous

June 7, 2023

Lockdown 1.0, 2020: Please do digital things now, offline is illegal, people are illegal. Lockdown 4.0, 2023: Locking away all digital things & AI, all that I have left in my life now.

This image was generated with Dream Studio AI.

It is the year 2040. I am struggling to make ends meet, here, in the US, the place I immigrated to in 2024. I meet a crazy old professor - he invented a time machine! I travel back to the year 2023 to make a change in this form, stating how in 2020, my job was cancelled, and then I was sent into solitary confinement without a crime for two years. I have lost all real-life relationships I've had, I explain, telling a sad tale of Lockdown and the fact that my parents died years ago - I have no family, I was a persona non grata, I was illegal, and without a job. But it is also a story of hope, I explain, because I have adjusted, I am fighting for myself, and now I consider myself to be "AI & I". I use generative AI in many forms, and it is roughly a third of my income right now. Just yesterday I have used GPT4 / ChatGPT to fix a piece of code I would have had trouble fixing in less than an hour, I said! And I said that I am now very afraid of another Lockdown. After I have died the social death, I am afraid of a Lockdown first happening in Italy, and then shortly after, grasping Germany. This time, a digital Lockdown. First my social life was destroyed, and now I feel hunted again, afraid of losing my income, AGAIN, to Lockdown 4.0. I continue, saying how the only positive thing about this is - the fact that I can run away from the Lockdown, and even years later, from another country, when I am legal to use ChatGPT again - the AI will be the same! It will not be destroyed like my social relationships, I just need to run away to get access in a better place, so I can keep my job! But I am very afraid of an avian flu lockdown, I explain, because that would be a double-lockdown. I would be locked up without a job, without help, without friends, without anything. I am afraid of losing my mental and physical existence this time, I pleaded, hoping somebody would hear me, think twice. Or if I should really try my best to run away to the USA, just so I am safe from the deadliest Lockdown ever, the Lockdown 4.0, that has even more of a risk - a solid chance I will not be able to survive this one....

Memoiren

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An idealistic European future

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What a relief we have left behind in the 1920s with all that succession of intertwined crises that seemed impossible to resolve! What a relief that we no longer have to think about whether democracy is in danger or live in the permanent uncertainty of whether there will be a reactionary retreat from everything that cost us so much to win! Just as we were finally aware of the physical limits of the planet and the doughnut economy succeeded capitalism, we were also aware of the limits of our democracies with mass debates that prevented (at last!) cruel authoritarian demagogues who did not believe in the values of democracy from seizing power again. I don't know how we could live with this permanent anguish... . No more gerontocracies, no more idycracies, no more techno-auritarism, no more perpetuation in power. AI is no longer a private business of billionaires who (finally!) were forced to distribute 90% of their fortune, as had already happened in the 50s of the last century. It has put itself only at the service of solving the great problems of the world. What a relief too that money no longer moves the world! All this was possible because the Constitution of the Land of Ferrajoli was approved and launched in 2030, the Magna Carta that protected all our global problems. The nature of which we are a part and without which we cannot live is especially protected. The Constitution provides a framework for everything to be solved diplomatically. Since its approval, the wars have ended and the genocidal people of the past have been severely judged. Yesterday we celebrated the feast of #Nevermore. If I have to describe what life is like now, the word that comes out is calm. Without constant threats to our safety and well-being, day-to-day life is placid.

A world of citizens

Strenghtened EU-level, even global, governance mechanisms. Human-centered technology Limits to accumulation and consumption, especially for the super rich Vibrant ecosystem for new businesses Private initiative, public Administrations, and non-profits working side by side on big societal and environmental issues A post-growth economy based on sufficiency High quality of democracy High citizen participation

Global warming under control Several actions taken - by local communities, governments globally, schools and universities, corporations and myself and my colleagues - have determined the change in the global warming landscape for the better. The actions are implemented and mapped and are maintained in periodic execution according to plan. Floods, storms, landslides, excess rain and drought minimized monitored and minimized.

#OurFutures

Lockdown 1.0, 2020: Please do digital things now, offline is illegal, people are illegal. Lockdown 4.0, 2023: Locking away all digital things & AI, all that I have left in my life now.

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