What is scary about AI is not ChatGPT or Midjourney, Dalle, whatever. What is scary is that they showed up 10 years sooner than the earliest predictions, and are still rapidly improving. That is what should give people pause and it's amazing how many people miss this.
This is a very big "probably". About as big as the "in a few years, AI drivers will probably be better than human drivers" line from 2015.
Regardless: an AI can definitively be better than a human at something like Go (a closed game with a clear win condition) or driving (a logistical task with no creativity). But how do you define "better" when it comes to art? From a technical perspective, AI is already better than the vast majority of human artists! Very few artists would be able to, say, draw images of nature to create something that has the same contours as a popular meme[0].
So, arguably, we're already at the point where AI-generated art is "better" than human art. The question is, does that matter? Or does it matter in the same way that it matters that a motorcycle is faster than Usain Bolt?
There will come a day when someone realizes they don't need a team of artists, they just need one. And that one doesn't need to be that good (read: paid well) either.
Human art isn't going to disappear. Definitely not. But the value of it is on the cusp of falling dramatically. Banksy will stay popular and still command millions. However that kid who you graduated with that is "an incredible artist" probably just went from a 75% chance of a decent artistic career to a 3% chance.
Now this will happen with graphics and writing as well. Handmade graphics will become a niche, and there will be top graphic artists working for new AI models, like top tailors now do in fashion.
This is just the beginning of extreme market disruptions. All commercial driving will certainly be automated within the next 25 years. Things will change. Markets will adapt.
And if the rich are smart, they won't let people starve. Because this does not serve anyone. Hungry angry mobs will sow chaos and destruction.
Bit of a nitpick but the best known predictor of this kind of stuff is probably Ray Kurzweil and he's predicted AI passing the Turing test for 2029 since 2005 or so, so the state of AI being a little pre Turing now is almost spot on.
He also got AI beating humans at chess correct to within a year. It's not actually that hard - you plot computer capabilities on a log graph and extend the line a bit.
What is maybe a little scary and amazing how many people dismiss is the bit after 2029.
By what measure of better? Is a work by Thomas Kinkade[1] "better" than one by Leon Glob[2]? Statements like this are utterly bizarre to me.