Impromptu: Amplifying Our Humanity Through AI universally optimistic about the future. I’m sure there were plenty of people who were skeptical and worried about the direction things were heading. But the fact that so many people were able to channel their energies into creating a better future, despite the setbacks, is something I think we can learn from today. GPT-4 is right that people in the 1920s were not universally opti- mistic about the future —or about technology. In 1920, Czecho- slavakian writer Karel Čapek introduced the word “robot” and the idea of robot rebellion in his play, R.U.R., which depicts a world in which serf-like entities created to provide cheap labor for humanity become so ubiquitous they take up arms and wipe out the human race. In Metropolis, Fritz Lang’s cinematic sci-fi epic, workers toiling underground for the wealthy capitalists living above them use a robot to help win their freedom. But as historian Peter J. Bowler suggests in his book A History of the Future, at a time when 65 percent of America’s house- holds already had a telephone and 37 percent had a car, it was clear that “invention was the key to a better life.” GPT-4? GPT-4: So, despite the carnage of World War I and the Spanish flu, the 1920s ended up being a decade of technological optimism. And while some of that opti- mism may have been a little over the top, it nonetheless enabled people to imagine a better future and work toward it. Reid: Yes, I’d agree with that. Despite optimism winning out, I think the concerns about technology were valid, just as they are today. GPT-4 (edited for length): The fears about technology in the 1920s were not without merit, but ultimately, they did not come to pass. For example, the idea of robots 190