My position on AI is merely the conservative, skeptical position of
2006, updated with intellectual honesty for the reality of late 2026.
And that position, if you need me to spell it out, is as follows:
It seems to me that the Singularity has already started; it’s just
wildly unevenly distributed. Yes, I still unload the dishwasher and clip
my toenails. On the other hand, in whatever years I have left, I don’t
expect that I’ll ever again prove a theorem because I’m actually needed
to prove it. If I do, it will only be for my or others’ enjoyment or
edification.
...
Maybe it will help if I briefly switch topics. Ever since my wife and I
moved to Austin, I’ve sometimes gotten some version of the following
query: “How can you, as both a Jew and a skeptical scientist, possibly
get along well with all those evangelical Christians down there in
Texas? Sure, they might seem super friendly to Jews, but don’t you
understand that that’s only because of the special role Jews play in
their eschatology—when Christ will return in glory, and you’ll either
accept Him as Lord or else roast in hell for eternity?” I stare at them
and say: “wait, so I get to accept Christ only after He returns? What a
great deal! How could I possibly have any objection to that?”
For anyone who says AI doom sounds like an apocalyptic religion, that
the rationalists/Singulatarians seem like a Bay Area cult, that Eliezer
Yudkowsky gives off the vibes of a messianic prophet: yes, yes, and yes.
But crucially, today you’re no longer being asked to believe in
arguments and extrapolations, but only in the front-page news. Accepting
the reality of the coming machine god after it’s solved Navier-Stokes
and dozens of other longstanding open math problems (while dramatically
ramping up in capability every month), is sort of like accepting Jesus
after he’s returned to earth on the gleaming cloud. It’s the epistemic
bare minimum.
