Give the AI revolution time. It’s less about machines, more about us

Artificial intelligence (AI) will not save us. But people using AI might. Everywhere I go, I hear the same breathless excitement. Generative AI is hailed as the new saviour. Some worship it as the ultimate game-changer. Others whisper about disruption and doom. Valuations climb, pilot projects multiply and everyone seems desperate to be the first to claim they’ve cracked the AI code. But fire illuminates and blinds in equal measure.

Transformations can take long: History is full of technological promises that did not arrive overnight. Electricity took more than 30 years to change how we lived and worked. Why? Because dangerous currents had to be made safe, buildings had to be rewired, tools re-engineered and new systems imagined.