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Everyone is worried about Artificial Intelligence. From writers in Hollywood to computer programmers, recent advances in technology are causing concern about what Generative AI is going to mean for the future of work, our society and the wider world. Is there nothing machines will not be able to do?

We have spent a decade researching the impacts of AI. Ten years ago, we wrote a paper estimating that some 47% of US-based jobs could be automated in principle, as AI and mobile robotics expanded the scope of tasks that computers can do.

Our estimates were based on the premise that, while computers might eventually be able to do most tasks, humans would continue to hold the comparative advantage in three key domains: creativity, complex social interactions, and interaction with unstructured environments (such as your home).

However, it is important to acknowledge there has been meaningful progress in these domains, with Large Language Models (LLMs), such as GPT4, capable of producing human-like text responses to a very wide range of queries. In the age of Generative AI, a machine might even write your love letters.

Yet if GPT4 does write your love letters, your in-person dates will become even more important. The bottom line is, as virtual social interactions are increasingly aided by algorithms, the premium on in-person interactions, which cannot be replicated by machines, will become even greater.

As virtual social interactions are increasingly aided by algorithms, the premium on in-person interactions, which cannot be replicated by machines, will become even greater

Second, although AI can produce a letter in the style of Shakespeare, this is only because Shakespeare’s works already exist, and on which an AI can be trained. AI is generally good at tasks which have clear data and a clear goal, such as maximizing the score in a video game, or the similarity to the language of Shakespeare. But if you want to create something genuinely new, rather than rehashing existing ideas, for what should you optimise? Answering the question of the true goal is where much human creativity resides.

Third, as we noted in our 2013 paper, there are many jobs that can be automated, but Generative AI – a subfield of the broader field of AI – is not yet an automation technology. It needs prompting from a human, and it needs a human to select, fact-check and edit the output.

Finally, Generative AI generates content that mirrors the quality of its training data – ‘garbage in results in garbage out’. And these algorithms require training on expansive datasets, such as extensive segments of the internet, as opposed to smaller, refined datasets developed by experts. Consequently, LLMs are inclined to create text that aligns with the average, rather than the extraordinary, portions of the internet. Average input yields average output.

If you want to create something genuinely new, rather than rehashing existing ideas, for what should you optimise? Answering the question of the true goal is where much human creativity resides

What implications does this hold for the future of employment? For one thing, the latest generation of AI will persist in necessitating human intervention. What is more, workers with less specialised skills stand to gain disproportionately, as they can now generate content that aligns with the ‘average’ benchmark.

What implications does this hold for the future of employment? For one thing, the latest generation of AI will persist in necessitating human intervention. What is more, workers with less specialised skills stand to gain disproportionately

Could the hurdles outlined above be overcome shortly, paving the way for widespread automation also of creative and social tasks? In the absence of a major breakthrough, we think it is unlikely. Firstly, the data already ingested by LLMs is likely to comprise a considerable fraction of the internet, making it unlikely that training data can be significantly expanded to power further progress. Furthermore, there are legitimate grounds to expect a surge of inferior AI-crafted content on the Web, progressively degrading its quality as a source of training data.

Second, while we have become accustomed to Moore's Law - the observational law that declares the quantity of transistors in an integrated circuit (IC) doubles approximately every two years - many anticipate this trend will lose momentum, owing to physical constraints, around 2025.

Third, it is estimated that the energy to create GPT4 cost a large fraction of its $100 million training cost – even before the price of energy went up. With the climate challenge looming large, there are questions over whether this approach can continue.

Many jobs will be automated, but not because of the latest wave of Generative AI

What is needed, in other words, is AI that is capable of learning from smaller, curated datasets, drawing upon expert samples, rather than the average population. But when such innovation will come is notoriously hard to predict. What we can do is create better incentives for data-saving innovation.

Consider this: around the turn of the 20th century, there was a genuine contest - would electric vehicles or the combustion engine prevail in the burgeoning car industry? At first, both contenders were on a par, but massive oil discoveries tipped the balance in favour of the combustion engine. Now imagine that we leveraged a tax on oil back then: we might have shifted the balance in favour of the electric car, sparing us plenty of carbon emissions. In similar fashion, a tax on data would create incentives for innovation to make AI less data-intensive.

Going forward, as we have argued elsewhere, many jobs will be automated, but not because of the latest wave of Generative AI. In the absence of major breakthroughs, we expect the bottlenecks we outlined in our 2013 paper to continue to constrain automation possibilities for the foreseeable future.

This opinion piece reflects the views of the author, and does not necessarily reflect the position of the Oxford Martin School or the University of Oxford. Any errors or omissions are those of the author.

Ten years ago, two experts in AI from the Oxford Martin School predicted that almost half of jobs were at risk of automation. In a new upcoming study, Professors Carl-Benedikt Frey and Michael A Osborne now say that while Generative AI has increased the scope of automation further, it will also make many jobs easier to do for people with lower skills.

In their paper ‘Generative AI and the Future of Work: A Reappraisal’, they also found:

The researchers provide a reassessment of the division of labour between humans and computers in the age of Generative AI and the impact of the technology on the future of work.

They argue that whilst there have been significant advances in AI in recent years, particularly with the growth of Large Language Models (LLMs) like GPT4, significant bottlenecks remain in the deployment of Generative AI technologies that will prevent the complete replacement of humans in the workplace.

As Professor Carl-Benedikt Frey, Director of the Future of Work Programme at the Oxford Martin School and Dieter Schwarz Professor of AI & Work at the Oxford Internet Institute, explains:

‘Ten years on from our paper on “The Future of Employment”, we find that key bottlenecks to the automation of social tasks persist. In-person interactions remain valuable, and such real-life interactions cannot be readily substituted by Large Language Models.

‘As a general rule, it now looks like AI may be able to replace human labour in many virtual settings, meaning that if a task can be done remotely, it can also be potentially automated. Also we find that the more transactional a relationship becomes, the more prone it is to automation. But without major leaps, longstanding relationships – benefitting from in-person interaction – will remain in the realms of humans.’

Looking specifically at the creative industries, the study finds that whilst generative AI LLMs such as GPT4 can help turn a ‘poor’ writer into an ‘average’ writer, the algorithm is typically good at generating new combination of existing ideas, rather than making conceptual leaps. The authors also report that the deployment of Generative AI in creative work will focus on existing product lines rather than creating new works and won’t be game-changing for creativity.

The study considered the implications of Generative AI on the future of work, particularly in those situations when AI algorithms interact with the physical world. The experts find that Generative AI in its current form is less likely to be deployed in higher-stakes contexts like driving than lower-stakes activities.

As co-author Professor Michael A Osborne, Associate Professor of Machine Learning and Director of the Oxford Martin AI Governance Initiative, explains:

‘A key bottleneck to the automation of perception and mobility tasks, particularly in the physical world, is that we can’t accept mistakes. Yet foundation models based on deep neural networks, whose decisions we cannot explain, have the capacity to create plenty of mistakes.

‘For now, deployment of generative AI will be confined to lower stakes activities like customer service or warehouse automation where engineers can redesign and simplify the environment to enable automation.’

Prof. Frey concludes:

‘AI will continue to surprise us, and many jobs may be automated. However, in the absence of major breakthroughs, we also expect the bottlenecks we outline in our 2013 paper to continue to constrain our automation possibilities for the foreseeable future.’

The full paper, ‘Generative AI and the Future of Work: A Reappraisal’, is set to be published in the Brown Journal of World Affairs in January 2024.

Related Programmes

Future of Work Oxford Martin Programme on the Future of Work

OXFORD — This harvest season, pumpkins and apples aren’t the only autumn commodities available to pick yourself in Johnson County.

Now in rural Oxford, pick-your-own hemp is available — at least for a couple weekends — at one of Iowa’s hemp farms. On Sept. 18 and 19, hundreds of visitors flocked to Carriage House Hemp Farm, where hemp farmer Mark Wright helped them clip and bag the right flower buds to take home. Another pick-your-own weekend is planned for this Saturday and Sunday.

“People stop here all the time and ask questions,” Wright said. So why not let them pick it, he asked himself.

In addition to being one the few hemp farms growing cannabigerol (CBG) strains instead of cannabidiol (CBD), Carriage House is one of the first hemp farms in Iowa to open the lush green plants up to the public for personal picking.

If you go

What: Pick your own hemp weekend

Where: Carriage House Hemp Farm, 2433 Cemetery Rd. NW, Oxford

When: Noon to 6 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 25 and 26

Cost: $10 per ounce

Details: (319) 330-0436 and Carriage House Hemp Farm Facebook page

“That is the only pick-your-own farm I’m aware of so far,” said Robin Pruisner, state entomologist and state hemp administrator at the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship. “Because it’s such a new crop (to Iowa), people are ruminating about all the ways to make this work. I haven’t seen anyone else do it yet.”

As part of her job, Pruisner travels the state to farms like Wright’s to test for THC levels — a requirement for hemp farmers before hemp can be harvested or sold. THC, short for tetrahydrocannabinol, is the psychoactive compound in cannabis that produces a high.

For Iowa, hemp levels must be below 0.3 percent THC. If a crop is running “too hot,” it is considered marijuana and must be destroyed. Hemp from Wright’s field had a THC level of 0.096 percent this month.

“That was one of the reasons we decided to go for CBG. I don’t think there’s a lot of people doing that,” Wright said. “(CBD) is likely to get too hot with THC.”

Pruisner said that about 20 percent of hemp crops had to be destroyed in 2020 because of excessive THC levels. This year, none of the 10 tests so far have failed, but harvest season is just starting.

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“Some valuable lessons were learned,” Pruisner said. Notably, farmers learned the importance of testing throughout the season to know the right time to harvest.

CBG also commands a higher price with its unique properties, Wright said. Though fewer than a quarter of the visitors over last weekend purchased hemp flower to take home, he said many of them left with questions answered — education that hemp farmers hope will trickle through the community.

Wright said he was surprised by the turnout and the types of people most curious about the product during the first pick-your-own weekend.

“What surprised me is the ones I figured would be the hardest sell are people like me — maybe older, skeptical,” he said. “A lot of them are really enthusiastic.”

CBG hemp used for oil, butter, alcohol, vinegar and more

Cannabigerol is described as the “mother of all cannabinoids” by CBG farmer Megan Booher, Wright’s daughter who grows hemp and sells CBG-infused products from nearby Four Winds Farm in Homestead. By binding directly into the body’s endocannabinoid system, she said CBG provides fast-acting benefits compared with CBD, which is by and far the dominant choice for growers in Iowa.

Flower purchased for $10 per ounce from Carriage House can be dried and infused into oil, butter, alcohol, vinegar or water with instructions provided by the farm. Trimmed buds of CBG can sell for up to $75 an ounce, Wright said.

Most of the flower harvested from his small field, where the retired Oxford Public Works director used to plant vegetables, will be sent to a company in Wisconsin to be turned into CBG oil.

Though Booher’s farm focuses more on infusing the products to sell directly to consumers online and through farmers markets — soap, massage oil, lotion, body salve and face cream — shes’s excited to see the potential growth with the pick-your-own model her father is testing.

“In 2019, we had something happen that’s still haunting the market. When you look at the nation, the 2019 crop was estimated to be 550 percent larger than 2018’s,” she explained. “However, processing capability and consumer demand didn't increase at the same trajectory.”

For hemp, that left a big glut between supply and demand that the market still is adjusting to. The number of licenses for hemp farming issued by the state dropped from 85 in 2020 to 50 so far this year, Pruisner said.

“What’s important is they have to economically turn it into consumer goods that people will continue to buy,” she said, calling Booher’s farm “a real template” for producing a quality crop and marketing it within Iowa’s legal boundaries.

CBG touts ‘easing,’ ‘soothing’ benefits

Though the state does not track whether hemp farmers are planting for CBD or CBG, the Iowa Hemp Administrator said CBD was much more popular, in her estimate. Though CBG is gaining more traction, it remains a minority in the market.

For Booher, the positive aspects about CBG were what made her fall in love with it. Though hemp producers cannot market or advertise any medical or pain-reducing benefits from the use of CBG, packaging can call products “easing” or “soothing.”

“CBG works on a molecular level to restore balance and well-being to the user,” she said. “At farmers markets, we let people sample it and they’ll come back an hour later (to purchase.)”

For Wright, a good experience trying it after experiencing discomfort made him a believer. “It doesn’t give you a buzz, it calms you down,” he said.

And with a product that can be used without showing up on a drug test, Booher thinks CBG could help make hemp and cannabis more mainstream in Iowa.

“Now that we have an industry in the state, people are learning a little more every time they come to see us,” she said. “I think it’s helping to lessen that stigma.”

Comments: (319) 398-8340; [email protected]

Augusta Restaurant (630 Iowa Ave.) will be closing its doors briefly in early January for updates after co-owner Derek Perez had a falling out with Ben and Jeri Halperin, the founders and co-owners of the original restaurant, last week.

History: From Oxford to Iowa City

In 2008, Ben and Jeri Halperin opened Augusta Restaurant in Oxford, and the New Orleans-style restaurant was well-received by locals and critics alike, earning accolades for its burgers and pork tenderloin, which was named the best in the state for 2008.

After years of success and demand from fans, the Halperins opened the Iowa City location in February 2016 in collaboration with Derek Perez and Scott Kading.

Derek Perez, who also owns El Banditos, had recently closed the bicycle-themed restaurant Ride, which had previously occupied the building at Iowa Ave. and Dodge St.

Perez holds 51 percent of the Iowa City restaurant and Kading holds 49 percent. To maintain ownership of 630 Iowa Ave., Perez said he sold his investments in Short’s eastside, a farm property and the building where One Twenty Six, Hearth and Moonrakers are. The Halperins were not part of the ownership at the new location, according to Perez, but Ben maintained his role as head chef.

“It’s not like they ever put any money in, so there’s nothing that they lost in that way,” Perez said. “The only thing they lost was by walking out the door and quitting.”

Tensions peak

The restaurant had been doing okay, Perez said, but a “payroll issue” served as a point of contention.

Amidst rumors that the Halperins were fired, Perez said that the couple quit following disagreements over a difference in “work style.”

“They wanted to work a certain way and, since I was the person who had the most money involved, I wanted them to work a different way and they didn’t want to do that, so they quit,” Perez said.

When contacted for comment, the Halperins said they are cautious to say much about the situation. However, they did confirm that they are no longer part of the operation, even though the establishment is still using the same name despite their departure.

Going forward

Perez said that for now the rest of the staff, and therefore the menu offerings, have remained the same, but that the restaurant will change names and introduce new menu items in the future. Perez did guarantee that any reservations through the end of the year will be honored, and gift cards purchased for Augusta will still be valid for use at the location.

“In the long run it is not going to be Augusta, they [the Halperins] are going to have the option to take it, and they’re not going to have to pay for it, and move it wherever they want to move it,” Perez said.

Perez confirmed the closure after the first of the year will be for no more than a week and that the current staff will be keeping their jobs.

“The whole point of it being Augusta was that those guys [the Halperins] were coming to work and become part of the ownership after a certain amount of years,” Perez said.

The Halperins said they hope to stay in the area to continue to serve their Iowa City clientele and are looking for investors for a new venture.

“We’ve been building this for years, and it feels wrong that they’re running it anyway,” Ben Halperin said.

Today at the UN Biodiversity Conference (COP15), the University of Oxford and UN Environment Programme (UNEP) announced the launch of the Nature Positive Universities Alliance – a global network of universities that have made an official pledge to advance efforts to halt, prevent and reverse nature loss through addressing their own impacts and restoring ecosystems harmed by their activities. This push is part of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, a movement to avert climate catastrophe and mass extinction.

The Nature Positive Universities Alliance brings higher education institutions together to use their unique power and influence as drivers of positive change. Universities already carry out environmental and conservation research to help inform government and company action, but by publicly tackling their own supply chains and operational impacts on nature, universities can help guide the wider community on a path to address the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution.

The University of Oxford has an environmental sustainability strategy with dual targets of net zero carbon and a net gain in biodiversity by 2035. These targets for large institutions are challenging to achieve, but through collaboration and idea-sharing with other universities via the Nature Positive Universities Alliance, we can collectively make progress towards achieving biodiversity net gain.

Harriet Waters, Head of Environmental Sustainability

University of Oxford

The initiative, which is part of the UN’s Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, launches with 117 universities from 48 countries, who have made individual pledges to address their impacts on nature. University pledges include four key elements: 1) Carrying out baseline assessments; 2) Setting specific, time limited and measurable targets for nature; 3) Taking bold action to reduce biodiversity impacts, protect and restore species and ecosystems, while influencing others to do the same; 4) Transparent annual reporting.

The initiative builds on the University of Oxford's experience in setting an ambitious target for biodiversity net gain by 2035 alongside net zero commitments. Oxford's Environmental Sustainability Strategy is founded on a study which quantified its environmental footprint and established a framework to address them.

E.J. Milner-Gulland, Tasso Leventis Professor of Biodiversity at the Department of Biology, University of Oxford, and co-founder of the Nature Positive Universities Alliance, said:

'As universities, we occupy a unique position in educating future leaders, researching solutions to environmental challenges, and influencing our communities and governments. By addressing our own institutions' environmental impacts, we can be powerful thought leaders while also directly contributing to restoring nature.'

All the founding universities announced today have pledged to assess their impacts to determine the most impactful initiatives to introduce, and to report on their progress. Examples of initiatives so far have included:

People from a further 408 universities are already a part of the wider network, playing their part in bringing their universities closer to meeting environmental targets, by developing research, lobbying their senior management and sharing case studies of their activities.

The network also includes a Student Ambassador Programme, which totals over 100 students from across 35 countries who are taking action toward nature positive awareness and approaches on their campuses. They are encouraging their universities to make an institutional pledge through advocacy and organisation of nature-positive activities such as volunteering for nature restoration, establishment of sapling nurseries and using their studies to further advance their institutions’ sustainability.

Sam Barratt, Chief of Youth, Education and Advocacy at the UN Environment Programme, said: 'Universities live at the heart of cities, at the crossroads of students’ futures and provide ground-breaking research that educates and informs society. We are delighted to see Universities will be joining hands to reset our relationship with nature so that, through this Alliance, new action and possibilities are created. The virtue of higher education has come from a reappraisal of the present to then steer the world to a new future. We look forward to seeing how the Nature Positive Universities Alliance does just that for this agenda too.'

The Nature Positive Universities Alliance is calling on other universities worldwide to join its collaborative network and to make institutional pledges.

Information on different ways for universities and their members to engage, or how to ask your university to consider making a pledge, can be found at www.naturepositiveuniversities.net.