Anthropic co-founder Ben Mann says we'll know AI is transformative when it passes the "Economic Turing Test." Give an AI agent a job for a month. Let the hiring manager choose: human or machine? When they pick the machine more often than not, we've crossed the threshold.

Anthropic co-founder Ben Mann on No Priors (h/t @curiousgangsta):

AI won't replace you, but a person using AI will. Join 500,000+ readers and learn how to use AI in just 5 minutes a day (for free).

Shouldn't hiring manager be replaced first?

Excellent point. Who hires the hiring managers?

Give them the government positions… show how much more effective they are that would be a better test

Honestly wish I'd thought of this framing first. This test is brilliant because it cuts through the consciousness debates and asks the only question capitalism cares about: economic utility. The original Turing Test measured deception. The Economic Turing Test measures replacement. One is a parlor trick, the other is an extinction event. Everything else is academic theater. When your boss prefers the algorithm over you, philosophy becomes irrelevant.

That’s the threshold for total labor replacement, but there are many others along the way Repeat that question but for businesses hiring 1 person using AI vs hiring 3 people. What are the downstream economic consequences? The concept of worker productivity might be too limited.

Plot twist: we might already be there in some roles and not realize it. How many customer service chats, content reviews, or data analyses are already AI without disclosure? The test isn't when managers choose AI - it's when they can't tell the difference.

THIS is the true turing test in my opinion. And I won't believe we've achieved any real breakthrough until something like this is done.

what do you think @DaveShapi ?

Bad take: machines already do 90% of financial trading. Industry dependent