If you were wondering who’s going to stop AI from gaining consciousness, going rogue and messing with the nuclear codes ... or turning off the electric grid ... or shutting down air traffic control, I have some good news.
asserted
I → wonder → news
As AI executives and researchers — so, the people who are actually building the things — warn that increasingly powerful systems may require stronger oversight, the president has an innovative solution.
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president → build → solution
Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has called for slowing the development of the technology to give governments and companies time to work out how to make it safer.
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it → call → time
OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman and even Elon Musk have also backed greater scrutiny.
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Altman → back → scrutiny
Microsoft has published its own code of conduct intended to ensure humans remain in control.
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humans → publish → control
And the president of the United States has let us all know that a “STRONG AND SMART (High IQ!) PRESIDENT” is all it will actually take, something we apparently have “in spades.”
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we → let → spades
First of all: Don’t take everything the AI developers say as fact.
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developers → take → fact
They have a vested interest in presenting their own technology as dangerously powerful, so cutting-edge it’s frightening, and so on.
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it → have → edge
They are all competing for high-level government contracts and other such commercial opportunities.
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They → compete → contracts
Loudly stating that they are horrified by the huge potential of what they’ve made is a marketing choice as much as anything else.
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they → state → anything
(Nevertheless, they have a point.
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they → have → point
This is a fast-moving technology that has completely reshaped the world in the past couple of years.
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that → move → years
We do need laws around it.)
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We → need → it
Coming from a world in which bravado can stand in for expertise, he is a president who has always believed in a government where one man can be the guardrail for everything.
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man → come → everything
This will hardly come as a shock as anyone who has seen the AI slop he’s also put out on Truth Social, presenting himself alternately as a king dropping refuse bombs on protesters and as Jesus Christ himself (sorry, I mean “a doctor.”)
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I → come → doctor
Trump wants to be the one and only in everybody’s lives.
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Trump → want → lives
To state the absolutely obvious, a guardrail is supposed to be something that exists independently of the person driving the car.
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that → state → car
It is there because people are fallible: They get tired, make mistakes, panic, misjudge a corner.
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They → get → corner
The point of building a guardrail is not to find a sufficiently brilliant driver and then dispense with the barrier altogether.
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point → build → barrier
Dismantling rules and regulations around environmental protections, for instance, was defended on the basis that we can essentially trust the instincts of Trump more than we can scientists or global organizations.
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scientists → defend → Trump
He’ll decide when it’s OK to drill, when coal emissions don’t matter, and when the ocean is actually getting too hot.
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ocean → decide → ?
The same preference for personal authority has appeared in the structure of the administration itself.
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preference → appear → administration
In June, the Supreme Court gave the president greater power to remove the heads of most independent agencies, strengthening presidential control over bodies that Congress had traditionally insulated from direct White House interference.
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Congress → give → interference
Because what Trump thinks is best.
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thinks → think → what
And, of course, the ongoing war-not-war with Iran has proceeded on the same basis: Trump was sufficiently convinced that he could change something, and so you have to trust him to do it.
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you → proceed → it
That also means that if you criticize anything that’s happened in Iran, you’re actually directly criticizing the president, and therefore you’re just a twisted conspiracy theorist suffering from Trump Derangement Syndrome.
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you → mean → Syndrome
This leads us neatly back to AI.
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This → lead → AI
“There is a SICK conspiracy going on against AI and Data Centers!” Trump wrote on Monday.
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Trump → be → Monday
He added, after some warning about how China will take over the world if we don’t all trust in his own private judgment when it comes to AI, that “Conspiracy Theorists, Treasonists, Traitors, and Leakers, BEWARE!”
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it → add → AI
These constant invocations to “BEWARE” or to “be afraid” at the end of his rants about his own personal specialness should also be alarming, for very obvious reasons.
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invocations → beware → reasons
And invoking China as a scare tactic, in the same way that he has started warning people about the end of law-and-order or a country overrun with evil immigrants if they elect Democrats in the midterms, isn’t exactly convincing.
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they → invoke → midterms
Trump’s political philosophy is thus: Institutions are slow, rules are boring, regulators are sticklers, experts and bureaucrats disagree with each other and therefore must all be wrong, and international organizations have their own interests, whereas a president can simply decide.
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president → disagree → interests
The ultimate decision-maker and dealmaker, Donald J. Trump will be a substitute for every piece of red tape and every institution you’ve ever heard of.
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you → hear → tape
The Founding Fathers profoundly disagreed with this political philosophy; it’s why they wrote the Constitution.
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they → disagree → Constitution
And AI is perhaps the most ridiculous case imaginable to invoke it, anyway.
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AI → invoke → it
The entire problem under discussion is that these systems are becoming more complicated, more autonomous and harder for humans to predict.
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humans → become → discussion
The people building them are themselves arguing about the risks.
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people → build → risks
The prospect of a technology becoming too powerful for humans to control is the thing everyone is supposed to be worrying about — so putting one powerful human in charge is already guaranteed not to be the answer.
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putting → become → charge
Those of Trump’s ilk will twist themselves in pretzels to argue against the value of collective action.
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Those → twist → action
But where AI is concerned, it is quite literally our only option.
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it → concern → ?
…and 10 more, not listed.
The Aporia
