Dr. CJ Meadows argues that robots will handle repetitive work, leaving humans to focus on creativity and invention. Rather than training for specific jobs, teenagers need diverse knowledge, confidence to combine ideas like Leonardo da Vinci, and the ability to learn how to learn. The future demands empathy and the creation of new social customs as everyone becomes a researcher.
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Hello everyone, we're streaming live from Singapore and I have a very, very interesting and very inspiring person who's gonna talk to you all about two things: what does the future of work look like and what does the future of college education look like for you teenagers. So introducing to you the one and only Dr. CJ Meadows.
Hi there, thank you for joining us today. So everyone who has access to the internet, of course, is finding out that robots are going to be doing a lot of our physical labor and artificial intelligence is going to be doing a lot of our intellectual work. You know, when you want to know something, what do you do? Uh, you Google it. So what's left for a human to do? We still create, we still craft things that are new. As a matter of fact, that is currently the distinguishing feature of humans. Machines, in order to learn, have to see something done again and again and again. But what they don't do very well is the new. That's gonna be your job. Now, what does that mean for your education? Well, does it mean that all knowledge is going to be Googled and you don't need to learn anything? Actually, no. What you need to be putting into your mind are tools, bits and pieces of stuff. Like any artist, like Leonardo da Vinci, what if you crafted your mind to be like Leonardo da Vinci's workshop? Once you've collected in all those bits and pieces, you'll need to have something, some way to, to work with them. So you'll need creative processes, you'll need an understanding of your own talents, your own creative capabilities, and some creative confidence à la David Kelley. So the school of the future, I believe, will be not training you to do a job, because we can train a robot to do a job. We will be educating you to be uniquely yourself and in a very higher way a higher-order way, uniquely human. So welcome to the future, and I hope you enjoy getting started.
So Dr. CJ, is this a very exciting future for the teenagers?
Yeah, I mean, why else would you choose to be born now?
Oh, that's a nice way of looking at things.
This is an incredible time. This is the best time to be alive, except for the other times, like the Industrial Revolution, the Agricultural Revolution. Now is it, man, and you have a chance to craft the future, and your grandchildren are going to be saying, "Wow, I can't believe you were alive then and you did this." I'm sure there are a plethora of skills.
You always emphasize on skills as opposed to knowledge, right?
Well, skills are sort of the doing equivalent of knowledge. Right. So we need to make a shift and move beyond that. So yes, you need a little knowledge, yes, you need some skills, but you also need to take the next steps.
And what is the next step?
The next step is creativity. Creativity. The next step is taking what we know and discovering what we don't know. Everyone will be a researcher. We're not just gonna have professors researching things, finding out, then telling you. Everyone will need to learn how to learn and how to share what they learn with others so that the human race can evolve more quickly and better because we're really all helping each other. We are interconnected and vulnerable in a way that we never have been before. Now this will also require empathy. This will also require responsibility for others beyond yourself. This will require new social customs and institutions that we have not yet created in the same way that we had to create them in the Industrial Revolution. And what we need to do beyond skills is having skills to create and having skills to discover new skills, newer and better way of doing things.
Thank you so much, Dr. CJ Meadows. One last question.
Sure.
Do you love your Mondays?
Yeah, actually I do.
All right, thank you so much, and a lot of love from India and all the teenagers who are listening to this. Thank you all, and this was I Love Mondays, and this is Mala Mary Martina joining live from Singapore. Have a great day.
