This is not only about AI the technology, it's the deserved anger against the privileged and powerful for their utter mismanagement of society. The youth sees through the bullshit. Good on them, there may be hope for humanity after all.
This doesn't even work as a metaphor. I absolutely would not jump on the chance to ride on a literal rocket ship without asking a hell of a lot of questions first!
The whole speech was probably written by AI anyway </sarcasm>
But here, back in the real world, with one life to live, majority of people will simply refuse because they have lives and sane interested person asks a lot of questions. I mean, was he one of early Titan submersible passengers? And that one guaranteed quick death rather then prolonged one or slavery or what have you.
At this point, people in tech are just as hated as bankers and the general public will see them as their enemies, taking away their job, but this time permanently.
Of course he knows there will be a crash in this, so its unsurprising to see this reaction. But the point is, Schmidt does not care either way as he stands to benefit and expects humanity to be paying for the tokens.
He is already prepared for the eventual backlash anyway.
Perhaps Schmidt should Google “Space Shuttle Challenger” before making that analogy.
If BP had just built a rocket ship without testing, would you jump in it without asking questions? What about Phillip Morris? Some rando on the street? Because those are the equivalents of the people building these AI systems today. No care for safety or doing what’s right, only profit. Killing you and harming everyone around you is only as bad as the loss of revenue it may cause.
Does that make OpenAI Phillip-Morris selling "healthier" cigarettes, or are they actually trying? I don't know, I don't work there. But saying there's "no care" isn't true. Not enough, obviously, but it's not zero.