AI as a Bubble

Cory Doctorow's latest LOCUS column analyzes AI as a "tech bubble." What Kind of Bubble Is AI?

Although I had a vague idea of what economists mean by "bubble," I looked it up to make sure. I thought of the phenomenon as something that expands quickly and looks pretty but will burst sooner or later. The Wikipedia definition comes fairly close to that concept: "An economic bubble (also called a speculative bubble or a financial bubble) is a period when current asset prices greatly exceed their intrinsic valuation, being the valuation that the underlying long-term fundamentals justify." The term originated with the South Seas Bubble of the early eighteenth century, involving vastly inflated stocks. The Dutch "tulip mania" of the seventeenth century offers another prominent example.

Doctorow takes it for granted that AI fits into this category. He begins his essay with, "Of course AI is a bubble. It has all the hallmarks of a classic tech bubble." He focuses on the question of what KIND of bubble it is. He identifies two types, "The ones that leave something behind, and the ones that leave nothing behind." Naturally, the first type is desirable, the second bad. He analyzes the current state of the field with numerous examples, yet always with the apparent underlying assumption that the "bubble" will eventually "pop." Conclusion: "Our policymakers are putting a lot of energy into thinking about what they’ll do if the AI bubble doesn’t pop – wrangling about 'AI ethics' and 'AI safety.' But – as with all the previous tech bubbles – very few people are talking about what we’ll be able to salvage when the bubble is over."

This article delves into lots of material new to me, since I confess I don't know enough about the field to have given it much in-depth thought. I have one reservation about Doctorow's position, however -- he discusses "AI" as if it were a single monolithic entity, despite the variety of examples he refers to. Can all possible levels and applications of artificial intelligence be lumped together as components of one giant bubble, to endure or "pop" together? Maybe those multitudes of different applications are what he's getting at when he contemplates "what we'll be able to salvage"?

Margaret L. Carter

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