Does the importance of AI risk depend on caring about transhumanist utopias?

One does not need to care about transhumanist utopias to recognize the importance of AI risk. Misaligned artificial intelligence poses a serious threat to the continued flourishing, and maybe even continued existence, of humanity as a whole. While predictions about when artificial general intelligence may be achieved vary, surveys consistently report a >50% probability of achieving general AI before the year 2060 – within the expected lifetimes of most people alive today.

It is difficult to predict how technology will develop, and at what speed, in the years ahead; but as artificial intelligence poses a significant chance of causing worldwide disaster within the not-too-distant future, anyone who is concerned with their own future has reason to be interested.