In This Series...
AI is now moving beyond intelligence on screens and entering the world as “Physical AI” that acts in real environments. Humanoids will reorganize labor, industry, and organizational structures, becoming core infrastructure for a civilizational shift. This 6 -part series, “Humanoid Civilization Shift Driven by Physical AI,” interprets step by step how technology is changing—and how the human role is changing with it.
Series Index
1- Humanoid Civilization Shift Driven by Physical AI: The Emergence of “i-Human (AI-Human) Productivity.”
2- Human Reallocation: Laborers Disappear, Leaving “Architects” and “Governors.”
3- The Essential Conditions for Humanoids: System Requirements for Power, Safety, Autonomy, and Control
4- Expanding Forms, Differentiating Roles: An Evolution Map of Humanoids by Industry
5- The Growth Mechanism: The “i-Human (AI-Human) Economy,” Where Productivity Meets Knowledge
6- The Technology Inflection Point: How Sensors, Motors, Control, and Algorithms Are Reshaping the Physical AI Stack
By Im Byoung-min (IBM) Columnist
The AI era will transform the very structure of civilization, requiring us to prepare for the age of humanoids. The structure of civilization is moving from the era of knowledge productivity—after industrial productivity and labor productivity—to the era of AI knowledge productivity, and then to the era of i-human (AI-Human) productivity that combines humanoid (Physical AI) industrial productivity and knowledge, leading to the era of AI-Human productivity.
As we move from a labor-centered society to an intelligence-centered society, the value of AI’s purpose-designed capabilities will become crucial. Human work will be delegated to humanoids, and humans will shift from being laborers to architects and governors. Group structures, such as gatherings, will shift from company-centered to individual-centered, from nation-centered to network-centered, and from platform-centered to agent-centered.
The AI era will usher in a society where humans determine direction, ask questions, and AI answers, even suggesting alternative solutions.
Knowing that the humanoid body, which will be the center of labor in the AI era, is important, Elon Musk and major corporations such as Samsung and Hyundai predict that the AI era will change the very structure of civilization and are focusing on it. Humanoid robots are powered by electricity or batteries, transferring this energy to various components such as motors, sensors, and control systems, enabling them to move and respond. Humanoid robot power systems are designed with efficiency, autonomy, and safety in mind, enabling them to operate efficiently for extended periods of time.
Humanoid (Physical AI) robots are becoming more independent and efficient in the workplace. The humanoid control system is also moving toward the era of AI-Human productivity, combining intelligent program algorithms with diverse technologies, including system design, efficiency, and safety. Humanoid (Physical AI) refers to AI that perceives, judges, and acts in the physical world to replace humans. This refers to AI that uses sensors to see, hear, and feel reality, assesses situations, and then moves its body to replace and assist humans in their work.
Three years have already passed since the advent of AI. During this time, many have argued that some people will no longer need humans. Some people are amazed that AI can draw and even compose music, while others honestly worry about the future and wonder what they will do next. Many people have held abstract, superficial, and vague ideas about AI.
However, those times have passed, and what AI agents do is simply amazing. Therefore, to accurately understand the AI-Human era—an era in which the very structure of future civilization will change—we must first understand the principles of AI. Only by accurately understanding AI can we confidently prepare for the future of the AI-Human era.
As the author explains in an easy-to-understand manner, cars, airplanes, and rockets were created for human transportation. Therefore, the average human running speed is about 15 km. The speed of a human-made rocket is about 29,000 km, or about 1,930 times faster than a human.
A precise definition of AI is that it is an extension of human intelligence. Human-created intelligence is developed through learning, reasoning, pattern recognition, and modeling of human thought processes. As a tool for amplifying intelligence, it significantly expands human capabilities in areas like calculation, memory, and analysis. Therefore, it is sometimes called an “intelligence amplifier.”
Countless elements of human knowledge, data, and experiences are embedded within AI. However, unlike human intelligence, it lacks consciousness and a sense of self. For AI, understanding means generating the most probabilistically plausible answer. What AI cannot do, unlike humans, is make judgments of meaning and value—such as emotions, morality, and responsibility—which remain uniquely human domains.
AI cannot create its own goals; they must always be set by humans. All of this is achieved through program algorithms. Therefore, while AI is not human intelligence itself, it is a product that maximizes the power of human intelligence. The AI era is the era of AGI, the singularity era that surpasses humans with amplified brains, following the AI-Human era, which increases productivity through human-made robots.
If we organize the tools that are widely used to effectively utilize AI for general purposes by function, ChatGPT and Gemini are useful for general conversation-based thinking expansion, such as writing summaries, planning, and translation, as well as for idea generation and code learning assistance. Claude is useful for summarizing long PDF reports. Perplexity is useful for finding answers with clear sources and searching for the latest information.
Microsoft Copilot is useful for Excel analysis and automatic PowerPoint creation, and Google Workspace AI is useful for automating office tasks such as automatic summarization in Gmail and Docs. It is important to directly execute the full course of an Agent, such as search, creation, collaboration, management, code development, and integration. In image generation, Midjourney is considered to be at the highest level of quality for design drafts as concept art.
Learning Vibe Coding, which allows users to create to-do apps using natural language, and other AI automation workflows—such as DALL·E for description-based image generation, Canva AI for PPT and SNS design, GitHub Copilot for code auto-completion, and Zapier Make—will form the basis for preparing for the AGI era. To summarize recent general-purpose tools: ChatGPT and Gemini (thinking, planning, writing), Perplexity (search), Notion AI (organization), Canva or DALL·E (visualization), and Copilot or Cursor (program development).
In addition, users of generative tools should provide sufficient context with detailed prompt questions. It is important not to immediately believe the answers obtained, but to verify hallucinations and ask prompt questions from another angle. It will also be necessary to develop the habit of treating AI as a partner in solving my problems.
