alt Hacker NewsI feel like the hyper-competitiveness of academia generally is the elephant in the room.
The disaster for a problem-solution-oriented mathematician isn't that once problem-solution is easy they'll just switch to theory-explanation and machinery-building. It is that they will have to compete (and won't be able to compete) with students and post-docs who've been doing theory-explanation and machinery-building for their entire career - and there are lots of these 'cause academic pipeline produces more people who can fill a job than jobs in every imaginable category and subcategory.
Academic competitiveness doesn't explain all the hysteria and why those at the top of the field (Field Medal and all) wrote that breakup letter over AI. There seems to be this distinctly toxic trait common among math and CS folks where you don't see work as work, like the median worker, but as intrinsically linked to your self-worth and reason for existence. Literally a math academic crying while being interviewed on AI impact, talking about not knowing what to do with himself.
Who knew 2-3 SD won't save you from being a pattern matcher that can't stand to see a better one.