What do we call the 'it was ever thus' rhetoric used to dismiss AI concerns?
jjvincent · x · 2026-09-16
The author asks: is there a name for the rhetoric of dismissing fears with "it was ever thus"? E.g., discussing AI's effect on students and getting "calculators were supposed to end math," or finding 200-year-old quotes declaring literary criticism has always been in crisis.
A meta-question worth discussing: when do historical analogies in tech-panic debates genuinely inform, and when do they just shut down new concerns?
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