We already have proof that life won't be meaningless if AIs take all our jobs

People keep talking about how life will be meaningless without jobs, but we already know that this isn't true. 

It's called the aristocracy. 

We had a whole class of people for ages who had nothing to do but hangout with people and attend parties. Just read any Jane Austen novel to get a sense of what it's like to live in a world with no jobs. 

Only a small fraction of people, given complete freedom from jobs, went on to do science or create something big and important. 

Most people just want to lounge about and play games, watch plays, and attend parties. 

They are not filled with angst around not having a job. 

In fact, they consider a job to be a gross and terrible thing that you only do if you must, and then, usually, you must minimize. 

Our society has just conditioned us to think that jobs are a source of meaning and importance because, well, for one thing, it makes us happier. 

We have to work, so it's better for our mental health to think it's somehow good for us. 

And for two, we need money for survival, and so jobs do indeed make us happier by bringing in money.

Massive job loss from AI will not by default lead to us leading Jane Austen lives of leisure, but more like Great Depression lives of destitution. 

We are not immune to that. 

Us having enough is incredibly recent and rare, historically and globally speaking. 

Remember that approximately 1 in 4 people don't have access to something as basic as clean drinking water. 

You are not special. 

You could become one of those people. 

You could not have enough to eat. 

So AIs causing mass unemployment is indeed quite bad.

But it's because it will cause mass poverty and civil unrest. Not because it will cause a lack of meaning.