Two groups of people are pushing the fear:

1. People with nothing useful going on who found out that spouting made up crap about AI got them an audience. 2. People working on AI that want to feel like they're working on the Manhattan project.

The chances of an AI going foom rounds to 0%. It's worth a few dozen researchers planning for it, but the widespread panic is ridiculous.

The big labs have hundreds to thousands of engineers working on their AIs. To improve the next model, you must first understand more about how the current model works. They're not magically getting better, but they are steered to improve, and their capabilities are tied to and do not outpace our ability to steer them. You cannot push tech forwards without understanding it better, despite some people claiming AI is dark magic.

And I don't have my hands over my ears. It's worth cushioning people from the impact AI will have on careers and media, and regulating concrete bad effects.

But Bryan said it better than I could. The people pushing this message of fear know deep down that they just want to feel important.