AI Is Just the Latest: Inside the Hype as Hope Pattern
Bottom Line Up Front: We're watching the same pattern unfold with generative AI that we've seen with every magical promise before it. Not because we're foolish, but because our minds are wired to seek safety when overwhelmed by complexity. Understanding this ancient reflex—and recognizing when it's gripping you—changes everything about how we navigate our hyped up world.
Everywhere we look we are being fed hype. Want some examples?
Pharma - those nightly ads that scare the bejesus out of everyone? They employ timing strategies and psychological techniques to influence consumers when they are most receptive to persuasive (aka hype) messaging. In this case, creating disease fear and then offering the magical cure. Hype as Hope.
Social media gurus - EVERYWHERE hyping that "one secret" to transform your life. Yes, there are amazing thinkers out there. There is also a massive amount of HYPE AS HOPE from people who should be ashamed of themselves.
Political movements - every "side" is out there selling the BIG results from their approach. HYPING that HOPE of an easy answer to complex problems. The economy will thrive in no time, insurance will be so great, those different people won't have those jobs picking cotton that you so deserve, HYPE as HOPE.
I'm focused on Generative AI as yet another example. Because it's right in our face and is one of the biggest hypes in tech I've ever witnessed - since 1999 by the way. Is it brilliant tech? Absolutely. Is it what the hype says it is? NO F'IN WAY.
We bought the hype. Now the data is forcing a perspective shift:
Companies have invested $35-40 billion in AI. MIT just reported that 95% are seeing zero return.
Software developers using AI assistants are actually 19% slower.
Venture capital is backing away - Sequoia Capital calculated companies need $600bn in annual returns just to break even on current AI spending.
Yet due to the Hype as Hope cycle, other companies will bet millions, convinced this time will be different.
I think it's about time we understood why we do this so that those of us who really want to dig in can HACK the PATTERN and Alt-Delete the Hype as Hope cycle for good.
The Pattern Hidden in Plain Sight
I've watched this cycle repeat for thirty years in tech. The pattern never changes:
First comes the overwhelm. Markets shifting faster than you can track. Competition from places you never expected. Complexity that makes every decision feel impossible. The successful formula you've used for years suddenly stops working. Sound familiar? Of course it does. You're living it again and again. It's the cycle of business.
But here's what shifts when we finally see it:
We start recognizing the reflex in real time—that moment when your shoulders relax because someone promises rescue.
We notice when experts develop that particular certainty that comes from expert immunity.
We catch our own confirmation bias, selecting evidence that supports what we want to believe, and avoiding the evidence we know will counter us.
We reset the pattern by asking the right questions, removing our blinders.
Yet tomorrow, you'll sit in another meeting, reviewing another breakthrough. And that same reflex will trigger again.
We don't learn from it just because it happens to us, again and again. This pattern isn't happening in our rational minds.
Your Mind's Savior-Seeking Reflex
Here's what's actually happening in your mind when the next "solution" arrives:
When you're overwhelmed, your cognitive resources are already depleted. That prefrontal cortex you rely on for analysis and strategy? It's exhausted from processing endless “What ifs?”. Meanwhile, your amygdala is in overdrive, treating the chaos and constant change around us as a threat to escape.
This is when patterns kick in.
Research shows that when we're cognitively drained, our susceptibility to authority bias skyrockets. We don't just listen to experts—we surrender our logic to them. The Milgram experiments proved that 65% of people will defy their own moral judgment when an authority figure pushes them by saying it's necessary. Yes, they shocked other humans on command.
Add the overwhelming challenges you face daily. That percentage that seeks and follows expertise goes higher. Much higher.
Here's the piece that we aren’t often told: The experts believe their own hype. It's called "expert immunity"—the delusion that they're somehow above the biases that affect everyone else. They genuinely believe their solution is what they say it is.
This creates a perfect storm. You desperately want rescue from complexity or chaos. They sincerely believe they're rescuers. Both sides' confirmation bias kicks in—you see only evidence that supports the promise, forget evidence against it. When it fails, everyone rewrites history. They blame implementation. You blame organizational resistance. The vendor blames your legacy systems.
Nobody knows what's actually happening.
Until the moment when the Hype doesn't deliver the Hope, and we are forced to face reality.
The Real Cost of False Hope
Look at what's happening right now with AI, in actual adopters:
A pharmaceutical company just dropped AI customer tools for 500 workers. The presentations were unusable.
Experienced software developers—people with decades of expertise—are 19% slower with AI assistants than without them.
Workers report spending 11+ hours per week just managing the chaos these "productivity tools" have created.
Then there are the huge investments not paying off today. But I’m not focusing on that.
Now. Think about what we're not fixing while we chase the magic. Those strategic problems requiring deep thinking and systematic change? They're waiting. The incremental improvements that compound into real advantage? Ignored because they're not hyped and cool enough.
What crucial work is your organization avoiding right now by focusing on the next magic solution?
Remember the dot-com bubble? While companies chased "eyeballs" and "stickiness," they ignored fundamentals like revenue models and customer value. The crash wasn't just financial. It was a crash of faith that took years to rebuild.
We're doing it again. Not just with AI, but everywhere complexity overwhelms us. Healthcare systems implementing AI diagnostics while basic care crumbles. Education chasing digital transformation while teaching fundamentals disappear. Every industry has its own version.
The pattern isn't the only problem. The lack of recognition of the pattern is the issue as well.
But there's something more insidious. Each time the magic fails, we don't question the pattern. We question the execution. "It was the right idea, wrong implementation." "We needed better change management." "The technology wasn't quite ready."
That’s the mind pattern protecting itself.
Challenging Your Hype Reflex
Questions crack patterns. Statements cement them.
We're trained from business school to state our intentions with conviction. Defend our positions. Show no weakness. In most companies, the guy who sounds most certain gets the promotion—even when he's dead wrong.
Yet statements lock our minds into single tracks. Questions force them open.
Which is why it’s powerful to ask questions that break the pattern before it grabs you.
Pattern 1: "I Know We're Right"
We're wired to seek evidence that proves us right. The moment we commit to a solution, our minds become its defense attorney. Every data point that supports it glows. Every warning sign disappears.
So ask questions:
What evidence are we actively ignoring because it doesn't fit our hope?
If this fails spectacularly, what will we say we "should have seen coming"?
Which uncomfortable question are we avoiding because we already know the answer?
That last one? We all know that churning gut feeling that says "danger." The question we won't ask because it exposes what we don't want to see. Those are the questions that matter most.
Pattern 2: The Blame Game
When things go sideways, our minds scramble for external causes. IT built it wrong. The vendor oversold. The market shifted. Anyone's fault but ours.
Stop. Everyone was in the room. Everyone nodded. Everyone wanted to believe.
Now ask:
What did we desperately want to be true that wasn't?
What warning did someone give us that we dismissed?
What did our gut tell us that our spreadsheet overruled?
These aren't comfortable questions. They're not supposed to be. They're pattern breakers. They force us to see what our minds are desperately trying to hide—that we're not victims of bad solutions.
We're participants in an ancient pattern.
The Truth That Changes Everything
This pattern—this Hype as Hope cycle— is wired into us at a level deeper than strategy, deeper than analysis, deeper than experience.
When overwhelm meets authority offering salvation, your mind will always want to believe. Always.
But here's what shifts when we finally see it:
We start recognizing the reflex in real time—that moment when your shoulders relax because someone promises rescue.
We notice when experts develop that particular certainty that comes from expert immunity.
We catch our own confirmation bias, selecting evidence that supports what we want to believe, and avoiding the evidence we know will counter us.
We reset the pattern by asking the right questions, removing our blinders.
We can still engage with new solutions. Try new technologies. Make bold bets. But do it with eyes open to the patterns wired beneath your logical mind.
Because the truth is, there is no magic. There never was.
There's just us—brilliant, pattern-driven humans, trying to navigate complexity with minds designed for a simpler world.
The patterns will continue. New solutions will arrive. Experts will promise transformation. Our minds will want to believe.
But we don't have to be unconscious about it anymore.
We can feel the pattern. Question the reflex. Listen to our gut instead of ignoring it.
The only question is: Will we choose to do it?