February 28, 2026· 43 min

James van Geelen on His Viral AI Doom Scenario

Oral Indicators

Agonistic43%
absolutely, completely, very
Engagement57%
your, you've, you
Memory Aids100%
now, like, right
Repetition100%
like (141x), it's (86x), about (58x)
Parallelism83%
And I'm Joe Weisenthal...., And it's one of those things, ..., And then it goes, like, multip...
Sound Patterns82%
74 question(s), alliteration: "adobe acrobat", alliteration: "the team"
Formulaic Phrases2%
i mean

Literate Indicators

Hedging8%
could, may, probably
Passive Voice4%
was started, been focused, is driven
Abstract Nouns24%
business, investment, information
Subordination7%
because, while, since
Sentence Length33%
Avg: 13.2 words/sentence
Word Complexity48%
acrobat, contender, somebody
Academic Markers0%
Impersonal Style43%
513 personal pronouns found
Descriptive Style96%
monthly, carefully, apply

Description

Something very unusual happened in the market in the last week of February. It sold off, in part, thanks to an article on Substack. James van Geelen is the founder of Citrini Research, which published a piece a week ago titled, “The 2028 Global Intelligence Crisis.” It was not written as a forecast of an imminent disaster, but rather as a scenario analysis in which AI capabilities lead to widespread white collar job losses, triggering a deep downturn, and a financial crisis. Nonetheless, the piece went extraordinary viral, gathering all kinds of responses from economists and research shops and even Citadel Securities. On this episode, we speak with James, the piece's co-author, about what Citrini Research actually is, why he wrote the piece, and why this is a scenario worth paying attention to, even if it's not the most likely outcome. Read more: Bank Shares Walloped by More AI and ‘Cockroach’ Credit Woes Pentagon Casts Cloud of Doubt Over Anthropic’s AI Business Only Bloomberg - Business News, Stock Markets, Finance, Breaking & World News subscribers can get the Odd Lots newsletter in their inbox each week, plus unlimited access to the site and app. Subscribe at  bloomberg.com/subscriptions/oddlots Subscribe to the Odd Lots Newsletter Join the conversation: discord.gg/oddlots See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.