Android has just announced its latest new tech innovation combining AI and Extended Reality. The idea behind this latest mashup is to enable us to don a pair of fashionable looking glasses that when powered up can understand what we want to do (our intentions) and the world around us so that we might be able ‘get things done in entirely new ways’. That fired up my imagination. What might those be? To suggest the best way to run errands so that we can get them done without hassle? To  propose a new way to walk through a familiar woodland to see a flower in blossom we might never have noticed? To recommend a new coffee shop nearby where there is a lovely space to sit? 

The article continues by suggesting reimagining how to use the new AI to do existing digital tasks. The example given is one we have been able to do for many years – that is exploring the world by using Google Maps but in new immersive ways, soaring above cities and landmarks. I remember being wowed the first time I explored my street and other places using a desktop VR app and then with a VR headset whizzing over London at breakneck speed. How might this be reimagined?  I guess we could experience being even more immersed so that we can fly as if we were like an eagle flying high over mountains. The question this raises is how far can the technology go to making the real and the virtual experience indistinguishable? The mind boggles. 

One of the stumbling blocks with trying to make extended reality ever more lifelike is how best to interact with it and the world. Gesturing, pinching and pointing at thin air have been used with varying degrees of success. It seems these might get easier for us to learn and more natural to use when we want to bring up some relevant information that will overlay where we are. For example, it could show various details about a pair of running shoes we are looking at in response to a slight curl of a finger. However, it still needs to read our fingers, from what is a twitch to what is a gesture.  Perhaps in the future it will be able to read our mind so well we wont need to use our digits anymore. 

This kind of all-seeing AI could learn to know what, when and where to mention things we are interested in but never knew we needed or wanted to know, as we go about our everyday lives. It could even remind us at opportune times of what we need to do – an ever ready assistant. What if we could do different things with the tech rather than simply getting everyday things done more effectively or efficiently?

Being the beginning of a new year, many tech writers are envisioning how AI will reshape society for better or for worse. The new buzz term is ‘Agentic AI’ – where the AI shifts from thinking to doing and, in so doing, enables our tasks and work to be done more efficiently, effectively and faster. John Naughton, who writes for the Guardian, for example, says that 2025 will be the year of AI agents that will leverage LLMs to work out what our human intentions are and then break these down into steps that they can help us perform at home or work. So, instead of asking Alexa or ChatGPT to answer our queries, a new fangled agent AI will be proactive, learning, adapting and predicting what we need. 

These re-imaginings of our everyday and working lives are all well and good and will no doubt go a long way to transform society. But what if we were to dream about how we might use the latest AI and wearable tech to do new and different things? For example, imagine if we started creating new kinds of supertools that could help us with complex and protracted decision-making while dealing with uncertainty. The AI would work with us, not for us, empowering and supercharging how we think. It could also be designed to help us feel more confident about which avenues to pursue in life. Imagine, too, if it could help us make better decisions when under stress, for example, providing a chatbot-type ‘mirror’ that could be looked at periodically to reflect on how our moods are impacting our choices. We might become more self aware leading us to overcome our blind sightedness and our biases. The potential benefits for society are huge if we could only tap into this potential.

My 2025 vision is for new combinations of AI and ER tech to emerge that can engage with humans and each other in more diverse ways, pointing out new directions, and synthesizing different perspectives, leading to new insights and breakthroughs. Just imagine if we could develop AI that has some imagination itself, helping us to imagine what John Lennon imagined over 50 years ago:

Imagine there’s no countries
It isn’t hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion, too

Imagine all the people
Livin’ life in peace

You may say I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one

Happy New Year!