For centuries, visions of the future have been dominated by dystopian warnings—cautionary tales of power gone wrong. Five Pillars of Tomorrow offers an alternative: a governance model where transparency, collective wisdom, and advanced AI safeguard human dignity.
Q&A with Bob Hetherington, Founder and former Editor | RoboticsTomorrow and ManufacturingTomorrow
Tell us about yourself and your history with RoboticsTomorrow.com.
I worked several years as a Mechanical Engineer before venturing to the internet in 1995 where I eventually became the editor and publisher of 5 technical portals covering Home Technology (HomeToys.com), Alternative Energy (Altenergymag.com), Robotics (RoboticsTomorrow.com), Advanced Manufacturing (ManufacturingTomorrow.com) and Agricultural Technology (AgritechTomorrow.com).
What led you to the writing “Five Pillars of Tomorrow”?
Throughout my career reporting on the development of technologies that in my opinion moved the world forward and advanced our evolution, I became convinced that we would be well served by a social structure that relied heavily on these technologies to guide our decision making processes as we moved into the future.
As an engineer and designer, I have taken it upon myself to lay out some systems of governing and development that I feel would work to simplify the processes in the future (think several generations from now). My systems are based on math and logic rather than power and politics. Humans still rule of course, but their decisions are assisted and often implemented by technological processes.
Give us a summary of the short story.
Rather than publishing a technical thesis covering the details of my theories and systems, I decided to write several short stories covering various topics in my future society so readers would not get lost in the quagmire of my thoughts.
Book 1 introduces Pentarchia, a city of the future where the government is a pentarchy consisting of 5 elected leaders who guide the society using proven processes including an intelligent administration system (AI that works), a blockchain data system (keeping track of every individual transaction including elections, banking and business). Several simple scenarios arise which illustrate how such a system could operate.
The story is only 34 pages long so give it a quick look and let me know what you think.
What is the overall message you want a reader to take away from this?
For centuries, visions of the future have been dominated by dystopian warnings—cautionary tales of power gone wrong. Five Pillars of Tomorrow offers an alternative: a governance model where transparency, collective wisdom, and advanced AI safeguard human dignity. Through the Pentarchy and the Robot Minimum Wage Plan, this work explores how society can balance technological efficiency with social fairness, creating a system that evolves with its people rather than against them.
Readers are urged not to get hung up on technologies of today, some of which are successful and others which need many years of testing and change to become trustworthy. AI and Transactional Blockchain are examples of premature technologies that are works in process but promise to become tools which could change the future for the better as they develop. For example, I used ChatGPT to write parts of this story based on input from my technical papers.
Be optimistic for the sake of your great, great grandchildren.
What is next? Can we expect more stories?
Yes, I will follow up with more stories about Pentarchia that illustrate how various social and economic aspects could be handled by the Pentarchy and associated technological systems. Such things as Governance, Identification and Trust, Voting, Education, Working, Health Care and every other aspect of society will be touched upon. Using short stories, I hope to make a complicated theory palatable for readers of all ages and walks of life.
Download the eBook on Amazon
The content & opinions in this article are the author’s and do not necessarily represent the views of RoboticsTomorrow
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