Authored by Kay Rubacek via The Epoch Times,
Eric Schmidt hadn't finished the word "artificial" before the booing started.
A child uses a laptop in a file photo. Alain Jocard/AFP/Getty ImagesThe former Google CEO stood at the University of Arizona's commencement last month, ready to deliver the kind of speech he had probably given a dozen times before: AI as the next great transformation, graduates as its rightful authors.
He got as far as telling them the technology would "touch every profession, every classroom, every hospital, every laboratory, every person, and every relationship you have." The boos rose before he could finish his own sentence. "I can hear you," he said gently. The boos continued, as did Schmidt, who was unable to fully conceal the awkward embarrassment.
He wasn't the only one. A week earlier, at Middle Tennessee State University, Big Machine Records CEO Scott Borchetta told graduates that "AI is rewriting production as we sit here." The boos from graduates started immediately. He responded with tough love: "I know it. Deal with it." But the boos only grew louder.
A week before that, real estate executive Gloria Caulfield barely got through the phrase "next industrial revolution" at the University of Central Florida before the crowd erupted. "Okay, I struck a chord," she said, turning around with her hands up in disbelief and clearly caught off guard.
They were all caught off guard. This isn't how graduations usually go.
Older generations had their own frustrations wit
