The more sci-fi the AI scene grows, the more I find myself looking to the past in order to understand the moment we’re in right now.

The present feels weightless, as though established verities have become untethered from the earth and are already floating off into the upper air. But reviewing the past it’s clear we’ve done all this before, several times. It’s clear that this weightless feeling is an illusion caused by hype and a lifetime of drinking deeply from the heady propaganda of progress.

Here for example is nineteenth century author Victor Hugo, breathlessly eulogizing the ethereality of the printed book over the stolid weight of architecture:

“In its printed form, thought is more imperishable than ever; it is volatile, irresistible, indestructible. It is mingled with the air. In the days of architecture it made a mountain of itself, and took powerful possession of a century and a place. Now it converts itself into a flock of birds, scatters itself to the four winds, and occupies all points of air and space at once.” — Victor Hugo, Notre-Dame de Paris

Hugo called the book “human thought, stripping off one form and donning another” - isn’t this a wonderful summary of the emotional, visceral responses to the arrival of human-like AI conversation?

And just as Victor Hugo’s words combine a grain of truth with a shovel-full of hyperbole, so does our reception of AI. OK, yes it’s amazing. Soon enough though it will seem ordinary, and perhaps even unfashionable.