The Lead: This Week’s Buzzwords; Existential Threats

By
Bill Taylor
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95

The calendar insists it’s mid‑July, which means summer has officially arrived — even here in Bozeman, where it stopped snowing roughly twelve minutes ago and immediately jumped to 100 degrees. Classic Montana: no transition, just violence. And of course, there are no swimming pools, anywhere. If someone did have one, they’d guard that secret like nuclear launch codes. Friends are friends, but…

This morning, while enjoying the sweet mercy of air conditioning, I read that we’re facing yet another existential threat — this time courtesy of AI. Activists are out in force, trying to halt AI development, block data centers, and generally stop progress with the same enthusiasm usually reserved for stopping teenagers from skateboarding near a mall entrance. And with a couple of big AI IPOs on the horizon, some folks are hoping Wall Street will suddenly develop a conscience. (Good luck.)

But AI is just today’s panic. We’re drowning in threats — terrorist plots, Iranian retaliation, random local violence, tornadoes, floods, heat waves. All serious, sure, but they don’t usually get the dramatic “existential” label. For that, you need a threat with branding.

And every agency has its own threat‑rating system:

  • FBI Threat Levels — Low, Medium, High. Straightforward.
  • Cyber Alert Levels — Green to Red, like a Homeland Security mood ring.
  • DEFCON — The Hollywood favorite.
    • DEFCON 5: “Everything’s fine.”
    • DEFCON 4: “Maybe not.”
    • DEFCON 3: “Probably not.”
    • DEFCON 2: “One step from nuclear war.”
    • DEFCON 1: “Duck and cover, kids.”

Each system is specific — cyber, crime, military. But existential threat? That’s the junk drawer of danger. Everything gets tossed in.

Climate change? Existential threat. Misinformation? Existential threat. Inequality? Existential threat. The next pandemic? Existential threat. Democracy? Existential threat. And now… AI joins the club.

At this rate, we’ll need a threat‑rating system just to categorize the threat‑rating systems.

Activists insist we must be prepared to stop all of them — every existential threat, everywhere, all at once. But the biggest threat of all? The Existential Threat of the Existential Threat.

This morning, my kittens bravely defended the household from the existential menace of… my backpack. They won. The backpack retreated. Civilization endures.

So yes — this week’s “cool” buzzword is existential threat. Even reading about it is an existential threat to your intelligence.

 

Content provided by Bill Taylor with the assistance of co-pilot

 

 

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