The living talk
The AI Reckoning
The moment AI collides with our identity, our work, and what we value most. When denial is no longer possible.
Victor del Rosal 106 slides Updated 2 October 2026
First given at National College of Ireland, 29 September 2026
The question
When the machines are smarter than all of us, who do we get to be?
The arc of the hour
Nine beats, in the order the room saw them.
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In 1903, the New York Times predicted flying machines would be built in one to ten million years. The Wright brothers achieved the first powered flight 69 days later.
See it in the deck, slide 7 -
Six measurements, one direction. On puzzles it has never seen: 95%, from 6.5%, in 17 months. Every new test we build falls faster than the last.
See it in the deck, slide 11 -
AI as tool, as advisor, as digital colleague, as partner. Now we set the goal; it runs the chain. The steam engine did not design better steam engines.
See it in the deck, slide 22 -
Lake Michigan, one doubling at a time. By the time it looks dramatic, most of the journey has already happened.
See it in the deck, slide 34 -
Homo sapiens. The wise ones. We named ourselves for the one thing we assumed could never be exceeded.
See it in the deck, slide 51 -
“AI is not here to take your job; it’s to take away what you don’t want to do.”
See it in the deck, slide 73 -
Identity, purpose, meaning, agency. Meaning has never required being the best at something. Sometimes it comes entirely from choosing to do it.
See it in the deck, slide 74 -
A durable job is not one AI cannot do. It is one people keep choosing a human for, even when AI could: preference, institutional, accountability, capability.
See it in the deck, slide 77 -
A business is a chain of tasks, and the chain moves at the speed of its slowest link. Some weak links are chosen by society, not set by physics.
See it in the deck, slide 79
The reckoning was never about AI. It was about us.
Who do we get to be?
The ultimate question?
How do we make superintelligence truly care about us while preserving our agency?
From the room
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