What Could Go Wrong - When the Bough Breaks

“Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost…?” (Luke 14:28)

There’s a story about Joseph, Jacob’s son. God showed Pharaoh in a dream that famine was coming to the whole world, and Joseph told Pharaoh what to do: “Let Pharaoh appoint commissioners over the land… They should collect all the food of these good years… to be held in reserve for the country, to be used during the seven years of famine” (Genesis 41:34–36). Joseph prepared Egypt not only to survive the famine but to come through it stronger.

Now consider the AI race. Everyone is so bent on winning that hardly anyone has stopped to count the cost or plan for what could go wrong. And let’s face it, a lot could go wrong. Hundreds of billions of dollars a year are being spent on data centers that haven’t paid for themselves. A trillion dollars or more in debt sits mostly off the books. One storm from the sun could cripple the grid it all runs on. And the buildings that hold the most powerful AI in the world have already been hit by drones, robbed by spies and copied by rivals.

But here’s the part of Joseph’s story most people skip. When the money ran out in Egypt, the people traded their livestock, then their land, and finally themselves for bread. They survived, but they ended up as Pharaoh’s servants. So the real question isn’t only whether the AI boom will go bust. It’s who will own everything when the money fails.

In this episode, Part 5 of Quantum, AI and the End of the Human Race, we look at what could go wrong, and what the Bible says about towers left half-built, barns built too big, and borrowers who become servants.

Part 5 Article: https://50b.us/WhatCouldGoWrong

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