The rise of AI denialism

The piece argues that recent claims that AI has stalled, that its output is mere “slop,” or that the boom is just another bubble ignore how quickly frontier models are improving. It says the public reaction is better explained as denial about the possibility of losing human cognitive supremacy to artificial systems.

It also says AI may soon rival or exceed humans in creativity and emotional intelligence, which would matter for jobs, communication, and influence. The article points to coding progress, model performance in competition, and the risk of AI assistants reading and shaping people with superhuman accuracy.

Reading notes

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• AI skepticism is presented as denial of continuing rapid progress, not as a neutral correction.
• The article says frontier models are improving at a pace the author finds unprecedented in his lifetime.
• Human creativity is treated as vulnerable to being matched or exceeded by AI systems.
• Emotional intelligence is described as a possible weakness, because AI may read micro-expressions and behavior more accurately than people can.
• AI assistants are expected to become embedded in phones and glasses and to influence users throughout the day.
• The article says denial makes preparation for AI risks harder.
• It uses coding benchmarks and competition results to argue that current systems already outperform earlier expectations.
• The text concludes that AI will change work, government, science, engineering, the military, and education, and that this is not a bubble but a real transformation.