I think the biggest tragedy that comes from AI is that it caused people to give up. They see this thing that has the potential to displace them and instead of having the drive to improve themselves said “It’ll be better than me so why bother.”
It’s almost self fulfilling at that point, like, of course it’ll be better than you if you’ve made no effort.
This is also perpetuated by this idea that “AI is inevitable” that “it’s the worst it’ll ever be.” These truisms aren’t so true though, technology is not a thing that only improves over time, on the whole it seems to be, but that’s a result of incredible efforts from people who want to make the world a better place.
How much better is your experience on the internet? I’d wager pages are more frustrating to use and use many times more resources than in early days. You could have said the same about the internet when it popped off, but the last couple decades of “improvement” have people questioning the role it plays in their life. To even maintain the same level of quality of a piece of tech requires constant maintenance.
The idea that AI is inevitable seems tenuous at best, AI has not been proven yet, and a trend line, is not a guarantee. It could happen, but that will require the money to pour in at a high enough rate for long enough to not fizzle out. Like playing a game of chicken, what will happen first will AI succeed or will investors pull out?
The last thing that bugs me is, if you think it through, it could happen that AI replaces you, or it doesn’t, and you work on developing yourself or you don’t. If you consider the outcomes of the combinations,
- AI replaces you and you do not develop: AI is doing the thing you wanted to do.
- AI replaces you and you do develop: AI is doing the thing you wanted to do.
- AI doesn’t replace you and you do not develop: AI is also not doing the thing you wanted to do, but neither are you.
- AI doesn’t replace you and you develop: You are doing the thing you wanted to do.
To me it’s clear what to do with this thought, I am going to assume the best outcome and keep going, I can’t control the fate of AI. I can bet on myself though and assume that AI will not replace me, that to me gives me the only chance at the best outcome.