Can AI and VR Make Life More Fun & Abundant? | Alvin Wang Graylin
VR pioneer Alvin Graylin believes we're 5-10 years away from a post-scarcity society where virtual worlds eliminate geographic inequality and AI productivity creates universal prosperity—if we choose cooperation over competition.
The most predictive factor of your future success isn't your talent, work ethic, or dreams. It's something completely beyond your control: where you were born and who your parents are.
"It's a lottery," says Alvin Graylin, co-author of Our Next Reality and a 30-year veteran of virtual reality and AI. "Most people can't determine where they're born. For those in developed countries, they've won the lottery. But what if we could change that?"
Graylin envisions a future where physical borders dissolve, not through immigration but through immersion, where a child in rural Kenya can learn alongside MIT students, where appearance and accent don't determine opportunity, and where your mind and character matter more than your zip code.
The Empathy Engine
The transformation begins with perspective. In police departments across America, officers slip on VR headsets for bias training, experiencing arrests from a suspect's point of view. Sexual harassment scenarios put male executives in the shoes of female colleagues. Customer service reps practice patience with AI-generated difficult customers.
"VR is an empathy machine," Graylin explains. "It allows you to step into someone else's shoes and appreciate what it feels like to be them."
But this is just the beginning. The real revolution happens when the internet itself transforms from flat websites to interconnected 3D worlds—what Graylin calls the metaverse.
-
MAGICademy Podcast (00:00)
The most different people in the world is not more than 0.1 % different in genetics. We really are one people. We are creating these artificial boundaries that separate us. And because they're artificial, they can be removed. Get like a group of kids together from all over the world and invite them to play. That's true. If they were not indoctrinated with certain biases, then they would not even know the difference. They would just feel like they're all just playing. In the long run, the key to success
will not be what formulas we know, but how successful are we interacting with other people?
Jiani (00:33)
front of you lands a spaceship. Out walks a friendly cute little alien. If you were to use one word, one sound or one movement to introduce yourself to this little fella, what would that be?
Alvin W. Graylin (00:46)
I would just say hi and reach my hand out and hopefully they will be
Jiani (00:52)
Welcome to MAGICademy podcast. Today with us is Alvin, the co -author of Our Next Reality, Exploring the Future of Artificial Intelligence and Virtual Reality. Yes. He has been a thought leader, an executive and entrepreneur for over 30 years and focusing on the areas of virtual reality and artificial intelligence.
He started his career studying human machine interactions, the interface, and he also founded four venture backed
So our next reality and what was the sparky moment where you realized
it's time for me to write a book focusing on virtual reality and in the future of potentially collectively flourishing society.
Alvin W. Graylin (01:52)
Yeah, so I think this is something I've actually wanted to write for a long time, not just about VR, but also about how the combination of VR and AI, they come together. And we see over the last 10 years or so, how both of these really started to mature. And the pandemic actually gave me an opportunity to have some time to work
because I was traveling a lot less than I used to. I was usually on the roads, know, 70, 80 % of time. And during the pandemic, I had a lot more time, you know, in the office or at home. And so I started to think about putting this into the works. And the other thing that I thought was happening is that the changes are happening quickly, but it feels like the world is not really seeing it and it's not
for the changes that are coming. And when the changes come this time, it's going to come much faster than the prior three revolutions. The first three took 80, 60, and about 45 years respectively to play out and become part of our society. Whereas I think with this new kind of AI and immersive tech revolution, it's going to happen in kind of the five to 10 years timeframe.
and the world is really not prepared to move at that pace. So I wanted to get this information out so people can hear and read what's coming and that way they can play a role in smoothing the transition because if we don't prepare well, the transitions could be very rocky and could end poorly. and the book is not just about abundance, it's actually about the potential
diverging outcomes, right? This is why Lewis and I wrote it as a debate. So he plays the pessimist and I play more the optimist. And we give the two potential outcomes that will arise in this world over the next 10 years. And by understanding what are the two potential outcomes, you kind of see where things are headed. And then you also see what do you need to do in the meantime.
to try to push the result towards that positive side. Cause I don't think any of us want to see the fully dystopian outcome. So I think that's what kind of pushed us to write this and also what helped to lead the format. Because I think a lot of readers today, when they find books or articles to read, they seek out content that reinforces what they already believe. And unfortunately that does not.
Jiani (04:29)
Yes.
Alvin W. Graylin (04:39)
lead you to learn anything new and it does not give you a balanced view of the world. So by putting both sides of the arguments into one book, we're forcing the reader to grapple with the complexity of the issues and to come up with their own conclusion. that's kind of the, I guess, the background reason of why the book was written.
Remember at the end of the book, there's also a section specifically about tips for readers because we don't want this book to just be something you read and forget. We want it to be something you read and then you're motivated enough to take action. And we give you a relatively simple list of things to think about and take action on no matter if you're a policymaker or a corporate leader or even a student, what you should be thinking about.
Jiani (05:24)
That's great. I also I appreciate how when when you are writing this book, it's not about just delivering all the messages out. It's about reader centered experience. So it's like a learning experience for the readers and you're putting a lot of handouts, their visualization, tips for the readers. And also there's a chat box on the book site where if
For curious readers, can just keep exploring and diving deeper and interacting and engaging with the content on a much deeper level, just beyond passively consuming. And I think that's really kind of tapping into the next question about the real power of the metaverse and in combination with artificial intelligence, it's no longer like a passively consuming
is more like, yes, we are part of the environment we are actively engaging
what is truly a metaverse?
Alvin W. Graylin (06:23)
Yeah, let me answer that first. because definitely over the last few years, there has been a lot of confusion about this topic and about the term. And because of Facebook's involvement with this term, it's made it there's been a lot of negative connotations because of some of the negative context around Facebook and privacy and all these other things. There's also probably been some negative views of it because of the crypto community who
Jiani (06:25)
Okay, first.
Alvin W. Graylin (06:48)
have leveraged it for some maybe scams or less productive use cases for this idea. I think that the easy way to think about the term metaverse is actually not confusing. It should be something that is anybody can remember. And it is just a 3D version of the internet that we've been building. So we've been spending the last three, four decades building the internet.
focused on 2D, on pictures, on text, on video. But we will soon move to a internet that connects everybody in the world through hundreds of millions of virtual worlds instead of websites, instead of apps, you essentially have worlds to go into. And that is actually the most natural way for humans to interact with technology. In the real world, we've evolved for the last five million years.
you know, depending on what you think, or 200 ,000 years of kind of more modern humans to survive in a 3D space. And so our senses are maximized, our brains are maximized to learn and consume content and to interact naturally in that type of environment. But we've been forcing ourselves to use a 2D screen to interact digitally, which has been effective, but it is not the natural way for us to do that.
If we can move it to a 3D space, can learn better, we can enjoy entertainment more, we can socialize in a more natural way. Right now I see you as a picture of a screen, but it would be so much better if I could actually be face to face across from you on the table and having a drink together. That conversation would feel more natural. And that's possible. It's possible not in the future, it's actually possible today.
Jiani (08:24)
Yeah.
Alvin W. Graylin (08:31)
I mean today we have devices like this, like the Vision Pro which is 600 grams. It's relatively heavy. We also have devices like this from HTC that's 200 grams. very soon we're going to get to devices that are more like this, 39 grams or under 50 grams that has a display that has cameras. when these devices become part of our daily rituals where we get up and we put this on just like we
we get up and we pick up our phone or turn on our computers. When that becomes our natural process of interacting with a screen on our face, we will be able to realize this whole metaverse idea. Now this is the long -term metaverse. I think the short -term, we can still have metaverse
on a 2D screen but still in a 3D space just like we play video games. There's a lot of people who play video games who are multi -users, thousands of people in a game or sometimes hundreds of thousands and they are in a 3D space but they're using their keyboards and their mice to navigate. I think that's one way to use that type of platform and in the beginning when the metaverse starts to form, a lot of people will actually be using it that way because those are devices they have. Are the phones, the tablets and the
and the PCs that they have today. But in the long run, these kind of devices are going to become, this is $1 ,000 now, it is going to become a few hundred dollars and it's going to cost as much as a phone. And phones today, they sell over a billion phones a year. So when it gets to that type of economics, really anybody in the world will be able to enjoy the 3D aspect of this metaverse. And it's just a matter of.
Jiani (10:01)
Hmm.
Yeah and I think accessibility really makes a huge difference because we really need people to access that space. That's why the internet is really kind of bringing part of the real world onto the 2D space and that's wonderful. so it's a 3D, so ultimately it is a 3D environment. What do you think?
Alvin W. Graylin (10:33)
Well, it's not just a
3D environment. It's actually a 3D interconnected network. Because we have 3D environments today. But the metaverse does not exist yet. The real metaverse does not exist yet. Because the real metaverse is a global interconnected network of all these worlds. There are lots of silo games and are some silo social networks that are 3D social networks. But they are not the metaverse. So it is not only that it is 3D.
It is that it is 3D and it is open and interconnected globally. And just like the internet.
Jiani (11:03)
to be honest, still have some trouble kind of imagine what would that look like.
So I can only draw analogies to something that I'm familiar with. So for example, I'm in this 2D world, in this 2D internet world.
I type in something and I go to Google and then it shows me different websites. are we talking that in the future it's kind of like something like a virtual Google. Maybe we can just access that through our glasses and then that will direct us to different virtual worlds.
Alvin W. Graylin (11:38)
Yeah, and then I think that the whole search
engine, the search engine concept actually becomes a lot less relevant when we get into that type of world. I don't know if you ever watched Ready Player One. Have you watched that? Yeah, so essentially it's like that where you can jump between worlds, right? You may have a home space that essentially is a 3D space and that space can look exactly like your real home or it doesn't have to.
Jiani (11:49)
Yes.
Alvin W. Graylin (12:03)
You could essentially wrap a different texture on top of everything that's in your home. So you can still touch it and feel it, but it can represent and look like different things. think the key is in the future, AI interface will be a much more natural interface than it is today where you're typing in something. Where in this case, you may talk to your AI agent and say, hey, I want to go to a world that looks like this, or I just want to go back in time and explore Egypt.
or want to become the size of a cell and explore the blood system inside a body. You don't have to type into Google, you just tell it what you want. Or I just want to have a virtual tea with my friend Jiani I think those are the ways you would interface.
And it's like having an assistant that understands you in natural language. And we're very close to getting there from an AI maturity perspective. We still have a little bit more time, I think, to create the underlying infrastructure for delivering high quality 3D content and also the capability to do real -time rendering and real -time generation of these 3D worlds. Right now...
It's very expensive to make a 3D game or a 3D world, which is also why I think VR AR really hasn't taken off. It's not really the hardware's not ready. think the hardware is actually pretty good and it's relatively inexpensive. For a few hundred dollars, you can get a pretty high quality VR device, but there's only a few hundred, or maybe a few thousand if you go into the PC games of content out there, because it's very expensive and difficult to make. But just like right now, you can...
ask Chad GBT to make a poem in a few seconds. And you can also ask me Journey to make a picture in a few seconds, right? Very soon we will be able to go into these systems and say, make me this kind of a world that's a 3D world that looks like this or say, hey, my favorite book is Lord of the Rings. I want to live in chapter one and I want to be the hero of that story and I want to go play that story.
And I think we are probably a few years away from being able to realize that type of an interaction model.
Jiani (14:17)
I love that. It's like your imagination is the limit.
Alvin W. Graylin (14:20)
Yes, exactly. Or not even your own imagination. It could be an imagination of your favorite author or your favorite
Jiani (14:25)
I like it.
you mentioned about the the role that the AI agent in the virtual or the metaverse can potentially play. And that gets me interested in the context of power skill development. You were talking about how in the future, the power skills or what we we traditionally call as soft skills will become more important, like communication, leadership.
focus, curiosity, imagination. Do you have some stories or visions to share about how AI agents can potentially play a role to help us develop stronger focus and stronger leadership and imagination?
Alvin W. Graylin (15:10)
Sure, I I think today, our current school system, our education system actually teaches the curiosity out of children
because they work on a fixed curriculum and everybody is teaching to the same rubric, the same tests and graded the same way. And when you keep telling kids what's right and wrong,
they stop thinking, they stop being curious because they just want to say, okay, what is the teacher trying to teach me? Okay, I'm just going to follow that. And, you know, when you look at kids when they're young, they just ask questions about everything. know, think there's some data that says a child in the first few years of their life asks like 40 or 50 ,000 questions. And makes their parents very annoyed sometimes, but that's real curiosity, right? You just keep asking, why, what is that? How does that work?
Jiani (15:57)
Yes.
Alvin W. Graylin (16:12)
But when you start getting into your teens, kids don't ask those questions anymore. Not because they know the answers, they they just, you know, they've lost that basic curiosity.
I think one of the most important soft skills is actually learning
about language and culture. And it's very difficult to learn a language just by reading something, right? Just by reading. But if you put yourself into a virtual immersive environment and you essentially travel to France or to China or to, you know, Kenya, you can learn a language by being in that environment and everything becomes natural. They say the best way to learn languages is to spend six months in a country. This allows any child
Jiani (16:27)
Hmm.
Yeah.
Mm.
Alvin W. Graylin (16:52)
to virtually travel to any country they want for as long as they want and interact with the local community. And the local community could be a real person on the other side, or it could be an AI agent that is speaking to them in the local language. And of course, if you need, you can have real -time translations that gives you some more subtitles to help with that communication. those kinds of things are just not even possible.
Jiani (17:16)
Yeah. Yeah.
Alvin W. Graylin (17:16)
even in the real life and even for very
wealthy families to do. So I think this is important. Now, why is it important to do more soft skills? Because I think the things that we used to focus on, which is STEM, it was a core to success in a career for the last few decades. Going forward, if the engineering and the math and the science
things that are very formulaic are the things that AI can do naturally and much, much better than any human can. At that point, does it matter if you memorize a formula, if you can calculate long division or whatever? It doesn't matter anymore. What will be more important are the things that you talked about, about communication, about ethics, about philosophy, about leadership.
about psychology, right? And these are the things that will allow you to be successful in a human community. Because
in the long run, I think that the key to success will not be what formulas we know, but how we, how successful are we interacting with other people? And those skills, we will have a lot more time to do face -to -face interactions, not only with the people around us, but with people around the world.
Jiani (18:29)
Hmm.
Alvin W. Graylin (18:38)
And when you see more people around the world, you can travel to different places, you can learn different culture, you can see different history. It broadens your understanding and it removes the barriers that we have today between cultures, between religions, between languages. And I think that's something that is truly lacking in today's education system. If you look at America, 90 % of Americans
don't even have a passport. And it used to be a 95 % didn't. And it became from 5 % to 10 % had because they forced you to have a passport to go to Canada and to go to Mexico. So for America, which is the richest country in the world, if they cannot afford to go travel around the world, it's even worse than that. Now, Europe is actually one place I have to say is quite...
international in the sense of because the country is so close to each other, you can travel brain for, you know, $50 to another country and, know, completely right across the border, you have a different language, you have a different culture. And people do that on a regular basis. And I wish America would learn more from some of the things that they're doing there in terms of being multilingual. Because I think most Europeans have three or sometimes four or five languages that they speak.
and Americans just speak English. So until you can understand the language, it is very difficult for you to have effective communication with people from another country or another culture.
Jiani (20:09)
I love that. I think then in the future, the location and the environment becomes more accessible on a much bigger and wider level. And that opens up plenty of opportunities for people to engage with that particular environment with whether it's real people or it's AI agent where in current world, it's all limited. Yeah.
Alvin W. Graylin (20:31)
And I think it also
helps you economically, Because if you look at today, the data shows that the thing that affects you or that can predict the most about your future success is where you're born and who your parents are, right? Now, most people cannot affect, cannot determine, actually nobody can determine where they were born because it's up to their parents. Yeah, it's a lottery. So for the people who are in the developed,
Jiani (20:45)
Hmm.
It's like a lottery.
Alvin W. Graylin (20:56)
countries, they've won the lottery. But if we get into a world where you put on a headset and there's no longer physical borders that are separating you, you are no longer constrained by where you were born, who your parents are, how much money they had, what clothes you're wearing. Because right now, even if you were born in the right place, your parents came from the wrong part of town, if you didn't wear the right clothes,
you go to a place and you just won't get respected or you won't get an opportunity to go into a place or to go to meet somebody. So, but in a virtual world, you can look like whatever you want. can wear whatever you like. It costs the same to wear Versace as it does to wear a t -shirt. Right. And so, so I think that's, that's something that allows us to then stop judging people by the cover, right. By, by the appearance because
the real value of any individual's insight is in their minds and it's in their character. And I think this allows us to then judge them by that. And it also allows to create a workforce that is truly mobile, right? Today, you can pretty much work for companies that are in your city. Sometimes people will let you work remotely, but you're still in the same country.
Jiani (21:53)
Mm.
Alvin W. Graylin (22:12)
Very seldom do you do you maybe in software development and outsourcing you have some of the kind of remote work That's outside your country, but it's only in certain sectors. This now allows you to almost any Cognitive labor or service? remotely and and feel like you're there and I think that that Opens up the economic opportunity to everybody in the world and it creates a very natural way for wealth redistribution to happen
without having to immigrate.
Jiani (22:41)
Are we not there yet?
Alvin W. Graylin (22:42)
Well, like anything, technology takes time to be adopted. But I think that the beauty of this is that the natural forces will take us there. I think there's been surveys that show that if there was no borders between any countries in the world, there would be something like 800 million to a billion people that would immigrate to another country because of opportunity.
But now, essentially, by having this technology, we no longer need to do that physical immigration, but we get all the benefits of that physical immigration. so it allows something that would have been impossible in the real world to be realized in the virtual world.
Jiani (23:23)
Yeah. And also it's from like a practical perspective, saves us the travel costs and also to travel between physical spaces. really takes a lot of energy and time and being able to just step into one space to versus another. It's just magical.
Alvin W. Graylin (23:41)
Yeah, absolutely. I I'm sure you've seen all the data about how much CO2 is wasted when you fly in a transcontinental flight or how much a car uses or puts out every year. By taking a meeting virtually, by doing it through 3D instead of through a flight, you could say 10x, 100x that type of emissions, which can definitely help us in the long run.
for our climate.
Jiani (24:07)
Beautiful. And we've talked about like the power skills for kids. How about for our adults population, like current leaders who are leading a team, who are building a startup, building a venture. How can they leverage virtual reality and AI to power up their leadership development?
Alvin W. Graylin (24:22)
Yeah, I mean,
Jiani (24:28)
development in a way that they've never done before.
Alvin W. Graylin (24:32)
Yeah, I think it's twofold, right? One is...
A lot of people say XR, is an empathy machine. It allows you to step in the shoes of somebody else and appreciate what it feels like to be them. I'll give you an example. Let's say for police officers, every day they're putting their life at risk, but they also are sometimes dealing with people when they have a certain bias towards a certain race or a certain age or whatever.
we actually have worked with the police department to create police training for using tasers. And so you're using non -lethal weapons to be able to restrain potential criminals. And so by putting them into that position where they're the criminal and they put this headset on and they are now being accosted by police, they are now being reacted to.
It helps them to understand what it feels like when how to speak to somebody, how it affects me. And also you can have skills training. I've actually took some of these same scenarios where they put you in the situation where somebody is just taking a candy bar out of their pocket. But because you're nervous and you have a gun in your hand, the first thing you do is shoot because you're afraid and you're nervous.
But by having these type of scenarios to know, okay, how do I do this? Whether or not they have a gun and how do I work together with her so that I can use non -lethal methods and train in that way. I think that that's one thing. Some people are using it for maybe sexual harassment. So what does it feel like to be a female in workplace and what type of...
Jiani (26:04)
Hmm.
Alvin W. Graylin (26:20)
of ways which you communicate with them. And there's also what people who are doing it for customer interactions where you have a very frantic customer that comes in as being very rude. How do you stay patient when you have that type of So there's a lot of things you can do, I think, a professional and staff perspective. From leadership perspective, I think it's really about educating leaders.
giving them more knowledge. Most leaders are so busy with their day -to -day work that they don't have time to really get to know their people. And they don't have time to read information beyond their industry. And a lot of the soft skills that you talk about, it takes time to go read sociology and management skills and psychology and history and philosophy and these things.
Jiani (26:57)
Yeah.
Alvin W. Graylin (27:13)
And if you're busy all the time just dealing with day -to -day things, you don't have time to do that. But if you have an AI agent that now says, OK, I'm going to sort all your emails, tell you the only that here's a 10 that you really care about, and the rest of them I will answer for you. Or instead of going to a meeting, you can just read the five -minute summary because the AI did it for you. And so these kind of things allows you to have more free time to
expand and make yourself a better leader, but it also makes you a lot more productive and a lot more informed, right? Because the issue is usually the higher you are in the company, the more shielded you are from the realities of the issues of the company. But if you have an AI agent that can look at all the meeting notes on every single meeting, all the way down to the most junior staff, you will have a much better sense of what's really happening. What are the issues and where you need to
player role to help solve them.
Jiani (28:10)
I love that. will having this ability also help the organizations to be flatter and more egalitarian and everyone kind of lead from their own position? Like everyone is a leader of some sort.
Alvin W. Graylin (28:22)
Yeah. So, I think it will make it flatter,
but it actually will probably also make the organization smaller. Right. So, this actually brings up the other concern a lot of people have about AI is job displacement. Because if you're able to, particularly for white collar work, if you're able to produce, developers today are two to five X more productive with AI helping them program than they are when they do that themselves.
Right now you have the same thing, even things like I think BCG,
so Boston Consulting Group, they're one of the premier consulting organizations with the best MBAs from around the world. And they said that when they used AI for some groups and some that didn't, they were able to produce a whole standard deviation, better quality and something like 50 % faster to deliver on their reports. And this is already with...
lead people, not to mention that I think they also found that the more junior you are, the more value it brought to you. So this probably means that we don't need as many people as we do today in a lot of these companies. So lot of companies like Microsoft with 100, 200 ,000 people. And if you can automate software programming, maybe a significant portion of those developers would not be needed.
how do you manage that transition? Do you give people two days off a week or do you cut 40% of your people? So those are some ethical concerns that as a leader we need to think about. But maybe it's actually a good thing that now you give them two days off a week to go learn other things and make them more productive, make them healthier, gives them more time to go exercise and to spend with their family and friends. And I think that's
Jiani (30:18)
and discover their own magic.
Alvin W. Graylin (30:21)
Exactly, right? Because I think we now are overly defined by our occupation and we really need to be thinking more longer term about what is it that our purpose in life. And I think most people are not doing the job that they feel they're most gifted to do and they have the magic to actually execute and they are doing the job that they think they can make the most money in.
Jiani (30:27)
Yes.
Alvin W. Graylin (30:45)
And if longer term, you know, we have such high productivity that everybody gets UBI and universal basic income, or maybe universal high income, then we don't necessarily even have to work at all, right? We don't have to work because we need an income. We would want to work because we want to be able to contribute to society. And I think that's the future I would like to see us get to.
Jiani (30:55)
you
Alvin W. Graylin (31:10)
if the current leaders in society and the current leaders in government provides that to happen. Actually, I think there's going to be lot of barriers to that happening because capitalism right now is forcing these companies to maximize profitability. So instead of giving two days off a week, they will probably lay off 40 % of their workforce.
instead of giving everybody universal basic income or high income, they will probably keep that income for themselves. But I think this is where we need to make sure that our senior leaders in both corporations and governments are also educating themselves, are also re -skilling themselves so that they don't have to be afraid of losing their roles. Because at the end of the day,
If they can enjoy that same benefit, if they can have essentially one day a week that they work and have more days with their family, with their hobbies, with their interests, it's actually going to make them happier as well. So instead of trying to holding on to power or holding on to money, it doesn't matter how much money you have if you're overly stressed and or unhealthy.
So, and that's what we're happening, what we're doing to our society today is that, know, the work is made overly stressed and, you know, there's all this loneliness because people don't know how to communicate to each other anymore. People are taking more, you know, drugs to try to deal with their various mental issues. You know, we're just, you know, we're disconnected from our families.
There's so many problems that could be resolved that we spent more time doing the things that really matter.
Jiani (32:57)
That's a moment where I was like, I'm so happy that I read your book and I, whenever, whether you're talking about it or reading about it, it just warms my heart and...
Alvin W. Graylin (33:01)
So.
Jiani (33:10)
And even though there are challenges and people need to shift their perspectives and systems and all that, on maybe not even a country, but a global level, but wouldn't future generations be happy to live in a world like that? And wouldn't the current potential parents will be happy to give birth to kids that they know?
They will be living in a future like that where their potential are being fully actualized and they're enjoying every moment of it and work becomes play and play is work and they don't have to sacrifice for money and if they want, they can hop on any place that they want with the virtual reality technology. then the...
Alvin W. Graylin (33:54)
Absolutely.
I think you understand the vision I'm trying to paint. I appreciate you have taken the time to read the book fully and to also listen to some of the other cast and interviews I've done so that you know that what I'm talking about is actually coming from a sincere place.
Jiani (34:09)
Yes, and your vision is hope, is the light that I wanted to welcome into my reality and our audience's reality. And no matter how long it's gonna take, let's be patient and let's put our intention toward that reality.
Alvin W. Graylin (34:26)
Yeah, I think let's
be patient and let's welcome it. But I think we also, the important things, we also need to play a role to bring it about. Because if we let it happen, we just say, I'll just let it happen to me, then it may actually not happen. Because the natural forces today, sometimes, you know, people are selfish. Sometimes people are self -serving. And a lot of people in positions of power or government are trying to preserve power. And by doing the things that we just talked about,
And actually they have to be willing to give away. They have to be able to, to, to give away profits. Right. And so, I guess my, my, my point is, it's highly possible and it is, it is definitely to the benefit of our current and future generations. We cannot expect that somebody else would do it for us. We have to play an active role.
to both spread the message as well as do the things that are in the back of the book because everybody can play a part.
Jiani (35:23)
and collective efforts increases the chances of that happening and sooner.
Alvin W. Graylin (35:29)
Exactly. encouraging more people to actually open up their minds because honestly, there's a lot of people who think they understand and they know that this technology, how, know, because I talked to a people today that saying, we have to win this AI race and, you know, we have to do it before China does. And, you know, we have to weaponize it so that, you know, they don't do it. And the reality is that
There is no winning. There is no winning that race because if you win this race and you think of it as a weapon that you can then use to keep another country down or another people down, whether whichever country gets there first, they will start a cascade of activities and responses from the other countries that they try to suppress. That will be a negative response that then
it will only escalate the problem and it will end in probably global war. And that's not what this technology is meant to do. It's meant to create abundance. It's meant to remove the reason for war, not to be the impetus for war.
Sorry, it got a little bit darker.
Jiani (36:36)
Yeah, I, and that's an important thing to be aware of. And, I hope us, the current leaders who are watching this podcast, I think there's a lot of fear. Like it's a very, I would say like 3d way of thinking or like binary thinking like wing or loose yes or no, white or
black and have or have not stay or lose it and by thinking of in terms of this it gives us so much fear and anxiety and we're not thinking in terms of collective flourishing like the future that you're painting yes it may require some sort of
short -term sacrifice, what we see as short -term sacrifices or willing to give away but in the long run collectively because we are all one like we're all human humans like just different I mean even the genes are mostly the same.
Alvin W. Graylin (37:28)
Yeah.
Exactly. this is
why what we talked about earlier, this is why what we talked about earlier matters so much, is that the people who are the wisest and most passionate and the most patient people are the ones who have seen the world, who have traveled, who have talked to people from around the world, and they realize that there are many differences between us, but we are all one people. And we are so much more alike than we are different.
you know, if you look genetically between the, the, any one individual, the most different people in the world is not more than 0 .1 % different in their genetics,
So we really are one people and we are creating these artificial boundaries that separate us. And those things, because they're artificial, they can be removed. We don't need to, to create these in groups and out groups. it's, it's a way that it's an instrument, the concept that's been
in the past to unite people so that they can fight against this other group. Usually they want to fight against this other group because they want to take the resources of this other group. Now live in a world where everybody has everything they want. Why would you send your children around the world to go fight somebody to take their oil or their land or something? It doesn't make sense. There's no need to do that.
Unfortunately, a lot of people still live in the world of scarcity and the mindset of scarcity. So they can't turn that switch and understand that you don't have to fight for resources very much longer.
Jiani (39:10)
Yes, and I think we both went like lived a considerably long time in different places and and just by observing the people around us it's like it's even even where like for me even even I live in a different country and when I see folks like yes you know like it's human like there's a lot of like similarities I can just
Alvin W. Graylin (39:15)
lived this every long time.
Jiani (39:33)
from those little details. And it just brings me closer to the concept of humanity. Yeah, we're all together. And yes, we do have man -made separations that divides us, and even policies and all that. However, I think...
maybe with the help of virtual reality, let technology first develop a little bit and then let people to find it so easy to travel around the world and join in different conversations on a global scale and just by exposing them to the similarities that they see around the world to empower them to understand, we're all the same. So I guess that's...
Alvin W. Graylin (39:55)
you
Yeah, and
you know, the first step to resolving conflict is to be able to understand the perspective of the other side. So when we have these language barriers or these cultural barriers or these physical barriers where you would never get to see each other, that first step just doesn't happen. And when that doesn't happen, there is no resolution.
Jiani (40:35)
No, there's no... Because there's no understanding and it's not even in their mind. And what we don't see, we don't understand, and we don't even bother, and we don't even have the curiosity to...
Alvin W. Graylin (40:45)
And it just perpetuates the hate that was there. And a lot of times once you actually talk to each other, you realize that there really wasn't that much to fight about, wasn't that much you disagreed about.
Jiani (40:58)
Yeah, it'll be interesting to get like a group of toddlers or kids together from all over the world and let them to let them invite them to play and let people see.
Alvin W. Graylin (41:09)
I'll bet
you if they were not indoctrinated with certain biases that they would not even know the difference. It would just feel like they're all just playing. Particularly if you put them into a VR environment where people can't see each other's the color of their skin or their height or whatever and it does translation. Everybody will just feel like they're just playing. I think our cultures have taught us to
Jiani (41:18)
Yeah.
Alvin W. Graylin (41:35)
pass down biases to our children and it doesn't need to be there. And I think this is one thing that I have to say that the AIs will be able to do better because if it's trained on sufficiently broad data set, it won't be biased by any one culture or any one history because as we know, the history is written by the victors. But then every country has their own perspective.
trained in everybody's version of history, now you understand why things happen. How did they view this particular same event? And it allows you to take on the other person's perspectives. And I think an AI teacher or AI guide that helps you with your negotiation could be a moderator that facilitates coming to a common understanding.
And the world needs more understanding as you said earlier.
Jiani (42:26)
Yes, more understanding through the power of... mean, technology plays a role and I think that's an opportunity for us to get to know each other more and go beyond our small ego and find the fascination of the bigger collective coexistence. Wonderful.
Thank you, Alvin. And let's move into the magic portion of it. And before that, let me give our audience a brief recap of everything we've talked about.
So we talked about Alvin's story, the founding reasons behind our next reality, like the cup that he's drinking right now, and why he structured the book in terms of, in forms of a debate. So two is to provide perspectives for our readers to explore more comprehensively and holistically about this whole topic of
Alvin W. Graylin (42:57)
for.
Jiani (43:16)
virtual reality, metaverse, and AI. And also we've explored the possibility of leveraging virtual reality and AI agent to power
interconnected, multicultural, multilingual environment where just by voicing your desire, you will be able to travel to different places.
of the world and experience their culture, speak their language and hear their perspective, learn about their history and their philosophy in a much cost effective and environmentally friendly way. We also explore the possibility of virtual reality and AI to power up power skills development, leadership development.
And also this perspective taking, it's kind of the core, core focus of virtual reality is the, what Alvin called the empathy engine. And we also talked about far into the future through our collective intentional efforts, potential sacrifices, perspective taking and long -term views and patience, we can potentially step into a future.
that everyone is able to see more commonality than the differences. And we can truly thrive as a whole human species, no matter where you are, skin color you wear, how big, how tall you are, what religion that you come from. And there will be more deep, deep collective and global empathy.
So that would be a beautiful world for us to step in and our future generations to thriving as well. Moving to Alvin's magic. So Alvin, what did you enjoy creating so much when you were 11 years old that time just disappeared for you?
Alvin W. Graylin (45:04)
I guess probably programming. I started coding when I was probably about nine or ten. Being able to create something from scratch and to do it without the help of other people. I think that was something that was my way to express myself. Both my parents are artists. My dad's a painter and professor. My mom was a
ballerina and also a dance teacher. But, you know, so they express themselves through their art and, you know, given that I have limited artistic ability, I think, you know, using technology as a way to express myself was something allowed for creation in a digital realm that brought me fulfillment.
Jiani (45:34)
you
The technology to you is the brushes, the paint, the canvas. It's your art supplies. Beautiful.
Alvin W. Graylin (45:51)
Existently.
Jiani (45:53)
What role does childlike wonder play in your life, in your adventurous life?
Alvin W. Graylin (45:59)
Like I said earlier, think today's education system takes away that wonder, takes away the curiosity. But over the last probably 20 years or so, I've actually changed my perspective. When I was in school, I was so focused on getting good grades. And I prided myself on graduating top of my class and blah, And looking back, it really didn't matter.
what the grades were. If you're in the top 10%, you'll probably end up in the same place. But because I was trying to strive for being number one, I didn't do very much else outside of the school activity. After probably about 30 or so, I started to realize that I need to broaden my exposure and started to read much more broadly.
the more I read, the more I realized I didn't know. I that's kind of a cliche, but then the more I learned, the more enjoyment I got from learning. So I think that's the part that I wish a lot of people would realize earlier. And I think they would be glad that they made a change of priority from improving test scores to improving actual learning.
to broaden their information and understanding beyond their sector of industry. that's kind of my perspective. And then I tried to have taught that to my kids and get them to learn beyond their specific curriculum because I think that'll make them a much more fuller human long run.
Jiani (47:27)
Beautiful. A holistic increase of depth and width of what we call life through reading and learning. It's great. What do you think is your magic?
Alvin W. Graylin (47:32)
and what we select.
I don't know if I have any specific magic, but I think the thing that I seem to do well is to be able to communicate the complex concepts in a way that is understandable and to aggregate content and information from a lot of disparate sources and to come up with something somewhat concrete from that. you know, hopefully, you know, the book is kind of one of the
results of some of things that I've, you it took two or two years to write it, but it's something that has been brewing for much longer.
Jiani (48:08)
It's just time for it to bear fruit. Beautiful. Thank you, Alvin, for sharing your precious time and your vision and your magic with us and our audience. for those who want to get connected with Alvin, his information is in the show note below. Please get connected to create new adventures and...
Alvin W. Graylin (48:11)
Yes, exactly.
Jiani (48:29)
potentially expedite us to that potential ideal future that we all want to step into. thank you so much, Alvin.
Alvin W. Graylin (48:37)
Thanks for inviting me and enjoy the conversation and let's all play a role in bringing about that future that you're talking about.
Jiani (48:41)
play a role.
Beyond Geography Lottery
Imagine putting on glasses weighing less than 50 grams and instantly traveling to ancient Egypt, shrinking to explore the human bloodstream, or having tea with an elderly woman in rural China. No passport required, no carbon footprint, no economic barriers.
"In virtual worlds, it costs the same to wear Versace as a t-shirt," Graylin notes. "You can look like whatever you want. This allows us to stop judging people by their cover and judge them by what really matters—their insights and character."
The economic implications are staggering. Today, you can mostly work for companies in your city, sometimes remotely within your country. Tomorrow, any cognitive work could be performed virtually anywhere, creating what Graylin calls "a truly mobile workforce" where "wealth redistribution happens naturally without immigration."
The Learning Revolution
Perhaps nowhere is the potential more transformative than in education. Traditional schools, Graylin argues, "teach the curiosity out of children" by forcing everyone through the same curriculum at the same pace.
With AI tutors providing one-on-one instruction and VR enabling hands-on learning, students could explore at their own speed, in their preferred style, asking endless questions without pestering teachers. A visual learner could watch planets collide to understand gravity. A kinesthetic learner could manipulate virtual molecules to grasp chemistry.
"The best way to learn languages is to spend six months in a country," Graylin says. "This technology allows any child to virtually travel anywhere they want, for as long as they want, interacting with locals—real or AI."
The Choice Point
But Graylin isn't naive about the challenges. His book is structured as a debate between an optimist and a pessimist because, he insists, we get to choose our future. The same AI that could provide universal abundance could concentrate power in a few hands. The same automation that could give everyone a two-day work week could eliminate 40% of jobs instead.
"We're at a critical moment," he warns. "The changes will happen in 5-10 years, much faster than previous industrial revolutions. If we don't prepare well, the transition could be very rocky."
The solution requires shifting from a scarcity to an abundance mindset, from competition to collaboration. Instead of countries racing to "win" the AI race, Graylin advocates for global cooperation: "There is no winning if you think of it as a weapon to keep others down. That will only escalate problems and end in war."
The Human Future
In Graylin's optimistic scenario, work transforms from a survival necessity to a meaningful contribution. Universal basic income—or "universal high income"—frees people to pursue their true gifts rather than just the highest paycheck.
"Most people aren't doing the job they feel most gifted to do," he observes. "They're doing the job they think will make the most money."
As AI handles formulaic tasks, human skills become premium: empathy, communication, leadership, ethics. The very qualities that make us human become our greatest assets.
The geographic lottery that has determined human destiny for millennia could finally end—not through physical migration, but through digital transcendence. The question isn't whether the technology will arrive, but whether we'll choose to use it for universal flourishing or concentrated power.
"We cannot expect someone else to do it for us," Graylin concludes. "We have to play an active role. Everybody can play a part."
The future is calling. Will you pick up?
⭐ Alvin’s MAGIC
Alvin W. Graylin is a globally recognized tech leader, entrepreneur, author, and investor with over 30 years of experience in AI, extended reality (XR), cybersecurity, and semiconductors. He currently serves as Chairman of the Virtual World Society, Digital Fellow at Stanford’s Digital Economy Lab, and was formerly Global VP and China President at HTC, driving major innovation in the VR/AR space. Graylin is also the author of "Our Next Reality," which explores the convergence of AI and XR and its impact on society.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/agraylin/
AGI philosophy: https://open.substack.com/pub/abundanist/p/abundanism
Book: OurNextReality.com
Alvin's Magic
At nine years old, Alvin discovered his superpower: breathing life into ideas through code. While his painter father wielded brushes and pens and his ballerina mother danced stories into existence, young Alvin found his artistic voice in the digital realm—creating something from nothing, line by line. Today, that same magic manifests as a rare gift for distilling complexity into clarity, weaving disparate threads of knowledge into tapestries of possibility. He doesn't just see the future—he paints it in words vivid enough for others to inhabit, transforming technology from cold abstraction into humanity's canvas for collective flourishing.
Credits & Revisions:
Guest Alignment Reviewer: Alvin Wang Graylin
Story Writer/Editor: Dr. Jiani Wu
AI Partner: Perplexity, Claude
Initial Publication: Aug 16 2025
Disclaimer:
AI technologies are harnessed to create initial content derived from genuine conversations. Human re-creation & review are used to ensure accuracy, relevance & quality.
