Sixty-five years ago a brilliant nineteen year old college sophomore wrote a paper with the deliberately provocative title, ‘The Peasant Class”, in which he postulated that during the history of the mis-named Homo Sapiens species the vast majority of its members had provided muscle power and a gene pool and that neither was any longer needed. This was long before genetic engineering, robots, drones, or AI.
Perhaps a few others had reached a similar conclusion, but he had figured this out for himself, as he had that we are Home Insipiens, not Homo Sapiens, and as he grew older perhaps Homo Narcissus. For more than a thousand years we thought we were the center of the universe.
He had a rarely original intelligence as well as time would reveal a rare body and will.
All gifts.
How can one take pride in gifts, but most of us do. He tried not to, but sometimes gave himself credit for persevering on his own, which was probably a gift too.
He got an A on the paper.
If you read the news you know that the present has caught up with his hypothesis.
Here is a recent example
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/
That prescient student has unexpectedly survived a life of calculated risk and is now an old man. He does not know how this will play out, but he does not see a pleasant outcome.
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