[0:00]Hello, I'm Matt Galloway, and this is The Current podcast. Artificial intelligence exploded in 2025. This year saw big promises that AI would usher in an age of unprecedented abundance, solve intractable problems, and touch every corner of our lives. Time Magazine recently made the architects of AI its 2025 person of the year. At the same time, we saw growing anxiety about AI taking jobs, mounting concerns about mental health and emotional attachment to AI chatbots, and big worries that there is an AI bubble brewing. So between the hype and the anxiety, what was AI's impact in 2025 and what can we expect from the technology in 2026? Today, we're bringing together two people who spend their time thinking about all of this. Shaned Bovel is a Canadian futurist and the founder of the Tech Education Company Way, and Jackson Khan is the CEO of Aperture AI, a former federal policy adviser and a senior fellow at the Monk School of Global Affairs. Good morning to you both. Good morning. Good morning. Great to be here with you. Shaned, let's start with you. If you look back at the headlines at the beginning of this year, there was a lot of hype around AI. We'll talk about some of the specifics in a moment, but broadly, how much do you think the technology transformed our lives this year? Did it live up to the hype? I think it did in ways that people don't realize. Over 800 million people use Chat GPT alone, that's just one AI model every single day or every single week. So it's showing just the pervasiveness of how AI is seeping into our world and the backdrop of our daily living without even recognizing it. So in terms of some of the hype, could it solve this problem or could it automate a workflow? No, it was probably disappointing to expectations there, but it is slowly becoming the backdrop of our lives and just a normal part of our day-to-day. So I think in that regard, it did. Jackson, how about you? How pivotal was this year for the future of artificial intelligence? Will we look back on 2025 and think, you know, this is the year it really took off? I certainly agree with Shaned. I mean, listen, there's no putting the genie back in the bottle here. There is wide, wide-spread use and engagement and investment in AI. Um, I think where where people are struggling is sometimes they're making these big investments and they're not seeing necessarily the return on that. Um, so I I think there's going to have to be a a closing between the hype gap and and reality, there'll be some correction there. Um, but ultimately, listen, like this is this is not like, you know, a new computer. This is more something like an a new invisible technology that will just be a part of a foundational layer of our lives, like electricity. Right? Um, that that's how to really think about it and I think we can we can dive into some specifics as well. Well, interesting that you say it's invisible because it's really creeping in everywhere. I look at my phone and suddenly it's offering me new options on, you know, getting a getting a podcast on a Wikipedia site. I mean, but but some some of this stuff seems useless at at first blush. But how do you think, Jackson, this technology will improve in 2026? I think it's it's going to get better and more targeted. Right now, I mean, people are just trying to throw AI at everything, so you will see ads and it's like the new pop-up banner, I suppose, you could say in in a different way. But I think where the real power is actually going to come is that invisible layer, you know, if if you can get better translation, faster document review, a real partner you can work with when, you know, you're just going about your day-to-day. Um, or, you know, your music recommendations are going to be better, your child's education is going to be better. These are all things that people want, but yeah, they probably don't necessarily want to see them all, you know, up in their face, uh, you know, in in every single moment. Uh, and and yeah, I think I think that will be that will be the change that will actually be foundational and and transformational. Um, and I think for companies as well, a lot of workers are probably getting, you know, pressure from up top to to use AI in everything they're doing and part of that's probably pretty annoying and part of that's pretty cool. And we'll have to figure out how how do we get there, um, you know, as as a nation, as a world. Let's look more closely at a few sectors. Shaned, what we're seeing already and what we could see in the future. I mean, we've seen headlines this year about AI linked layoffs, how much has AI already taking jobs? Hmm. Yeah, so it's quite nuanced here. So it's not that AI has been actually automating entire workflows. It is not capable of that. I think a lot of us see the mistakes it makes, it hallucinates. What is happening is that companies are preparing for the disruption AI is going to bring. Um, whether that means economically, they're transferring capital away from labor, so, uh, lean off some roles into toward the AI investment. Or just knowing that they need to start behaving like a startup, especially some of the leading bigger companies, because they recognize AI is also coming for their lunch, for their market. It's going to lead to entirely new types of businesses, new types of industries, and they are slimming down and preparing to behave much more like a startup. Um, so we saw this in in in some of the numbers, mass layoffs across multiple firms. What we didn't see as overtly was things like the slowing down of hiring, um, and you know, that that the mandates of coming back to work. These kind of subtle ways to slim down the workforce, um, but we have yet to even encounter the true impact of AI actually automating roles. Um, it's not even there yet, and we've already seen it start to ripple throughout the workforce. So in in terms of job impact, what what do you what do you predict for 2026? I think we're going to continue to hear more stories about mass layoffs. Um, we're going to hear more stories about slowing down of hiring. We will also probably start to see the emergence of new roles, maybe more in the form of independent contractors, people coming into companies to build things like AI agent workflows. So this wouldn't necessarily be a role that's widely marketed or hired for today, but I think we'll start to see pockets of those new types of AI first roles. Um, but I think the workforce is an area I'm really concerned about, even though we we talk about it, we don't talk as much about the plan for it. What does the structure mean for how we're going to support workers transitioning through this time? I think the biggest example we have from history was the Industrial Revolution, and yes, over time, technology usually creates more jobs. I mean, it's not a guarantee, but it usually does. What is the same plan to actually transition people in the industrial or or through this AI era that doesn't leave people scrambling, um, without the skills to reach out for new jobs or without the economic support in those times of transition? So I'm hoping in 2026, we hear from leaders, not just about sovereign AI, uh, but about how they plan to support workers through whatever may, um, be meeting them as a result of of changes and and changes in hiring and work working contracts. Jackson, how are you seeing AI impact jobs in the tech sector? Well, the biggest difference, of course, is that AI is coming for white collar jobs, which I think notionally hasn't always happened in previous technological transformations. With tech, I mean, listen, there's no going back in certain areas. Computer science graduates, everyone used to say, okay, that's that's the clearest best way, you know, to get a job. We're looking for more stem skills, uh, but a lot of this, uh, transformation is actually, you know, AI is one of AI's best use cases is for coders, right? Um, and so this this kind of educational pathway isn't necessarily a direct, uh, success, um, for for everyone. Um, I think what we'll see is the best engineers, the best developers will get better and better, and they may be able to automate or, um, you know, more easily do a range of tasks. So so that's interesting, I think, in the context of the tech sector. I picked up on one thing that Shaned mentioned is, I do really feel for a lot of folks who I think are living in this kind of period of uncertainty. Um, you know, it's there a lot of Canadians are in particular struggling with trust or concern about what AI is going to have. Uh, what kind of impact it's going to have on their workplace? There's areas that I think are are, you know, basically haven't been found before to, uh, to be of high exposure, which now are. So think about public administration, right, and government jobs, um, that that's actually one of the highest areas of exposure of impact. Um, so things like benefits administration, right? Um, immigration applications. These are areas where AI could actually be quite useful because you know, you're using a a model or an algorithm to score them over time, help flag them, move them up the chain. At the same time, you're not entirely removing humans from the workflow. Um, you always want to have a human in the loop there. And so, these are some of the opportunities but also the challenges of AI. I think one thing that I'm, I'm really hoping that we do start to see is, again, to pick up on something Shaned said is some sort of national workforce transformation plan, uh, or a transition fund. Canada is actually one of the only nations that doesn't have a national K to 12 education program for AI. And so, um, you know, I'm actually, uh, my wife and I had a, yeah, we have a young daughter, young baby, we just had in the past year. And I'm really hoping that, you know, in our country, we we start to take action here to make sure that the next generation, uh, is really prepped to to understand these skills from a from a native perspective. And how about those who are really, you know, living it in that they're in their early stage of their career, struggling to get a foot in the door? I mean, what should they realistically expect from the job market in the next year or two?
[9:37]You know, it's really hard. I actually just started teaching at the university and it's blown me away how many top, smart young grads have had reaching out or struggling to get that first job. I think the truth is that the competition is is higher than ever. I also think it's been become harder to distinguish oneself because lots of people are using artificial intelligence to, you know, help write their resumes, help write those job submission applications. And so if everything kind of sounds the same, how are reviewers supposed to distinguish and you've also kind of heard, you know, from from the recruiting and the hiring side that sometimes people actually, you know, let's say you're you're reach out to an employer, they're looking for a specific role, they might actually ghost you or never even really get back to you in the process. So that can feel really impersonal, can feel really dehumanizing. You know, I I don't have a perfect silver bullet here. What I would say is to to young grads is keep trying to improve on your skills. There are a ton of free resources out there, including from the big tech companies, but also actually from Canadian-based institutions. Uh, I always think of the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute has a really, really good AI curriculum. Um, those are all opportunities that, you know, you can take to continue to improve your skills. The second thing I would say is don't use AI sometimes, right? I feel like this is maybe just sounds really cliche or counterintuitive, but I think it's so easy as as a more trained eye to just detect when AI has been used heavily in, let's say, an application or, um, you know, an essay to to get a role. And sometimes you really just got to show like what is it that you uniquely can provide and what's that creativity that you're bringing to, um, to to the project or, you know, to the application? Um, we're kind of seeing, you know, YouTube and all sorts of online content explode with AI slop, and, you know, this kind of low quality content that just expands and expands. I mean, if everybody's producing that kind of stuff, I mean, how how are we going to know who's who's actually got the skills or not, right? So that's that's what I encourage for young grads. You've each mentioned, you know, white collar jobs, administrative roles, coders at at being particular risk. I'd like to talk about creative work a little, Shaned. This year Open AI released the AI video app Sora, which Disney partnered with, allowing its characters onto the platform. AI generated music top the music charts. How much risk is there for creative workers? I think similar to the white collar roles, um, they're highly exposed to artificial intelligence and really throughout the pipeline. On the one hand, we are seeing that, uh, lower resourced creative workers, um, or new types of creators are starting to appear. Um, so somebody who doesn't have a big budget to to make some form of of movie production, it can be streamlined using artificial intelligence, so we're starting to see that. The rise of different types of musicians, um, but in terms of what this means for for creative roles, uh, highly exposed, very highly exposed and especially on the back end. We didn't really settle any of the copyright challenges with artificial intelligence. Um, if you look to America, it seems like that won't be resolved. President Trump has already commented that that's not a part of the American agenda anymore. Um, so I think from from a creative standpoint, it is quite concerning. And there are subtle ways that creative roles also get impacted, right? So if you see the rise of AI fashion models and we started to see some even in Vogue magazine, what does that mean for makeup artists, for producers, executive directors on these sets? So this ripple throughout the entire workflow or throughout the entire pipeline, um, of the creative industries, we're starting to see. But again, creatives will probably see some of them adapt in these unforeseen ways, the rise of new types of creatives. But we're in that strange in-between time across the workforce where, um, we don't yet have the shape of new roles, new industries, new ways to apply the technology. Um, so it does in the moment feel quite zero sum. Well, I want to talk about the the positives, but but first I want to finish on on some of the warnings around AI. They are pretty dire. Canadian computer scientist Geoffrey Hinton is known as the Godfather of AI. He won the Nobel Prize for his work at the University of Toronto. He now spends a lot of time warning about the dangers of the technology he helped to create. I want you to hear something. Earlier this year, he had this to say on the podcast Diary of a CEO. I'm okay. I'm 77. I'm going to be out of here soon. But for my children, and my my younger friends, I just don't like to think about what could happen. Because it could be awful. Well, if AI ever decided to take over, I mean, it would need people for a while until it designed better analog machines to run the power stations. There's so many ways it could get rid of people, all of which would of course be very nasty. Jackson, Geoffrey Hinton has said that there's a 10 to 20% chance that AI destroys humanity and he's not alone in this fear. Other AI researchers say that human extinction is a plausible outcome of AI. How do you make sense of that kind of prediction? No, Fan, thanks so much for the question. Uh, I've had the chance to hear Mr. Hinton as well as another famous Canadian AI researcher, Yashu Benji speak about these scenarios in the past. I mean, listen, I don't want to scare folks on the line or, you know, go too far on hypotheticals, but what I will say is, if we think there's possibilities that these technologies could be more dangerous, um, why would we not try and prepare for them and just build more safeguards in, right? And and I do think we're seeing some engagement on that, even in the US government again, I you have a more aggressive, um, approach under President Trump, but there's still the, you know, the US National AI Safety testing, uh, pieces that they have, um, very much with the top companies, including Open AI and Anthropic. We also have a Canadian AI Safety Institute, it's partnered with the UK. There there is an international network of these organizations which are looking to test the most advanced models. The second is, uh, we are unfortunately living in a more challenging, more securitized time, you know, where there's there's multiple wars happening around the world. And so, I do think we also want to make sure that we are preparing for defense of of possible AI powered solutions that we could face in those those fronts, those those areas of combat. It could be drones, right? Uh, it could be AI powered missiles. So, those when I think about those more specific uses of AI towards violence or cyber security breaches at scale, I mean, those are the things I think are probably make a bit more sense to prepare for because they're more in the near-term horizon. Um, but this kind of long-term AI super intelligence or, um, AI general intelligence that's going to extinguish humanity. I think that's a tough thing for a lot of people to wrap their heads around and I would I would just continue to invest government dollars, um, and and the time of some of our smartest researchers to to to pre-deployment testing and invest in, um, the the most, uh, the most advanced models and and before they are released. In terms of investment, I mean, there's a lot of talk about an AI bubble. Shaned, trillion dollar valuations, is this a bubble and what happens if it bursts? I think nobody can say for sure. Um, I think it's important to to ensure that people recognize this technology is real. Uh, we've heard, you know, terms like electricity today. It will be that persuasive or that pervasive where it is just everywhere, and we rebuild our world on top of it. But what happens between now and AI becoming the foundation, uh, of the world, it is possible that a bubble does burst? I mean, there's a lot of investment that has gotten ahead out of the capabilities of the technology and how it's actually showing up. So there could be some correction, um, in the next couple of years. We spent a lot of time talking about the doom and gloom, but in in the few minutes we have left, let's talk about some of the positives and the promise of AI. Jackson, what are some of the sectors where AI could drive real progress? Oh, there's so many. This is the part I'm most excited about, right? I mean, think about scientific discovery of new drugs that could cure rare diseases. Um, again, think about programming and building new applications. I would also think about automating some of the parts that, you know, people find maybe more tedious in their life, like reviewing documents or contracts, especially if you're a small business owner. These are areas where AI can excel. I also think that AI can be useful in for certainly for creative industries. Um, Shaned had mentioned this before, you know, when I was in government, I had the chance to meet with a lot of concerned screenwriters and actors and folks worried about how this is going to impact their, um, their livelihoods. Um, there are a lot of opportunities to create with AI and I'm hopeful that, you know, if if future copyright changes or or regulations are not passed, that, you know, creators kind of come together in collectives and and actually get ahead of this technology and learn how to capture the value for themselves. Uh, because there are a lot of opportunities in, you know, image generation or video generation, new creative developments. So those are big opportunities. One thing I would say as well is, you know, Canada is trying to figure out how do we survive in the midst of a trade war. Um, there are lots of opportunities to use AI in the context of advanced manufacturing, um, in natural resources, like areas like mining, geological surveying. I also get really excited about the applications of artificial intelligence in space. Um, those are those are huge areas, I think to watch, um, in Canada where we actually have a lot of the right ingredients to to to be more advanced in our economies. But overall, I think there's these revolutionary applications in science, um, and also I think that there's these very, very useful applications for people's day-to-day. So those are the things that I get excited about. I want to thank you both. We are out of time. Uh, Shaned Bovel, Jackson Khan, thank you. Thanks so much for having me. Um, very interesting discussion. Keen to find out what AI has in store in 2026. Shaned Bovel is a Canadian futurist and the founder of the Tech Education Company Way. Jackson Khan is the CEO of Aperture AI, a former federal policy adviser and a senior fellow at the Monk School of Global Affairs.
[22:28]You've been listening to the Current podcast. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening. I'll talk to you soon.
