Some people's lives are like horror movies. It's strange that, in an age that can create virtual reality, self-driving cars and intelligent machines, the world's third-largest economy can't solve the problem of human misery. More and more Japanese women seem to feel it is. Female suicide is sharply rising. National Police Agency statistics tell the tale, as far as numbers can tell it -- 651 women are known to have taken their own lives that month, up from 400-500 a month typically.

"We today," says Komazawa University economist Tomohiro Inoue, whose thought it is, "will soon be'the former human race.'" The propulsion forward comes from artificial intelligence, already upon us and infinite in its potential. We're going somewhere -- that much is certain. That, there is no knowing. Inoue's remark occurs in a conversation with two others, published by the monthly Bungei Shunju (March) as part of a wide-ranging package of articles on the subject.