Homo sapiens emerged on the fabric of time around 300000 years ago. Originating in Africa around sixty millennia ago, they spread across the planet and, after the extinction of the Neanderthals, became rulers of the Earth. Since that time history of our planet is, in essence, the history of the human race and its love story with the machines.

In this series of columns, an endeavor will be made to understand the impact of AI on the current world, the near future, and what it entails for Pakistan. They will highlight that if we don’t wake up now and adopt a war footing attitude in catering to the incoming tsunami of Artificial Intelligence, by 2050 we shall be left far behind and face serious consequences as it sweeps across every facet of life as we know it today.

Human civilization has lived through 6 life-changing revolutions, all directly linked to the invention and usage of machines, ranging from the first stone used for digging to the wheel, to the rockets today. The first revolution was the origin of the hunter-gatherer communities, which depended on each other to survive, with primitive tools used for digging and fighting animals. The second one was the Neolithic revolution, starting around 12000 years ago, in which permanent settlements, farming, and civilization began along the rivers of Mesopotamia (Today’s Middle East). This was followed by the Urban and Political revolution, giving rise to the concepts of Government, law, and writing systems. Then came the Axial revolution, around 1000 BCE, which shaped the moral and spiritual framework of different civilizations, accompanied by major advancements in machine construction, especially in shipbuilding. The fifth revolution was the Industrial Revolution, in which machines came........

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