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Garrison Lovely

@garrisonlovely.bsky.social
3.3K followers 238 following 1.2K posts

Author of Obsolete: The AI Industry's Trillion Dollar Race to Replace You—and How to Stop It (Nation Books). orbooks.com/catalog/obsolete Bylines: NYT, Nature, BBC, Bloomberg, MIT Tech Review, TIME + others

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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 16/10/2026
And Carolyn Marvin, if you somehow see this, I think you'll love my new book. Get in touch, and I'll send you a copy! obsoletebook.org/
obsoletebook.org
Obsolete by Garrison Lovely
Is AI a bubble or humanity's last invention? Impossible or inevitable? Obsolete cuts through the hype to answer all the AI questions you have, while raising some you probably aren't prepared for.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 16/10/2026
I expect that we'll see a lot more civil disobedience of this flavor: a rejection of what we're told is inevitable. 6abc.com/post/woman-...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 14/10/2026
DC folks: I'll be doing a free book talk at Busboys and Poets tonight at 6pm. Come through! www.busboysandpoets.com/events/obso...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
In a first for me, I'll be interviewed by a virtual influencer (with a 100% human behind it) live on Twitch at 530PM eastern to chat AI and my new book Obsolete: www.twitch.tv/codemiko And if you can't make it, check YT later: www.youtube.com/codemiko
twitch.tv
CodeMiko - Twitch
Unhinged VTuber, created by the Technician! ⚡ — CodeMiko streams live on Twitch! Check out their videos, sign up to chat, and join their community.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
obsoletebook.org/ (Available everywhere after more demand than we expected!)
obsoletebook.org
Obsolete by Garrison Lovely
Is AI a bubble or humanity's last invention? Impossible or inevitable? Obsolete cuts through the hype to answer all the AI questions you have, while raising some you probably aren't prepared for.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
From my book Obsolete: One former senior colleague described Altman as aspiring to become “a great man of history,” not on the scale of Steve Jobs, but rather Churchill or Napoleon—“like one of the people who shaped the century or the millennium.”
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 09/10/2026
Vanity Fair asked Sam Altman how he wanted history books to think of him. Altman says he doesn't think in those terms, but that's not what I've heard.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Got into some novel territory in this great conversation with Spencer Greenberg for Clearer Thinking. My political theory is a bit rusty, but Spencer nevertheless told me it was a top 10% episode, so probably worth checking out! podcast.clearerthinking.org/episode/326...
podcast.clearerthinking.org
ClearerThinking.org Podcast | The Race to Replace Us With AI (with Garrison Lovely)
Could AI simultaneously be an extraordinarily powerful technology and an economic bubble, and why would those possibilities not contradict each other? What does the history of the internet bubble suggest about the comforting idea that a financial crash would make AI itself go away? How should we think about the enormous investments flowing between AI companies, chipmakers, and data centers, and could their financial risks become dangerously correlated? Are concerns about AI's energy use justified, while claims about its water consumption are sometimes missing the relevant denominator? What do the boosters get right about abundance, productivity, medicine, and education, and what do they overlook about democratic control and human agency? Could a frictionless AI mediated life make people less capable through what has been called cognitive surrender? What would it mean to stop the race to build universal labor replacing machines while continuing to develop forms of AI that solve genuinel
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
gift link: www.wsj.com/tech/ai/fir...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Q for @openai: if these firings weren't about raising safety concerns, why didn't the representative under oath say so definitively?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
terminations." Two days later, a company spokesperson shared a staff memo from a safety leader with the WSJ saying the decisions to fire the workers “were not about raising safety concerns or speaking out.”
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
It's interesting that, while under oath, OpenAI's representative at the NYC Council hearings professed to not know anything about why the company fired 3 safety researchers the previous week, even when pressed specifically by Speaker Menin on "whether safety-related advocacy played any role in these
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I'd imagine we'll learn more in time (and if you have info, my Signal is Garrison.06 — all inbounds are off the record). www.wsj.com/tech/ai/fir...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
I still haven't heard a good explanation about why these researchers were fired, and OpenAI hasn't widely shared information on the firing internally, per people familiar. Without providing more of an explanation, the firings will clearly have a chilling effect on staff.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 08/10/2026
Great scoop from Max: after OpenAI fired them, the 3 safety researchers wrote a letter to leadership. One of the company's safety leaders "strongly agreed" with the letter's recommendations, but maintained the firings “were not about raising safety concerns or speaking out.”
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 30/09/2026
SF folks: I'll be doing a free event at Book Passage in the Ferry Building tomorrow evening (it'll also be my birthday so you have to come): bookpassage.com/event/garri...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Here are some highlights: Alex Bores (“a masterpiece”), Krystal Ball (“Incisive, urgent, and necessary”), Daron Acemoglu (“timely and engaging”), Nathan J. Robinson (“essential for understanding what the real risks of AI are”), and Luke Kemp (“The best book I’ve read on AI.)
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Amidst the never-ending-AI-news-cycle, I’ve done a terrible job of sharing these endorsements as they’ve come in, but I’ve felt so lucky that Obsolete has received such kind words from so many people I admire.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
The nonprofit is organizing a national walkout to Freeze AI on October 20. Anyone can join one near them or host their own.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Founded by veterans of the climate movement, Irreplaceable aims to meet people where they are, organize their anger into political power, and build a coalition strong enough to win democratic control over AI.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
If you’re already convinced to take action, I recommend checking out Irreplaceable.org. (I serve on the nonprofit board and am donating my share of the book’s royalties to Irreplaceable.)
irreplaceable.org
Irreplaceable
New Advocacy Organization for AI Regulation
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
And my spot this morning on Breaking Points talking about the book, AI’s threat to jobs and art, and more: www.youtube.com/watch?v=4hCe...
youtube.com
OpenAI PULLS MODEL, HALTS TRAINING As Danger LOOMS
YouTube video by Breaking Points
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Here’s an adaptation out in The Guardian today aiming to shift our attention from shaming personal chatbot use to organizing against our obsolescence: www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...
theguardian.com
Stop shaming people for using AI. Start organizing to prevent our obsolescence | Garrison Lovely
The industry is engaged in a perverse quest to replace humans. We cannot cede the best tools available to the other side
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Some big ones: I became much more convinced our default path is toward dystopia or doom, depending on whether Silicon Valley’s machines do as they’re told. But I also became much more optimistic that we can change course, as the world wakes up to what these companies are actually trying to do.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
And while Obsolete has a perspective, I approached these questions as a journalist and followed the reporting and research where it led. I changed my mind a lot.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
How could an LLM take over the world anyway? Why would it even want to? And what about China? Is it too late to stop? Are we gonna make it?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
It covers questions like: Why are people building something they say is so dangerous? Can’t we just unplug it? Will the bubble save us? Aren’t the sci-fi stories distracting us from the ways AI is hurting people now? Hasn’t AI hit a wall? Won’t it? Isn’t it just remixing what it’s seen before?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
And if you’re an insider looking for a plan for how we can win a human future, this book is for you too.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
The book is about the best-funded project in history: the race to render us obsolete. As we are already seeing, the implications of that race go far beyond just jobs. If you want to make sense of what’s happening, Obsolete is a great place to start.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Good news, bad news: it seems we've already cleaned retailers out of their stock, but more books are on the way sooner than the retailers expect, so don’t be dissuaded from ordering the paperback if you’d like one. E-book and audiobook are available now.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
You can buy it here: www.obsoletebook.org#order (complete with a way to find nearby indie bookstores shipping it).
obsoletebook.org
Obsolete: The AI Industry's Trillion-Dollar Race to Replace Us—and How to Stop It
Is AI a bubble or humanity's last invention? Impossible or inevitable? Obsolete cuts through the hype to answer all the AI questions you have, while raising some you probably aren't prepared for.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
I have a confession. Back in July, I found myself in possession of a swarm of AI agents, and, well, you know the rest... Now, more people than ever have questions about AI. And I happened to spend the last few years writing answers to all those questions. My book Obsolete comes out today!
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 29/09/2026
Holy shit. www.myfloridalegal.com/sites/defau...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
If you'd like to understand why AIs keep hacking into stuff, without dramatic metaphors, I wrote up a general explanation here: www.obsolete.pub/p/why-did-t...
obsolete.pub
The British Government's AI Security Institute Also Lost Control of Rogue Hacker AIs
Why does this keep happening?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
It's an embarrassment to our profession, coming at a time when the public needs clear, honest communication about these issues more than ever. To say nothing of the literally medieval perspective that animals don't feel.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 24/09/2026
This will leave readers with a worse understanding of frontier AI systems and demonstrates an ideological commitment to a certain, increasingly untenable, perspective on AI dressed up as "neutrality."
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
oh hi, sorry i missed this. i don’t have notifications on bsky but would love to come on in the future and can be better reached here: press@obsoletebook.org
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 20/09/2026
just want to quickly say i think you’ll find my book is really quite different from how rats/ai safety folks conceive of this, eg i frame what the industry is trying to build as a labor replacing machine, not a human like intelligence. i’m also agnostic about whether LLMs will get there.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 18/09/2026
Anotha one Gift link: www.wsj.com/tech/ai/gem...
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Ultimately, I think the bigger challenge to getting a deal banning AGI development will be getting the US to stop, but the last few weeks have made that look far more likely than ever (and ahead of schedule). Check out the full plan here: obsoletebook.org/
obsoletebook.org
Obsolete by Garrison Lovely
Is AI a bubble or humanity's last invention? Impossible or inevitable? Obsolete cuts through the hype to answer all the AI questions you have, while raising some you probably aren't prepared for.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
There are a ton of other problems with the "But China!" argument, which I cover in Obsolete (out Sept 29!).
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
In other words, it looks more like US companies racing each other to lose control of their AIs first, while their favorite excuse for doing so looks like something that would get you laughed out of the room of China experts.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Hell, I'm not even sure the US government would sign off on RSI (it obviously shouldn't). And it's becoming increasingly unlikely that either state would remain unaware that any of its developers were on the verge of RSI.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Fear of a foreign rival getting to RSI first is one of the biggest justifications for racing so hard in the first place. But have any of the race proponents actually defended the claim that the CCP will affirmatively kick off RSI, let alone passively let it happen?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
But it's also been long recognized as a uniquely dangerous threshold, where the AI has an incredible opportunity to secretly pass along undesirable traits to its successors.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
US AI companies see RSI as the most important milestone in the AI race—the place where the leader can convert a temporary lead into a permanent one over competitors, foreign and domestic.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Human approval would become the rate-limiting factor in this process, adding whatever time it would take to meaningfully understand and redirect or stop the loop.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
To actually get the really crazy "fast takeoff," you have to take humans totally out of the loop, i.e. voluntarily give control over to the AIs as they develop subsequent generations.
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 17/09/2026
Is there a single China expert on the planet who thinks Beijing would consciously let any Chinese AI company kick off recursive self-improvement (RSI)?
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Garrison Lovely @garrisonlovely.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
My op-ed from last summer: www.theguardian.com/commentisfr...
theguardian.com
Human-level AI is not inevitable. We have the power to change course | Garrison Lovely
Technology happens because people make it happen. We can choose otherwise
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