One of the fundamental shifts that still seems missing in the thinking of Altman, Thompson, and many others discussing AGI is the shift from technological thinking to civilizational thinking.
They’re reasoning in the paradigm of “products” — something that can diffuse, commoditize, slot into platform dynamics, maybe with some monetization tricks. Like smartphones or transistors. But AGI is not a product. It’s the point after which the game itself changes.
By definition, AGI brings general-purpose cognitive ability. That makes the usual strategic questions — like “what’s more valuable, the model or the user base?” — feel almost beside the point. The higher-order question becomes: who sets the rules of the game?
This is not a shift in tools; it’s a shift in the structure of goals, norms, and meaning.
If you don’t feel the AGI — maybe it’s because you’re not yet thinking at the right level of abstraction.
One of the fundamental shifts that still seems missing in the thinking of Altman, Thompson, and many others discussing AGI is the shift from technological thinking to civilizational thinking.
They’re reasoning in the paradigm of “products” — something that can diffuse, commoditize, slot into platform dynamics, maybe with some monetization tricks. Like smartphones or transistors. But AGI is not a product. It’s the point after which the game itself changes.
By definition, AGI brings general-purpose cognitive ability. That makes the usual strategic questions — like “what’s more valuable, the model or the user base?” — feel almost beside the point. The higher-order question becomes: who sets the rules of the game?
This is not a shift in tools; it’s a shift in the structure of goals, norms, and meaning.
If you don’t feel the AGI — maybe it’s because you’re not yet thinking at the right level of abstraction.