Here’s what Greg Joswiak had to say on the idea of merging the Mac and the iPad:

“Or people say that we’re merging them into one: that there’s really this grand conspiracy we have, to eliminate the two categories and make them one. And the reality is neither is true. We’re quite proud of the fact that we work really, really hard to create the best products in their respective category.”

I don’t see Apple merging the iPad and Mac platforms, rather I see them unifying the app ecosystem. This is already happening. iPad apps already run as-is on M1 Macs, and can be made more Mac-like via Catalyst and/or Swift UI. Same apps, different user experiences. I find the notion of an iPad containing macOS (or something macOS-like) in addition to iPadOS compelling because switching between the two based on available i/o seems feasible if apps can seamlessly be supported across both user experiences.

Doing so wouldn’t require merging platforms either. An iPad with two user experiences would let each experience be true to its form. A touch experience for touch, and a desktop experience for desktop. The notion of two user experiences on one devices seems crazy, but I would argue continuing to try and satisfy increasingly desktop i/o with an experience built for relatively small touch screens seems a lot crazier.