What is digital transformation? What are the fourth Industrial Revolution's consequences for industry and for humanity?

1. Digital transformation
and its effects on Industry & Humanity
Episode 1: The 4th (r)evolution

2. What is digital transformation?

3. The world as we know it is under great pressure by recent technological
developments.
This asks for new truths, new laws, new metaphysics and a whole new way of
doing business.
The paradigm shift from the old ways into the new is what we
call Digital Transformation.

4. It’s not a revolution, but an evolution with
revolutionary consequences for both business and society.
What not?

5. Let’s look at some history

6. First
Industrial Revolution
Second
Industrial Revolution
Third
Industrial Revolution
Fourth
Industrial Revolution
Today
Time
1800 1900 2000
The industrial (r)evolutions

7. The first Industrial Revolution brought us mechanical
production by means of water and steam power.

8. This is the 4th industrial (r)evolution
The second gave us mass
production through electrical power.

9. This is the 4th industrial (r)evolution
The third Industrial Revolution was the digital revolution, wherein production
was further automated through the use of electronic and IT systems.
We changed from mechanical and electronic technology to digital
technology.

10. Today, we are at the threshold of
the fourth Industrial Revolution.

11. This 4th revolution is characterized by a series of new technologies that
introduce a world where cyber physical systems transform traditional
production & lifestyle.
This is the 4th industrial (r)evolution

12. “We are witnessing profound shifts across all industries,
marked by the emergence of new business models, the disruption
of incumbents and the reshaping of production, consumption, transportation and
delivery systems” Klaus Schwab

13. This industrial (r)evolution is
challenging ideas about what it
means to be human.

14. And in comes the
4th human revolution.

15. The human revolution went something like this:

16. The first human revolution took place when Copernicus discovered earth was not
the center of the universe. The sun and planets did not revolve around us
anymore and we found ourselves being kicked out of the middle of the galaxy.

17. The second revolution was when Charles Darwin showed us we were not all
that different from the animals. Humans were no superior creature, put on
earth by some super brain. It was all just coincidence, luck and some
survival techniques in the mix. We might as well never have existed.

18. With Freud the 3rd revolution kicked in. He made us aware that we could
never have full control over ourselves or even gain full knowledge of our
passions and thoughts. Control and transparency were lost.

19. 3 defeats in a row…

20. After the 3rd human revolution we could still hold on to the view that our
special place in the universe might not be a matter of astronomy, biology
or self control, but of superior thinking abilities.
We were still a lot smarter than all other creatures on earth, which was a
comforting thought.
This famous quote shows it pretty clear: “I think, therefor I am.” R. Descartes
Our intelligence defined us and set us apart from everything non-human.

21. What happened next?

22. We entered the fourth human revolution the
moment we got our ass kicked at chess by a
computer.
This may seem futile but many losses followed after this and
nowadays computers are far more capable of processing and
interpreting certain streams of information than us humans.
We lost our intelligence monopoly..

23. Self learning algorithms are a fact
&
we lost our intelligence monopoly…

24. They outsmarted us.

25. What are the consequences of this 4th (r)evolution?
One of them is that recently we were placed out of the loop by technology
for certain processes. For a big number of interactions, calculations or decisions, the
human factor is no longer needed or is no longer qualified.
This will have its effect on the way we look at work.

26. Historically interactions evolved a little like this:
Human to MachineHuman to human Machine to Machine

27. Other consequences manifest themselves in the domain of work, privacy,
ownership and many more.
More about that in the next episodes!

28. So what sets us apart then…
What makes us human?

29. New questions are asked;
What will our jobs look like when a huge part of the existing ones will be taken
over by AI?
How do we combine the need to express ourselves online and set our selves apart from
others with our need for privacy?
When information can be copy-pasted in the blink of an eye, how can we look at
ownership and private property and what will the status of usage become?

30. More following soon