Is AI Apocalypse Inevitable? - Tristan Harris | After Skool

So I've always been a technologist.

And a decade ago, I was here warning about the problems of social media.

And I saw how a lack of clarity around the obvious downsides of that technology and a real inability to confront those downsides led to a totally preventable societal catastrophe.

And I'm here today because we don't have to make that mistake now with AI.

And I want us to choose differently.

Now, we're often told to dream about the possible of a new technology, but we don't often talk about the probable of what's actually likely to happen.

So the possible with social media was obviously, you know, we're going to give everyone a voice, democratize speech, help people connect with their friends.

But we didn't talk about how the probable, the business models behind social media aiming to maximize engagement, eyeballs, frequency of usage.

I saw 10 years ago how that would obviously lead and reward doom scrolling, more addiction, distraction, and ultimately result in the most anxious and depressed generation of our lifetime.

Now, it was kind of interesting watching this happen because at first I saw my friends who either started or worked at these social media companies and those in the tech industry more broadly, I saw them doubt these consequences.

You know, we didn't really want to face it.

And then we said, well, maybe this is just a moral panic.

Maybe this is just reflexive fear of a new technology.

And then once the data started rolling in and we saw the harms, people said, well, maybe this is inevitable.

This is just what happens when you connect people on the internet.

But we had a chance to make a different choice about the business models of engagement.

And had we made that choice 10 years ago, I want you to reimagine and replay in your mind how different the world might have played out if we didn't have maximizing engagement driving the psychology of billions of people.

So I'm here today to talk about AI.

So I've always been a technologist.

And a decade ago, I was here warning about the problems of social media.

And I saw how a lack of clarity around the obvious downsides of that technology and a real inability to confront those downsides led to a totally preventable societal catastrophe.

And I'm here today because we don't have to make that mistake now with AI.

And I want us to choose differently.

Now, we're often told to dream about the possible of a new technology, but we don't often talk about the probable of what's actually likely to happen.

So the possible with social media was obviously, you know, we're going to give everyone a voice, democratize speech, help people connect with their friends.

But we didn't talk about how the probable, the business models behind social media aiming to maximize engagement, eyeballs, frequency of usage.

I saw 10 years ago how that would obviously lead and reward doom scrolling, more addiction, distraction, and ultimately result in the most anxious and depressed generation of our lifetime.

Now, it was kind of interesting watching this happen because at first I saw my friends who either started or worked at these social media companies and those in the tech industry more broadly, I saw them doubt these consequences.

You know, we didn't really want to face it.

And then we said, well, maybe this is just a moral panic.

Maybe this is just reflexive fear of a new technology.

And then once the data started rolling in and we saw the harms, people said, well, maybe this is inevitable.

This is just what happens when you connect people on the internet.

But we had a chance to make a different choice about the business models of engagement.

And had we made that choice 10 years ago, I want you to reimagine and replay in your mind how different the world might have played out if we didn't have maximizing engagement driving the psychology of billions of people.

So I'm here today to talk about AI.