I completely agree with you. The only way this isn't true is if progress ceases because of some kind of socioeconomic catastrophy. We have already gotten over whatever hurdles there were that made supernnormal AI capability look potentially intractable.
I don't think your comparisons to civilization butressing inventions like fire and writing and language (the last, to be fair, is an evolutionary invention, not a cultural one) are unfair or exagerrated. Things are about to get very strange in short order.