Stephen Fry weighs in on the AI debate and says humans are not 'evolved' to work: 'The big mistake we made was to stop and settle'

Daily Mail​

4 days ago

Stephen Fry has weighed in on the ongoing debate around artificial intelligence and revealed why he doesn't think human beings are 'evolved' to work.
There has been much debate around how AI technology will reshape the job market, with many actors in particular protesting its use in Hollywood.
Now, Blackadder star Stephen has weighed in and argued that human beings were never 'evolved' to work steady 9-5 jobs in the first place.
Speaking to Alan Carr on his Life's A Beach podcast, he explained: 'We're going to have to re-examine what work means over the next decade as we know because of AI and so on.
'And this idea that jobs will be taken and there will be a large percentage now of the population where the mixture of robots and AI will be taking over the manual and indeed the white collar work.'
'We weren't evolved to work, work isn't a natural condition of humanity in the sense of nine to five,' he continued.
'Yes there are hunter-gatherers, you feed yourself and you find a way to feed yourself, and there are few hunter-gather tribes left, but the big mistake we made was to stop and settle.'
Stephen explained that the modern day work culture was born when aristocracy emerged, which forced other people to work for them.
'You have to remember, whatever you see from AI now, it's never going to be this primitive again... AI now is the equivalent of a gigantic mobile phone,' he added.
Stephen has been very vocal about both the pros and cons of AI in recent years and has actively got involved in the debate about the purpose and ethics of the tech.
An AI version of Stephen's voice was used at Hay Festival this year in an art installation, called Vocalize, to 'confront the future of AI, identity, and truth'.
Led by an AI-powered version of Stephen, visitors were given the chance to get their very own voiceover training session to learn the tricks of the trade.
However, just as visitors were finding their voice, things took an unexpected turn, according to an online description of the event.
The installation came two years after Stephen shared his concerns after discovering that an AI recording of his voice had been created without his knowledge.
Back in 2023, Stephen told of his shock upon learning that his recordings of the seven Harry Potter audiobooks had been used to recreate his voice with AI.
'I said not one word of that – it was a machine. Yes, it shocked me,' he said at the time during an appearance at the CogX Festival.
'What you heard was not the result of a mash-up. This is from a flexible artificial voice, where the words are modulated to fit the meaning of each sentence.
It could therefore have me read anything from a call to storm Parliament to hard p**n, all without my knowledge and without my permission.'
The actor revealed his agents went 'ballistic' when they learnt of the recreation, but he warned them: 'You ain't seen nothing yet.'
'When it comes to AI models, what we have now will advance at a faster rate than any technology we have ever seen. One thing we can all agree on: It's a f***ing weird time to be alive,' he added.