Our attitudes towards AI reveal how we really feel about human intelligence

We’re in the untenable position of regarding the AI as alien because we’re already in the position of alienating each other

The idea that superintelligent robots are alien invaders coming to “steal our jobs” reveals profound shortcomings in the way we think about work, value, and intelligence itself. Labor is not a zero-sum game, and robots aren’t an “other” that competes with us. Like any technology, they’re part of us, growing out of civilization the same way hair and nails grow out of a living body. They’re part of humanity – and we’re partly machine.

When we “other” a fruit-picking robot – thinking of it as a competitor in a zero-sum game – we take our eyes off the real problem: the human who used to pick the fruit is considered disposable by the farm’s owners and by society when no longer fit for that job. This implies that the human laborer was already being treated like a non-person – that is, like a machine. We’re in the untenable position of regarding the machine as alien because we are already in the untenable position of alienating each other.