I think most people already understand "saving the planet" to be a figure of speech, a synecdoche where "the planet" means life, humanity, our world's hospitable climate, etc.
When it comes to nukes in particular, I get the impression the belief of normal people is it can go all the way to Alderaan. Yes, even though that's wrong by many orders of magnitude.
VN swarms, while currently sci-fi and dismissed by normal people, are a much discussed outcome for ASI, and seem to be taken seriously in such circles.
Everything else, sure — us != planet.