It is one of our greatest advancements — Our society has made since introduction of the Internet. I don’t know when (or if) it will truly replace humans, but In the right hands and with the right mindset, this technology is a force multiplier. I work in tech and there are tasks I do regularly which are now done 2-3x faster with the help of an AI agent. And I’ve had instances where the agent helped me do something in 10 minutes that a year ago could have taken me most of the day.
It is a force multiplier, not a replacement — It seems a few years ago there was a belief floating around that Gen AI would democratize many roles and professions. Everyone can be a designer, anyone could be a coder. Now several years later I sense that belief is shifting to what I’m also observing first-hand in my day job and my professional network. AI multiplies the skillset a person already has. Senior developers can use this technology to augment their own abilities and become increasingly more effective. Yes, junior people can write some code and some design with AI, but they simply don’t have nearly as much that can be multiplied
People who learn to wield AI effectively will replace those that don’t — It is a tool and a very effective one at that. It’s the equivalent of giving someone a nail gun while others are happy to continue to build frames by bashing nails with whatever object they happen to hold. There are still folks out there who simply believe they don’t need to learn these tools, that they are fine being where they are as before and in a way they are right. But others, who take the time to learn will eventually run circles around them and economic forces will simply take care of the rest.
It will be the end human civilization — I don’t necessarily mean The Matrix or The Terminator scenarios. But any time an ecosystem is disrupted (think a forest fire or coral reef damage), the change puts stress on individual plants/animals. While the overall species will persevere (probably, hopefully) at the individual level many do not make it. This time the ecosystem is all of us, the human society. We, the humans, driven by greed and power and greed for power, will cause enough disruption through the deployment of these tools and this time the disruption will be on a global scale.