“This time it’s different.” Those four words, the official slogan of every economic bubble, have been weaponized in the age of AI. They’re the rallying cry of utopians and evangelists insisting the technology will reshape every corner of life, and that the financial games surrounding it are therefore excusable. At the same time, those same boosters, along with their critics, wield the phrase as a cudgel in their endless sparring. The AI conversation now feels as fractured—and as split-screen—as debates over politics or the economy. Every new headline becomes ammunition, seized on to reinforce whatever larger argument someone wants to make. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman captured it rather well in August: “Are we in a phase where investors as a whole are overexcited about AI? My opinion is yes,” he

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