Society determines what "shoulds" turn into "musts," and currently our society does not have any "must" for general cultural or social good. Only fiduciary responsibility. That's the structural cause here and should be the focus of attention
It's no different from the perspective of a business. A human is a tool in that context as much as a cotton gin or a horse is.
The difference is that it's less clear how humans can "just adapt to use the new tool" when the tool thinks. But this isn't actually that much of a difference -- were the horse ferriers re-employed as engine designers and manufacturers? No. From their perspective the engine was just as much of an existential threat.
The question remains: how do we mitigate the impact of making human labor obsolete on society and on the humans impacted. How do we make sure humans still have a way to contribute to society and the economy? The alternative is disastrous.
1. Well substantiated up to this point
2. Unknown
3. This is a serious metaphysical, question not something to punt on. Is there anything fundamental to humanity that makes us required for innovation, or is the only important thing our taste/selection criteria over which innovations we want? If it's the latter, you truly don't need a labor force the way we have one today to do what we're doing today.
"Path that needs a lot of things to go wrong" -- wrong for whom? For the people with money and power, the people who determine what jobs exist and what those jobs are doing, this would be a dramatic version of things going right (as long as they're able to capitalize on it). Human labor is an expense for business owners, not a virtue.
Not speaking to you in particular, but I'm shocked at how so many otherwise brilliant people are rendered practically neo-luddites by AI. The cotton gin was disruptive, but once it was invented there was no putting the genie back in the bottle. The same is true of agentic AI. The question isn't whether or not it will upset the status quo of human labor, it's how much and in what way.
Can it change? Yes. That's not the same question as will it change. And that is also not the same question as "will the change result in a different posture towards antitrust."
When was the last time substantive antitrust action was taken that forcefully restructured a large company to a significant degree?
> Occam's razor. This isn't a shadowy manufacturing cabal, threatened by 3D printing. Gun control lobbyists are trying to prevent the printing of handgun frames and Glock switches, because they're the easiest parts to print.
Probably more accurate to say politicians are trying to take actions which will be seen publicly as fighting against gun crime. It seems like a stretch to say anyone earnestly believes that 3D printed guns are a real problem in the landscape of existing gun crime in America
Isn't it expected that in a system that favors individualism over collectivism that a few people will be able to amass disproportionately more wealth and power than everyone else with no incentive or societally enforced responsibility to share that wealth and power, thus creating a society were your life is dictated by a few imbeciles at the top, not who are not bought by large corps, but who own the large corps?