It's real hard for me to conjure up "good" uses for, say, mustard gas or bioweapons or nuclear warheads.

"Technology is neutral" is a cop-out and should be seen as such. People should, at the very least, try to ask how people / society will make use of a technology and ask whether it should be developed/promoted.

We are all-too-often over-optimistic about how things will be used or position them being used in the best possible light rather than being realistic in how things will be used.

In a perfect world, people might only use AI responsibly and in ways that largely benefit mankind. We don't live in that perfect world, and it is/was predictable that AI would be used in the worst ways more than it's used in beneficial ones.