Gen Zers have long careers ahead and might face more uncertainty about their professional futures than older workers.

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For Star Trek fans and tech nerds, the holodeck concept is a form of geek grail. The idea is an entirely realistic simulated environment where just speaking the request (prompt) seemingly brings to life an immersive environment populated by role-playing AI-powered digital humans. As several Star Trek series envisioned, a multitude of scenes and narratives could be created, from New Orleans jazz clubs to private eye capers. Not only did this imagine an exciting future for technology, but it also delved into philosophical questions such as the humanity of digital beings.

Since it first emerged on screen in 1988, the holodeck has been a mainstay quest of the Digerati. Over the years, several companies, including Microsoft and IBM, have created labs in pursuit of building the underlying technologies. Yet, the technical challenges have been daunting for both software and hardware. Perhaps AI, and in particular generative AI, can advance these efforts. That is just one vision for how generative AI might contribute to the next generation of technology.

Archaeologists and computer scientists have worked together to create an artificial intelligence (AI) program capable of translating ancient cuneiform texts. The researchers say their goal is for the program to form part of a “human-machine collaboration”, which will assist future scholars in their study of archaic languages.

Cuneiform is thought to be the oldest writing system in the world. Recorded by gouging symbols into clay tablets, it was originally developed by the Mesopotamians in what is now Iraq, where it started out as a way of keeping track of bread and beer rations. The system quickly spread throughout the ancient Middle East, where it remained in use continuously for over 3,000 years.

Thousands of documents, most written in either the Sumerian or Akkadian languages using the cuneiform script, survive to this day; but translating them can be a major headache. For one thing, there simply aren’t that many people with the necessary expertise. For another, the texts are often broken up into fragments.

Launching today, AItopia will explore AI’s impact on design, architecture and humanity both today and in the future. Dezeen features editor Nat Barker introduces the series.

The future has arrived. Having been depicted countless times in sci-fi literature and cinema over the decades, machines that can think for themselves are becoming a reality.

Artificial intelligence (AI) – that is, computers or contraptions performing tasks that would usually require a human brain – is a concept that has captured the shared imagination in some form since ancient times. But it was the British polymath Alan Turing who first seriously addressed the matter in his seminal 1950 paper Computing Machinery and Intelligence. “I propose to consider the question, ‘Can machines think?’” Turing wrote.