Will A.I destroy more jobs than it creates?

Q - "What's the difference between AI and Automation?"

A - Automation is what we can do with computers and AI is what we wish we could do with computers.

Modern AI does very well at solving a narrow set of problems.

- AI now beats the best humans at chess, and poker, and go.
- AI powers Google search. This works so well that you now take it for granted.
- Speech recognition works very well in well-defined circumstances... and there are many of them that are commercially successful including Siri and Alexa. Hands-free mode in cell phones is being written into the law.
- Pattern recognition is very effective in many industries, for example for doing quality assurance.

There are two extremes here. It is ridiculous to believe that AI will soon take over all human tasks. It is equally ridiculous to say that AI is not already having a significant impact on modern life that will continue into the foreseeable future.

What some people call "Weak AI", I call "Strong Automation". That doesn't mean it isn't valuable of functional, but in my opinion, calling any of it "AI" is like calling a helicopter an anti-gravity device.

I like your historical perspective, it is encouraging, but...AI isn't a wheel or printing press, it's a possible replacement of the human brain. I recently read a test plan for a satellite that someone asked ChatGPT to write, it wasn't too far off. Where AI is dangerous to jobs is how Walmart and Amazon destroyed small towns...among other factors of course, but the danger with AI is that it has the potential to harness immense amounts of knowledge (not experience) and come up with optimal solutions quickly and conduct mathematical predictiveness (statistical forecasting) far quicker than humans. It's the equivalent of the Star Trek replicator...a big change is coming in our lifetimes imo. It may be great, or greed and privilege may overtake its benefit for the rest of us.