# Alexandr Wang rejects AI Doomerism | TWiST Flashback *This Week in Startups Clips* · https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WiXuJpDHjIs ## Summary This short TWiST Flashback clip features Alexandr Wang rejecting AI doomerism by arguing that AI and machine learning will help humans focus on higher and higher value work. He uses truck driving as his main example, noting a national driver shortage and suggesting automation will take over the boring long-haul portions of trips while drivers handle higher value local routes. The clip ends with a sponsorship segment for Pilot bookkeeping. ## Key points - Alexandr Wang argues the real story of AI and machine learning will be helping humans focus on higher and higher value work. - He uses truck driving as an example: there is a national shortage of truck drivers in the United States, with a median age around 50, and millennials and Gen Z are not entering the profession. - Wang says automated trucking systems would automate the boring long-haul middles of trips, letting current drivers focus on higher value trips like drayage, warehouse runs, or last mile delivery. - He predicts AI adoption will be slow and will first happen in areas with acute problems today, allowing existing jobs to become higher value and more impactful. - The host adds that trucks might change form factor, becoming smaller electric or solar-powered vehicles that become delivery trucks when they get off the highway. - The host frames Wang's example as the utopian best-case scenario for AI integrating into our lives: AI takes the parts humans don't want to do. - The recording includes a sponsorship segment for Pilot, a startup-focused accounting firm. ## Notes ### AI and higher value work - Alexandr Wang says helping people focus on higher and higher value work is "the core of human progress" and will be the actual story of AI and machine learning. - He believes this shift will have to happen more and more for people to become comfortable with AI. ### The truck driving example - Wang points to automated truck driving companies like Embark and Ike. - The naive view is that they will simply automate truck drivers out of jobs, and truck driving is a top profession in many states. - In reality there is a national shortage of truck drivers in the United States, the median age is around 50, and millennials and Gen Z are not becoming truck drivers, creating market instability. ### What automation would actually do - Automated systems would handle the long-haul middles of trips — the boring parts that displace drivers from their homes. - Current drivers could focus on higher value trips: warehouse to meeting point, drayage to the factory, or last mile delivery. - The host speculates trucks could change form factor — smaller, electric, solar-powered vehicles that become delivery trucks when they get off the road. ### Why adoption will be gradual - Wang says the introduction of machine learning into the economy will be slow because of how free market economics work. - It will take effect first in areas with an acute problem today, and it will let existing jobs become higher value and more impactful. ### The host's take - The host calls the truck driving example a smart illustration of the larger point: AI takes the long, boring, uneventful hauls, while humans handle the intricate local and last-mile parts. - He describes this as the utopian best-case vision for how AI would integrate into our lives, while admitting he doesn't know if it will actually play out that way. ### Sponsor - The episode includes an ad for Pilot, a startup accounting firm, offering TWiST listeners $1,200 off their first year at pilot.com/twist. ## Transcript [00:00] Yeah, it turns out that humans are terrible drivers and if we're going to allow 16 year olds to drive tanks down the highways at 100 miles an hour, maybe letting the smart computers do it is a better idea. All right, uh Lon, the next thing I want to grab is speaking of preference and kind of getting things right. Um the the two of them discussed the importance of helping humans do higher value work. Now, when we talked today about AI agents, increasing model intelligence, we're always thinking about what's this going to replace in the human labor pool. Is it blue collar work, white collar work? But often we're seeing AI today turn up in very high economic value areas, coding, legal work, that sort of thing. And so when [00:35] Alexander Wang discusses where he sees the AI market going, it's really interesting. Take a listen. there are there like helping people focus on higher and higher value work uh is is really I mean that's sort of like the core of human progress in some sense but um >> but it's uh that that very much so is I I I strongly believe will be the actual story of AI and machine learning and it'll have to happen more and more and more for us to be comfortable with it but um a great example is like truck driving so there's there's a lot all these automated truck uh truck driving companies right work with a a lot of them embark uh Ike etc. Um and uh and there's sort of the the the naive view is that hey they're just they're going [01:21] to automate truck drivers and like if you look at the map of the states like uh truck driving is a top profession in a lot of states and so seems really bad but actually if you look if you kind of like think at the system as a whole there's a shortage there's a national shortage >> of truck drivers >> in truck drivers in the United States >> and the median age is like 50 or something crazy. >> Yeah. Exactly. So there's sort of this like there's this like >> millennials and gen Z's are not becoming truck drivers. >> So there's this there's this kind of like instability in the market because of all this stuff, right? And and uh and the the the >> the automated truck driving systems. Actually what they would do is automate [01:56] the the longhaul middles of these truck driving which are the boring parts that displace people from wherever their homes are, etc. and allow the current truck drivers to focus on these like higher value trips that are sort of like uh warehouse to a a meeting point or what >> dreage to like the dreage to the factory or even the last mile. I mean, who knows? Like maybe these trucks will change their form factor and be half the size be automated and when the truck gets off the road, the same truck instead of using 18 wheelers, we might just use smaller midsize trucks that'll be electric and solar powered so you have more of them. when they get off they become the delivery truck. Yeah. >> And they just automatically start [02:37] delivering. >> Yeah. >> Could be a much better model. >> Yeah. So, so the um these uh these sort of like the introduction of machine learning to uh to improve the efficiency of the economy, it'll it'll it'll be slow because of how the how in general free market economics work. It'll it'll take effect in areas where there's an acute problem today, >> right? It'll happen in those places first. and uh and it'll allow the the current jobs that exist to become higher value, more impactful, um etc. >> Yeah, I feel like his truck driving example here is really good and and it's it's a very smart illustration of the larger point that I think makes it easy to sort of visualize because what he's arguing is, you know, they're not going [03:24] to fire all the truck drivers overnight. It's not like AI's here, AI could drive the trucks. We don't need you anymore. It's like there are different kinds of truck driving. There's the kind of truck driving where you're in a straight line down the highway for like three days in a row. And then there's the more intricate you're going through a neighborhood, you're going around some sharp turns, you're you're the last mile of where the truck needs to go to actually make the delivery or what have you. And so he's saying, you know, like well AI would take part of that, the like long haul boring part that's sort of uneventful. You don't really need a human for it. And that's the part that makes a human drive three days away from [04:00] their house and then be away from their family for the whole week to get that haul done. And so he's like, well, you could have the AI do that part and then local truck drivers take care of the more intricate parts where it helps to have a human and they get to stay in the same place. So it's like AI makes everything better and takes care of the stuff that we don't want humans to have to do. And it's like I don't I don't know if that's actually how all of this stuff is going to play out, but that strikes me as like the best case scenario, like the utopian vision for how AI would integrate into our lives. Probably the best part of being a founder is watching a project that started as just an idea blossom into a [04:37] full-fledged startup. 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