The future of NPCs specifically is going to be wild. The designers will only need a book of world lore and a background bio for each character, and the NPCs will be able to have rich, meaningful, unscripted conversations with the player.

On the other hand, I can envision myself becoming like the parents of the 90s, fretting over the influence of violent videogames and modern technology. For example, when GTA6 comes out and someone mods it to have AI-powered NPCs who literally beg and plead for their lives, are we sure that 14 year olds mowing them down with virtual AR15s won't be psychologically impacted in some way?

It also occurred to me that online games with a small userbase will probably 'fluff the numbers' with AI bot players who are indistinguishable from human players, the same way social networks and dating apps use bots to create the impression of a bustling community.

There are a few problems that AI could solve for the defense/intel community. Off the top of my head:

- Surveillance. Drones and cameras are cheap, but contractors with security clearances to watch them are not. AI could monitor video streams 24/7, providing routine summaries of what they observed, or contacting a human supervisor when they spot something important.

- Summarizing intel. The US is monitoring countless phone lines and digital transmissions, but nobody can possibly read all of it. AI like ChatGPT could produce quick, condensed summaries of each transmission. Think of the new Bing AI TEAMS meeting summary feature that Microsoft announced, only instead of summarizing your company's Monday morning budget meeting, it's summarizing key points from a PLA defense attache's call back to Beijing.

- Information Warfare. Imagine an ISIS cell in Africa receives a videocall from their leader in Somalia, instructing the terrorists to drive with all their weapons and supplies to a set of coordinates in the middle of the desert. The terrorists load up a truck and roll straight into the open arms of USSOCOM. The video of their leader was a deepfake from previously intercepted communications.

- Decoys. In a Sino-American war, the Chinese will rely heavily on precision-guided munitions and electronic warfare to target allied forces. We can easily imagine the PLA honing in on radio transmissions, cellphone signals, and other electromagnetic emissions to target their missile strikes (see: Ukrainian HIMARS finding Russian barracks). With AI chatbots, the US could have decoy 'chatterboxes' which roleplay as a cluster of US forces (a squad of Marines, or a USN vessel, etc). Each box could generate simulated radio conversations, text message arguments, and satphone strategy debates, all subject to PLA intercept. Every time the Chinese fall for a decoy, that's one less missile hitting genuine US assetes.

- Admin. The world's most powerful military spends roughly 20% of its time doing legitimate military work stuff and the other 80% of the time fiddling over a Powerpoint slide to brief the work to their boss, or writing performance reviews for subordinates, et cetera. If AI can cut that admin time down by even a fraction, it would free up millions of manhours to do more important things.

Personally I would be stunned if the first four aren't already being developed (DAPRA, NSA, DIA, etc) or even being prepared for active use. The last item is a bit of a joke though: the military will be stuck fiddling over Powerpoint slides until we're fighting with X-wings and laser blasters.

Instead of simulating an absurd number of atoms, I wonder if physical laws and scientific principles could be encoded into mathematical formulas, with the AI being taught the most fundamental principles and then building on them into a basic edifice of scientific understanding. That foundation could then be expanded through the addition of newer, more recent discoveries, and the AI could be tasked with expanding upon them.