Richard K. Sherwin
The mythos—or foundational stories—that we tell ourselves will determine our fate in the age of AI. As industry leaders regale us with utopian visions of benevolent digital gods delivering scientific breakthroughs and expanding our technological horizons, our best defense against hubris is a counternarrative of social cooperation.
NEW YORK—It is telling that Anthropic chose to call its most powerful AI model “Mythos.” In ancient Greek, the word denotes an original reality that we can imitate or embody through the stories we tell ourselves and one another. Pliny the Elder tells us that the fifth-century Greek painter Zeuxis rendered grapes so realistically as to fool even the birds.