A firm basis requires a theory of AI. Only then can you talk about whether they will pointlessly burn through resources or not.

We have the theory of evolution, we have hundreds of years of man-machine symbiosis to work from - and AI is probably now no longer terribly far off. IMHO, we have enough information to address this issue. Irrational AIs that run about in circles will sell poorly - so we probably won't build many like that.