AI is not useful for things you don't understand because it is unreliable and will misunderstand and lead you astray. Using AI to do things you don't understand is dangerous—you're 'out over your skis.' AI is a good collaboration tool only when applied to things you have knowledge about, allowing you to adjudicate whether output makes sense and ask the right follow-up questions.

normativepending

Speaker

David Autor

Evidence Quote

AI isn't really useful for things that you don't understand...if you're using AI to do something you really don't get you're kind of out over your skis...it's a good collaboration tool because it's complimentary...if it's something you know about then you can adjudicate [31:05]

Source

A Threat Bigger than China | MIT Economist David AutorReid Hoffman
Created: 8/11/2026, 6:32:32 AM

My Notes

Loading notes...