Apocalypse 2030: If Artificial Intelligence Kills Us, We've Only Helped It

This morning, cup of hot black coffee in hand and the usual feed spewing yet another gospel of terror. The Silicon Valley gurus and a handful of scientists with heavy chairs they dropped the bomb: by 2030 there is a 20% probability that the’Artificial intelligence wipe the human race off the face of the earth.

The 20%. One in five. Translated for those who don't know statistics: Russian roulette played with a five-shot pistol.

All hell breaks loose. Hysterical nine-column headlines, keyboard commentators with cold sweats on their temples, hordes of self-styled technophobes staring at the toaster as if it were a Terminator ready to slaughter their cat. All terrified of silicon, of code, of the ravenous algorithm that will take our breath away.

Too bad no one bothered to do a basic calculation. One of those you do in your head while you wait for the coffee maker to come out. Take the overall extinction risk between now and 2030 and set it at 100. If we assign a 20-point quota to Artificial Intelligence... where does the other 80% come from? From deep space? From the wrath of a deity fed up with our racket?

No.

The scientific literature on existential risks — the serious one Future of Humanity Institute of Oxford and the Center for the Study of Existential Risk from Cambridge, not sponsored posts on LinkedIn — speaks with disarming clarity.

Nature, in this collective madness, barely gets a miserable 1%.

Everything else, the remaining 79% (plus the algorithm's 20%, that's 99% hands down), bears a single, unmistakable signature. Ours. It's us. With our sick ingenuity, the pride of cheap demigods, and the chronic inability to not hurt ourselves. Let's lay this percentage out on the dissecting table, slice by slice.

1. Biohazards and engineered pandemics: about 35%

Forget bats or wet markets. Here we're talking about synthetic biology and low-cost gene editing. Natural pathogens, thanks to their ecological grace, rarely combine absolute lethality with supersonic spread. They have a limit. Humans don't. Humans enter high-containment laboratories to play the sorcerer's apprentice, creating viruses optimized for extermination with surgical efficiency. All it takes is a faulty seal, human error, a slipped test tube, or the usual fanatic with a DNA synthesizer in the basement. Liquid death, bottled and ready to use.

2. Thermonuclear Holocaust and Eternal Winter: About 30%

The timeless classic. The evergreen of our suicidal delirium. Two superpowers with nerves on edge, a few autocrats with fragile egos and a trembling finger over the red button. Nuclear lightning isn't even the worst problem. That incinerates immediately, sparing you the agony. The true human masterpiece is the millions of tons of soot blasted straight into the stratosphere. The sun goes out for years. The planet freezes. Photosynthesis stops and the earth stops producing food. Billions of people starving in pitch darkness. A tombstone to geopolitical ineptitude.

3. Climate tipping points and cascading collapse: around 10%

Forget the reassuring fairy tales from international conferences with targets set for 2050. By 2030, the real danger is an immediate short circuit. Permafrost collapsing and spewing methane hydrates into the atmosphere like a suffocating monster. The world's main granaries collapsing simultaneously. Or some desperate, uncoordinated attempt at solar geoengineering, where, to cool the planet, we end up disrupting monsoon cycles and poisoning drinking water. The Earth doesn't die: it just scrapes our presence off.

4. Nanotechnology and Civilizational Blackouts: About 4%

Microscopic self-replicating molecular machines gone haywire, or a combined cyber attack capable of wiping out the world's critical infrastructure on a typical Tuesday afternoon. No electricity. No water in the pipes. No food logistics. Three days without electricity, and our sophisticated civilization is tearing itself apart over a can of beans.

5. The Universe and the Cosmos: The Scarce 1%

Two-kilometer-diameter asteroids? The exploding Yellowstone caldera? Gamma rays from space? Sure, these are real threats. But geological timescales measure time in hundreds of thousands of years. Nature and the cosmos look down on us with sidereal boredom. If a giant asteroid crossed our orbit, it would probably brake so as not to spoil the show. It would shout: “Take your time, guys, you're killing yourselves very well.”.

Do you understand where the short circuit is?

We love to shout about the plague spreader against Artificial Intelligence.

It's a convenient, reassuring psychological alibi. Blaming the algorithm instantly absolves us. If a super-intelligent digital entity wipes us out, we become tragic victims, romantic heroes defeated by the Frankenstein monster we created. It's almost epic. It's even cool for podcasts.

To acknowledge, however, that the 80% risk four years from now depends on our biological laboratories, our ballistic missiles, and our inability to stop plundering the earth… well, that sucks. Because there's nothing epic about it. It's just miserable idiocy.

Artificial Intelligence hasn't yet picked up a weapon, but we've already packed nuclear silos and laboratory refrigerators to the brim. We're the arsonists who watch the spark in the silicon box while clutching the gasoline can to our chests.

He who causes his own misfortune cannot really cry over himself. And if we end up extinct, it won't be because machines have become too smart. It will be because we have remained desperately stupid.

The next time you read an apocalyptic post about ChatGPT stealing your planet, turn off the screen. Look at your hands. What beats there is flesh, blood, the ability to create wonders or the madness to set everything on fire. We are the detonator. We always have been.

I seek beauty, everywhere. And if I don't find it, I create it. Before anyone forgets how.