My comment won't be an exhaustive investigation into AI doomerism and why it's wrong and harmful, but I do want to just highlight one particular thread in all this, which is fear.

Human beings are addicted to it. And, unfortunately, it sells. It sells not just in politics, where in my country there is a surge of blaming the "other" (Russian disinfo ops, immigrants) for the slow decay of our lifestyles, it also sells in tech to otherwise smart people.

We'd all benefit from a little less fear, which shuts off our ability to reason. I'd so value more rational discourse that doesn't immediately veer into this extreme or that extreme. How can it be that we across the globe are so polarized, so incapable of having reasonable discourse that doesn't immediately result in wild-eyed proclamations of the total extinction of the human race or turning the "other side" into slavering devils who may as well be non-humans?

I knew this wouldn’t have any substance, but I’m kind of appalled nonetheless.

They had the time to find and interview Gebru and Bender to say that AI will never be smart enough to matter (which, in 2026: cmon), but not to engage with a single actual paper on the subject. Instead they just tossed some faces on a gradient, said that their reasoning is “not clear”, and moved on. Maybe, idk… maybe the books and papers and stuff might help? Or you could interview them?

Sources for the claim that AI scientists are “bad scientists”? Well, let’s run em down:

- some people speculated they are, without specifically citing an argument, figure, or even vague group.

- there’s a plausible motive for them to lie, as they want their field to exist and be important.

At least the climate change doubters had some data! These folks only remembered to bring the spurious allegations part. Kids these days…