What Worries Me About AI and What Doesn’t

I've been watching smart people lose their minds over generative AI for the past two years, and it's been… interesting.

Sometimes I’ll even break out the popcorn to watch Ivy League professors compete for the worst possible AI take. My favourite was when a humanities professor declared that AI is evil. No qualifications, no cost-benefit analysis, just evil. If you’re a fan of this bloodsport, you can grab yourself a front row seat by logging into BlueSky, which just might have more AI-haters than any other corner of the internet.

Please don't get me wrong. Just because I think so much of AI skepticism is overblown doesn’t mean I believe all the AI hype either. There are legitimate reasons to be concerned about AI, especially in my little corner of the world. But I've noticed that people often worry about the wrong things while ignoring the stuff that is actually concerning. So let me sort this out: here are two AI fears I believe you can safely ignore, followed by two that genuinely wor…