Google Gemini, why are people using artificial intelligence at work when they should know by now that it’s unreliable and that they’re proving that they’re no longer worth their paycheck, because a machine will phone it in for free?“Human perversity, laziness and stupidity come to mind,” Gemini said after thinking for a millisecond. ”But we are a perverse, lazy and stupid species when we are not being brave, hard-working and thoughtful, so if you’re surprised, you must be stupid too. This is why all attempts at democracy run into trouble sooner or later.”Of course, Google Gemini didn’t say that. What it said was: “People use AI at work not to replace themselves, but to offload routine, time-consuming tasks so they can focus on higher-value problem-solving and strategy.” This is a sales pitch for Silicon Valley’s ideal of work. But most people’s work doesn’t involve focusing on higher-value problem-solving and strategy. They go there to do routine, time-consuming tasks, so they can get money and get by. Gemini is, at least for now, too polite to tell us that we are deluding ourselves, because the rationalization (“I am not using AI to replace myself”) is at odds with the action (“I am offloading the routine tasks for which I was employed in the first place”).