Honest question, why do you find it scary? I agree that some people take it too far, but most seem to be using metaphor to abstract away the underlying complex

Honest question, why do you find it scary? I agree that some people take it too far, but most seem to be using metaphor to abstract away the underlying complexities and facilitate conversation. I did the same thing back in college, anthropomorphizing cells and even molecules when I was learning about microbiology and biophysics (e.g., kinesins[1] are a family of postal workers who work hard to deliver packages to their clients in a timely manner, and they spend their free time going for strolls and practicing on their favorite tightropes). I now do it in my day-to-day work at an AI/ML shop to communicate not just what the entire pipeline is doing, but what individuals layers or encoders are doing, or even what variables in an equation are doing. I find that my colleagues and I are better able to understand and remember concepts and ideas when they're communicated as part of an anthropomorphic story, but we scarcely forget that the things we're dealing with aren't human. But maybe I'm missing the point, and you're really worried about that first, smaller group of people who have really swallowed the Kool aid. To that, I can say that I don't think their behavior exceeds the baseline craziness/weirdness that I've come to expect from humanity. I'm sure there are far more people who believe in astrology than who believe that we've achieved true humanlike artificial general intelligence, for example. [1] https://youtu.be/y-uuk4Pr2i8 https://youtu.be/y-uuk4Pr2i8