I think the author is hiding the ball a bit. The problem is that, for a long time, humans have attributed meaning, value, and social status to great cognitive insights. Taking physics as an example, it has almost always been the theorists who develop new ideas, not the experimentalists that test and validate them, who have won praise and acclaim. The name Arthur Eddington doesn’t have the same cachet as that of Albert Einstein. But now that the creation of those insights can be automated, there is a great wrenching as esteem shifts away from the former.

Well, maybe it’s a good thing that we are seeing this shift. Maybe it is good and right that we begin valuing your ability to exist in the real world, rather than play math puzzles on a sheet of paper. Because, while the AI labs are receiving a lot of attention and excitement now, that’s a short run phenomenon. Ultimately, people aren’t impressed for long by a machine doing something novel. Once it’s up and running, it fades into the background just like the combustion engine, or the dishwasher, or electric lighting.