From all the benefits/positives I have seen from the use of AI I am yet to see an example of something that couldn't have been solved with simply providing more resource (more people - or more capital, if you prefer those terms). Any of the scientific breakthroughs or whatever... I'm sure humans could still have achieved. But fundamentally - the research was for what, exactly? Everything is geared towards the idea of progress, of enhancement, of bettering the human race to some extent. But why? How much of that is really needed? Why do we lack the ability to say no - we already have enough, or too much? What I hate the most about AI is that it came at a moment in time when it was least needed (see: polycrisis). It is now like the opposite of the elephant in the room... people can't stop talking about it. When this happens it becomes a magnet for further analysis and conservation, it becomes this self-fulfilling hype loop. Even I am talking about it here (again!). Why can't we talk about how moving away from capitalism and away from a growth-obsessed economy would have provided a real tangible benefit to our lives (or perhaps vitally, to allow people to live beyond our lives... to have ancestors that inhabit a healthy planet?) We love the shiny new gadgets and toys, we love all the drama AI brings (will it or wont it wipe out humanity?) etc etc. We fail to ask the deeper (more difficult) questions like, a plan to reject capitalism and re-arrange how our society functions. I welcome the day we collectively start to ask the biggest questions like - does any of this tech *really* serve us, anymore? Or is it all just a means for yet *more* economic growth, no matter how you dress it up.