The automation race is upon us and with it, a great deal of fear about AIs taking jobs. Currently, society’s view of AI is it’s as shocking and scary as electricity was at in the early 1900s. The transition to electricity was scary, but there aren’t too many among us today who would willingly go back to oil lanterns. There are different categories of AI (machine learning, deep learning, cognitive computing) and most of them seem as useful as electricity and only one is an existential threat to humanity (superintelligence).

AIs taking jobs, creating better ones.

There’s no doubt AIs taking jobs is a threat to the current way we live, but so was the advent of automobiles to buggy and carriage manufacturers. We may have lost the romantic nostalgia of riding off into the sunset on our steed, but the lack of horse shit everywhere has greatly improved our ability to live in densely populated areas without a rampant spread of the disease that horse shit brings.

There will undoubtedly be some big scary upsets and people will lose their jobs, but like most exciting developments there will be plenty of upsides as well. Like any tool, one of the biggest threats AIs pose is who we let control them and to what degree they’re regulated. One of the biggest obstacles to getting over people’s fear of AIs taking jobs is to admit that a lot of today’s jobs are pretty boring and meaningless.

Most people do work out of materialist mandate to “earn a living” rather than pursue their interests or passion in life. Would you be as scared of losing your job if you knew that your AI replacement would enable you to enjoy life and pick a career you’d actually want to do? Artificial intelligence will not likely become a “sentient being” but if a superintelligence does, there isn’t much evidence it will take human characteristics of “evil” which don’t exist outside humanity.

AI Drivers: is it safe?

A lot of people in first world societies are lazy and content to be ignorant, increasingly so with the internet. For every concern of “AI cars taking the road” there are millions of accidents per year by human drivers – which can’t be ‘upgraded’ or ‘reprogrammed.’ Also, a human can’t drive at 300 MPH, but an AI could.

There may be cause for concern that humans will be increasingly “useless” from a societal function level. We simply won’t be able to drive 300MPH like an AI, but what if we didn’t have to? What if AIs opened more doors and provided a greater quality of life for everyone so that we wouldn’t have to worry about being replaced and instead could come up with better uses of human beings precious time on earth?

AIs vs. Superintelligence



Most of the fears people have about AI are not really AI, but more accurately referring to superintelligence. Superintelligence is a much bigger existential threat to and probably needs to be regulated as carefully as any other world-ending device like nuclear weapons. One of the worlds most popular AI businessman has stated that superintelligence is 100 times more dangerous than nuclear weapons. He’s not wrong that one day a machine could be so much smarter than humanity we will be powerless against it, but that’s assuming a superintelligence would care to enslave and or murder humanity.

Perhaps there would be some rationale for an AI to want to destroy all of humanity and could do so easily if it wished. It’s best not to take AI-lon’s warnings too seriously. First of all, there’s nothing you as an individual have the power to do to stop it – so why worry about it? Secondly, humanity’s had a good run – so why not bask in the good times and enjoy the time you have left on earth instead of being paralyzed in a state of panic over something that may or may not ever happen?

Should we fear AI, or fear itself?

Fear is the mind killer. – Frank Herbert, Dune



Fearmongering is at an all-time high on every side of the ideological fence. Whether you’re worried about nuclear war, climate change or illegal immigration our constant access to news and information has turned a lot of us into reactionary nervous wrecks. There have been far more serious existential crises throughout history and we seem to be getting along just fine, despite whatever difficulties we may face.

There may be plenty of legitimate cause for concern for AI, but that’s no excuse to start panicking. It is theoretically possible a “rogue” AI could end the world, but who’s to say another AI couldn’t counter it? There are always mentat berries to be had in case we need humans to evolve our intelligence to superhuman levels in order to counter the superintelligence.

What does AI-Lon Musk Think?

These are the ungrounded fears we need to address and stop playing the fool’s game of “yeah, but what if?” The amount of good that AI bring to the table, like electricity, far outweighs whatever downside we might fear. A superintelligence might be a problem, but like nuclear weapons, if all of humanity recognizes the threat ahead of time we’ll be far more careful how we approach it.

Part of the problem with taking AI-Lon too seriously is he’s pushing his own neural interface that may very well provide AIs the ability to “hack” humans. Like most captains of inudstry it’s best not to take their opinions as a sole source of information as they often have a hidden agenda. In AI-lon’s case, pushing more products and potentially

The less we indulge in the counterproductive emotion of fear, the more mental faculties we will have available to properly face our potential robotic foes. If we waste time cowering when we could be planting EMP bombs all over the place and sending people off planet to ensure humanity’s survival we will have nothing to fear, but fear itself. The wheels are already in motion, so you might as well hope for the best and prepare for the worst.

In the event of a massive machine war, you’ll need to have some protection against the various tactics we’ll take against it like EMP. So keep an old-fashioned spring watch handy, some beans in the cupboard and a smile on your face and everything will be just fine.

There are far worse fates than being enslaved by superintelligent AI, who knows you might just like it. Worrying about it certainly won’t help. If they do decide to annihilate humanity, chances are they’ll do it efficiently and you won’t feel a thing – so quit worrying about the future and start embracing your future helpers/overlords. Look on the bright side, we’ve had a good run and who knows, things may turn out better than ever before.

Even if the worst is true and we’re all doomed to be confined in sacks of goo like the Matrix, what good is panicking going to do about it?