Graduation ceremonies at North American universities, traditionally marked by motivational speeches and celebrations, began to record an unusual phenomenon: negative reactions from students whenever the topic of artificial intelligence comes up on stage. In different institutions, guests who highlighted the potential of the technology were greeted with boos from the graduates, in episodes that quickly gained repercussion on social media.
The cases occurred at universities in different regions of the country. At the University of Central Florida, real estate executive Gloria Caulfield was the target of protests when she called artificial intelligence “the next Industrial Revolution”. At the University of Arizona, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt faced similar backlash when praising the professionals responsible for advancing technology. At Middle Tennessee State University, music industry executive Scott Borchetta was also booed when he mentioned the impacts of AI on creative and production processes.
For technology expert Elemar Júnior, founder of eximia.co, the students’ reaction is linked to the way people tend to respond to profound changes that are still little understood.
“When faced with something they don’t understand, human beings biologically tend to flee or fight,” he highlights.
In the expert’s assessment, concern grows precisely at a time of transition for thousands of young people who are leaving university and entering the job market. The constant presence of the topic of artificial intelligence in the public debate ends up increasing doubts about employability, career prospects and adaptation to new professional demands.
“This saturation ends up leading to another horizon, which is the horizon of concern about the future. Those who have graduated are eventually considering the applications of what they learned for their career, and this scenario of transformation reinforces this feeling of insecurity. This, combined with the natural instinct to flee or fight in the face of everything that is not understood correctly, generates this stronger reaction.”
The accelerated advancement of AI-based tools, especially autonomous agents and systems capable of performing complex tasks, has fueled fears about the eventual replacement of workers in several areas. However, Elemar argues that the discussion should be conducted from another perspective.
According to him, the role of technology is not to eliminate professionals, but to expand their capacity to act, making processes faster, more efficient and productive.
“The arrival of AI agents points much more to a new era of collaboration than to a silent replacement. What tends to be replaced are specific tasks, especially those that are more repetitive or have low added value, while space is made for more strategic human action, with a greater focus on decision, context and value generation.”
In this context, experts point out that the competitive advantage of professionals will be increasingly associated with the ability to work together with these tools, using technology to enhance results and not as a direct competitor.
“The human difference becomes the quality of decisions and clarity of intention. Anyone who knows how to guide agents well, define context and take responsibility for the result will have a real competitive advantage within organizations”, concludes Elemar Júnior.
