And therein lies the problem -- Google has been extremely successful at persuading itself and others that "can invert a binary tree on a whiteboard" is in any w

And therein lies the problem -- Google has been extremely successful at persuading itself and others that "can invert a binary tree on a whiteboard" is in any way synonymous with being "smarter". That's how we end up with at best people believing that ML will give us self-driving cars and at worst with all the societal problems that result from what these companies do, "but we just need to adjust that algorithm, train that model, and more, more, MORE of your personal data, and then we will lead the world to utopia" thinking. And they might even believe that. Ed.: also appear to be very often very insecure about it.