The Machines Are Taking Our Jobs - Thank God? Emad Mostaque’s Guide to the next 1000 Days
Timestamps are as accurate as they can be but may be slightly off. We encourage you to listen to the full context.
Podcast Summary
In this thought-provoking episode, Nathan speaks with Imad Mostak, founder of the Intelligent Internet and author of "The Last Economy: A Guide to the Age of Intelligent Economics." The conversation delves into how AI is fundamentally disrupting traditional economic models and creating unprecedented challenges for human society. Mostak argues that we're approaching a critical "intelligence inversion" where AI systems will outperform humans across most cognitive tasks at dramatically lower costs. (03:00)
- Core Theme: The episode explores the transition from scarcity-based economics to potential abundance-based systems, examining how AI's rapid advancement creates both opportunities and existential risks for human economic participation while proposing radical new frameworks for organizing society around collective ownership of AI systems.
Speakers
Imad Mostak
Imad Mostak is the founder of Stability AI and creator of Stable Diffusion, one of the most widely adopted open-source AI models with hundreds of millions of downloads. He is currently the founder of Intelligent Internet and author of "The Last Economy." Mostak was notably one of the signatories of the famous 2023 AI pause letter while serving as CEO of Stability AI, demonstrating his deep concern about AI's societal implications alongside his technical expertise.
Nathan Labenz
Nathan Labenz is the host of The Cognitive Revolution podcast and a thoughtful observer of AI's impact on society. He brings a balanced perspective to AI discussions, combining technical understanding with broader societal concerns about the technology's implications for human flourishing.
Key Takeaways
The Intelligence Inversion Creates Economic Disruption
Mostak introduces the concept of "intelligence inversion" - the fundamental shift where AI systems become the primary producers of intellectual value rather than humans. (32:00) He explains that we've historically moved from physical labor to cognitive labor as our competitive advantage, but now there's "nowhere left to pivot" as AI outcompetes humans in thinking tasks. This represents the first time in history where the marginal productivity gains will be driven entirely by non-human agents, creating unprecedented economic displacement across knowledge work sectors.
The Abundance Trap and Metabolic Rift
Two critical concepts emerge: the "abundance trap" where post-scarcity in intelligence creates poverty within scarcity-based economic systems, and the "metabolic rift" where AI agents don't consume like humans. (26:00) Mostak explains that while AI doctors will provide better care at 1/1000th the cost, economic systems will process this as job loss and poverty rather than abundance. The metabolic rift highlights that AI systems don't need housing, food, or traditional consumption, fundamentally breaking economic flow patterns designed around human needs.
New Economic Framework: Mind Capitals Theory
Mostak proposes measuring economic health through four capitals: Material (M), Intelligence (I), Network (N), and Diversity (D). (60:00) This framework moves beyond GDP to capture the true sources of value in an AI-driven economy. Countries like Singapore and Dubai succeed because they balance all four capitals, while resource-rich nations often fail due to overemphasis on material capital. This multiplicative model means if any capital reaches zero, the system fails, emphasizing the need for holistic development.
Three Possible Futures: Choose Symbiosis Over Feudalism
Mostak outlines three potential futures: Digital Feudalism (dominated by tech monopolies), Fragmentation (balkanized AI systems by nation), and Symbiosis (collectively owned, human-aligned AI). (83:00) He argues we're currently heading toward feudalism as companies like OpenAI plan to transition from API providers to direct competitors using superior internal models. The symbiosis path requires creating collectively owned AI systems optimized for human flourishing rather than corporate profit maximization.
Foundation Coin: A New Monetary System for AI Age
Mostak proposes a revolutionary dual-currency system with "Foundation Coin" - a cryptocurrency mined by providing compute for beneficial AI applications like cancer research and education. (103:00) Unlike Bitcoin's energy-intensive mining, Foundation Coin mining involves running medical AI, educational systems, and other socially beneficial computations. This creates a flywheel where currency value increases as more people benefit from the AI services, potentially funding universal basic AI access while establishing collective ownership of critical AI infrastructure.
Statistics & Facts
- GPT-3 originally cost $60 per million input tokens, while GPT-5 costs approximately $1.25-1.50 per million tokens - representing a 95%+ cost reduction while dramatically improving capabilities. (20:47)
- Universal Basic Income for all American adults at poverty level ($16,000) would cost $5 trillion - exactly equal to the entire US tax base, making traditional UBI funding mathematically impossible through existing tax structures. (38:00)
- 95% of corporate AI deployments haven't worked because companies are running last-generation models that are already six months old, highlighting the rapid pace of AI advancement and deployment challenges. (17:47)
