The A.I. arms race boils down to companies, countries, and billionaires’ egos… and while that sounds like a nightmare to cynics across the globe … there could still be reason for optimism.

A.I. ethicist Tristan Harris joined us on “TMZ Live” and we asked him why we shouldn’t be cynical about CEOs of top A.I. companies suddenly sounding the alarm about their businesses, and what to make of all the doomsday scenarios.

Tristan says a bunch of new evidence and tests freaked out the CEOs and their scientists … and he says pressure from the public and Congress could get a group of powerful men who hate losing to each other to come together for the greater good.

That all sounds well and good, but with so much power and money at stake, are we really to trust the fate of humanity to folks like Elon Musk, Sam Altman and Dario Amodei?!?

Tristan says it’s not just these men, their egos and their companies that need to come together to put guardrails on A.I. to prevent a robot takeover that will kill us all like “Terminator” and Skynet … it’s up to countries too.

Cool, well the U.S. and China can’t agree on anything … but A.I. will be the catalyst? Tristan says these two super powers could come together here, but it has to be bigger than them, and other countries could force their hands.

Still not convinced?!? We know Harvey‘s not. Tristan is at a pro-human A.I. conference — yes, that’s really a thing in this timeline — and he says Sen.Bernie Sanders andSteve Bannonare joining forces to save mankind from our potential A.I. overlords.

Well, if that’s not a reason for optimism, we don’t know what is!!!

Tristan’s really knowledgeable and great at laying this all out in digestible terms … and he tells us how we got to the point, and how some predictions from just a few years ago are now playing out in front of our very eyes.

He breaks it all down in his new Netflix documentary “The A.I. Doc: Or How I Became an Apocaloptimist.”