Let’s begin with the most practical question. If artificial intelligence and automation really do eliminate a large share of existing jobs, what is the normal response of the state?
First, we have to admit one thing: this will not be a mere labor-market correction. It will be a social earthquake. Millions of people could suddenly find themselves in a situation where their labor is no longer needed—not because they have become worse, but because the system has moved past them. At such a moment, society has an obligation not to turn human beings into the debris of technological progress. So yes: basic income, basic security, a guaranteed minimum—these things will become unavoidable.
You frame the issue as if the problem were merely the loss of income. But the deeper loss is far greater. When you tell a person that their labor, their effort, their daily necessity no longer matters, you are not just taking away money—you are taking away form. Work is not always pleasant, but it binds a person to reality. It teaches them that outside themselves there is something that demands effort from them.
Forgive me, but romanticizing forced labor is a tragedy. A vast portion of modern work is neither a calling nor dignity nor any real “connection to reality.” It is supervised exhaustion, overload, falseness, and quiet humiliation. If machines can remove a large part of that absurdity, that is not bad in itself.
So you believe the disappearance of work is not, by itself, a catastrophe?
No. The catastrophe is when the disappearance of work is accompanied by the disappearance of income, security, and social standing. Unemployment is only tragic in a system where survival is tied entirely to wages. If society can generate enough wealth through automation, then it is a perfectly legitimate question: why should a person remain a hostage to fear simply in order to be considered “necessary”?
Because “security” very quickly becomes a way of life. Today you say a person should not starve. Tomorrow you say a person should not have to worry. The day after that you say a person should not be expected to work if it does not align with their natural inclinations. And in the end, you get a society restrained by nothing but the self—and the self, as a rule, is a weak guardian.
All right, then let me sharpen the question: which is more dangerous to you—hunger or the feeling of uselessness?
Hunger. Insecurity. Humiliation. Because none of that leads a person toward deep thought or heroism. It leads them toward fear. And a frightened person is neither free nor dignified. I am not saying that human beings do not need purpose. I am saying that preaching purpose to a hungry person is intellectual arrogance.
To me, what is more dangerous is the normalization of uselessness. Hunger is terrible—there is no argument there. But a society can feed people physically while dissolving them spiritually. A person whom the system tells, “You are no longer needed, but don’t worry, we’ll take care of you,” may be protected on the outside, but inwardly they have already been made smaller.
Those are beautiful phrases, but reality is dirtier than that. You speak to people about dignity when you know the market will simply discard them. If the choice is between mass insecurity and a guaranteed floor, I will secure the person first. We can discuss the rest afterward.
And that is exactly where the difference lies. You are saying: first let us save them, then we will think about what that salvation does to them. I am saying: if we do not think from the beginning about what we are doing to the human being, then the “saved” person may be saved only in the biological sense.
And yet, let’s be concrete. Suppose this future has already arrived. Millions are no longer needed as producers. What would you do?
I would begin by making sure society does not come apart. Yes, I would provide a basic income. Yes, I would create a guaranteed minimum. Yes, I would redistribute part of the wealth created by automation. And I would do so not because I think less of human beings, but because I think more of them than I do of the market. I do not want millions of people thrown into an abyss in the name of some “moral test.”
I, on the other hand, would first try to make sure the system does not turn entirely into a machine of care. But let us be honest: if the choice is between two disasters—either pay a social tribute or face a mass explosion—many people, myself included, may prefer to pay the tribute. A stipend is sometimes cheaper than a revolution.
Interesting. So you too are prepared to accept a basic income—just under another name.
Perhaps. But the difference is essential. For my colleague, this is almost a moral ideal. For me, it is a defensive measure. I do not see it as a new stage of freedom. I see it as a price the upper floors will pay so that the whole building does not collapse.
The difference goes deeper than that. To you, these people are not citizens. They are risk. A danger zone. A cost.
And what are they to you? A pure abstraction? “The protected person,” to whom you distribute a minimum of dignity from above?
Perhaps we should pause here. I think both of you have said something very important—perhaps unintentionally.
You—turning to the Liberal—are saying that a person must be given a guaranteed foundation, because insecurity diminishes them. That is completely logical. And you—turning to the Conservative—are saying that a person must not be stripped of the feeling of necessity, because without it they begin to disintegrate inwardly. That too is completely logical.
But now another question appears: when we carry both of those logics to their conclusion, what kind of picture do we get?
And in your view, what picture is that?
Let’s try it in your own terms first. You are saying: if the system declares human beings superfluous, they must be guaranteed existence, or everything will explode.
Yes. And that minimum is not cynicism. It is elementary justice.
Perhaps. But at the same time, you are already speaking of the human being primarily as a being whose stability must be preserved—not as a citizen whose power, role, and participation must be preserved.
Because against the backdrop of hunger, I cannot take the language of “participation” seriously.
I understand. Now to you. You are saying: if the majority is no longer needed, it may be better to pay, so long as hierarchy, order, and property do not completely collapse.
I am saying that reality is sometimes more cynical than our principles.
And that is precisely what is so interesting. Your differences are real. But you meet at the same point. One of you is prepared to feed the masses so that peace does not collapse. The other is prepared to pay tribute so that the vertical order does not collapse. One is defending peace. The other is defending hierarchy. But neither of you is still speaking about citizenship in its older sense.
And you think that is our fault? Perhaps reality itself has changed.
Perhaps that is the most unpleasant possibility of all—that reality really is changing, and we are still speaking in the old vocabulary.
When a large part of society is no longer needed as a productive force, politics begins to think not in terms of citizens, but in terms of population. Some think about how to provide for that population. Others think about how to manage it. But both are already standing on post-citizen terrain.
You are going very far.
Perhaps. But let us recall Rome. The Roman Republic did not die only because one day an ambitious man won his struggle for power. Long before that, the class of citizens had already been replaced by a tense, impoverished, dependent mass. Then came bread. Then spectacle. Then the purchase of peace. Then empire.
So you are saying that even basic protection can become dangerous?
No. I am saying that basic protection becomes dangerous when it ceases to be a bridge back to citizenship and becomes the final political form.
And if that is exactly what is inevitable?
Then the most intelligent people of our time are arguing not about how to save the republic, but about how to finance the new empire.