I saw the future. At the circus

Yesterday I took my kids to the circus. Or that was a bit of an exaggeration. My wife booked tickets to the circus on a whim, and I joined them. But that does not sound merely as good.

But I digress, we went to the circus and in that dimly lit tent filled colorful lights and a strange smoky and damp air packed in like animals amongst countless strangers I saw it. The future!

People dressed in modern cloths yes, but at the same time largely the same things my parents would have worn when I was a child. Different fabrics but largely unchanged for the last forty years. People were wearing jeans, prospector pants from the wild west that have survived unchanged more or less for hundreds of years and probably could remain unchanged for a millennium.

T-shirts remain the same, but the message printed on them change over the years but only slightly. Newly produced heavy metal band T-shirts tend to be the very same as those from yesteryear and the year before that and so on.

We are more or less the same, static, even though much has changed. But those changes are all outside the two-colored tents walls and the dim lighting makes the smaller details none existing. People are people and much the same today as they ever where or ever will become.

But even more so I see a possible future for us all. In a world of emerging AI many people are wondering what place humans will have in a quickly approaching future. What will we do when AI (with or without robotic avatars and mechanical appendages) will make us all more or less obsolete.

Well, this might be it? Culture!

Before me, talented musicians played jazz music at the same time as they did impressive acrobatic stunts. A surreal experience where music intertwined with daredevil antics and classical circus acts.

At the same time, a captivated audience of people of all ages watched on mesmerized by the whole performance. Much like people did forty years ago, or a hundred or even dating further back. The circus dates back to a time long before both T-shirts and jeans and have remained largely unchanged for countless ages. It transcends culture and languages, countries and continents and remains the same even as economic turmoil and world wars wreaks havoc.

I would guess that it will still be mesmerized and captivate us in the future and that even though the world outside might change the world inside the tent will remain largely the same.

This is also an area where we, the humans, may still hold a certain sway over the impending AI-replacements that soon will have made us all obsolete. All the activities, all the performances, would have been less impressive if they had been performed by a machine. Humanoid or not.

In this sector humans might be the safe just for a while longer. And since show animals are less prevalent now than when I was a kid, I guess we lack competition from other organics as well. The circus, last bastion of human the human form.

Culture is so much more than just the regurgitation of images, words and ideas. It’s the meeting place of the mind, where we can all coexist and experience the same performance or work of art but derive completely different meaning, symbolism and feelings about what we have seen.

I for example, and my father, sees the comedic tendencies in Ingemar Bergmans classic ‘The Seventh Seal’, a beautiful dark comedy. This is far from common and has often left cultured people looking at me like I must have been dropped on my head as an infant. But I still holding my position on this.

Culture will always have a human component. AI can surely help but will always play second fiddle.

In a world where AI might handle the data, humans become the interpreters, infusing meaning into the cold, hard facts. The culture is a forum for the exchange of ideas, were dialogue and discourse reign supreme. It’s a space where diversity of thought is not just tolerated but celebrated—a melting pot of perspectives that fuels the engine of progress.

So, fear not the rise of the machines, instead, anticipate the grand spectacle of the future circus.

In this whimsical arena, culture becomes the ringmaster, and humanity takes a bow as the star of the show. As AI assumes the role of the supporting cast, we are free to explore the boundless realms of creativity, innovation, and the profoundly human art of making meaning out of chaos.

As the curtain rises on the circus of tomorrow, let us revel in the extraordinary tapestry of human culture, for in its richness lies the promise of a future where our most exceptional qualities shine brighter than ever before. The circus beckons, and the show must go on!