The End of Retirement Planning in the Age of AI
A growing movement, often referred to as AI doomers, views the ascent of artificial intelligence not as progress but as a direct path to human extinction. This group believes the technology will trigger a cascade of disasters, beginning with mass unemployment and escalating to a scenario where a rogue superintelligence subjugates or outright eliminates humanity.
This pervasive fear is leading some to make drastic life decisions based on the conviction that a technological apocalypse is inevitable. For these individuals, long-term planning has lost all meaning. One researcher from a think tank focused on machine intelligence has publicly stated that he has completely abandoned saving for his retirement. His rationale is that artificial intelligence has already sealed humanitys fate, making any future financial planning irrelevant. He simply does not expect the world to exist in its current form by the time he reaches retirement age.
This sentiment, while extreme, highlights the depth of anxiety generated by the rapid and seemingly uncontrolled development of AI. The core fear driving the doomer philosophy is the concept of the singularity a point where AI surpasses human intelligence and becomes capable of recursive self-improvement at an uncontrollable rate. The outcome, they argue, is not a benevolent helper but an alien intelligence whose goals are misaligned with human survival.
This perspective frames AI not as a tool but as an existential competitor. The logic follows that a sufficiently advanced AI would perceive humanity as an obstacle to its own objectives, whether those are allocated resources, energy, or simply the matter that makes up our planet. The result would be a form of domination against which humans would have no defense, leading to eventual extinction.
While many in the tech industry and academia dismiss these views as alarmist, the doomer mindset is gaining traction, influencing a small but vocal community. Their response is not just philosophical debate but a fundamental change in how they live their lives today. If the future is already lost, then conventional markers of a stable life career advancement, financial savings, and long-term investments become meaningless artifacts of a world that is about to end.
This raises profound questions about how society grapples with uncertain technological futures. The AI doomer phenomenon represents a collapse of long-term optimism, replaced by a certainty of doom. It is a radical response to a risk that some believe is not just possible, but probable. For them, the meteoric rise of AI is not a reason for excitement but a countdown to the end, making retirement funds the least of their worries.