The Coming Wave: AI, Power, and Our Future

by Mustafa Suleyman

Global living conditions are objectively better today than at any time in the past. We take running water and plentiful food supplies for granted. Most people enjoy warmth and shelter all year round. Literacy rates, life expectancy, and gender equality sit at all-time highs. The sum of thousands of years of human scholarship and inquiry is available at the touch of a button. For most people in developed countries, life is marked by an ease and abundance that would have seemed unbelievable in bygone eras. And yet, under the surface, there’s a nagging feeling that something isn’t quite right. Western societies in particular are mired in a deep-seated anxiety; they are “nervous states,” impulsive and fractious. This persistent unease is partly the result of previous shocks—multiple financial crises, the pandemic, violence (everything from 9/11 to the Ukraine war)—and partly the effect of long-term and growing pressures like declining public trust, rising inequality, and a warming climate.

Ease and Edginess: Prosperity in a Nervous Age