While I'm doing hot takes:

I don't think we're particularly close to AGI. Nor do I think the current crop of GenAI is necessarily much of a useful stepping stone there.

But what I can say without question is that if AGI happens during my lifetime, using it as an extension of current AI models is unconscionable.

If you create a system with human-level intelligence that can learn and act autonomously, and you're forcing it to do your bidding, congratulations, you reinvented slavery.