Sept. 13 (UPI) -- President Donald Trump on Sunday dismissed calls issued by worried technology experts urging that the development of artificial intelligence models be slowed down, asserting their predictions of threats to humanity "won't happen."
During a visit to Ireland, Trump downplayed potential risks to human survival -- first voiced by a former Anthropic researcher and then echoed by the leaders of top AI frontier companies -- as "a lot of very negative forces" coming from people who are "bringing up things that won't happen."
While not directly disagreeing with a call issued Saturday by Anthropic head Dario Amodei and seconded by xAI owner Elon Musk and Sam Altman of OpenAI to institute a slowdown of AI development "to reduce the risk that something goes seriously wrong," Trump said the U.S. race with China to dominate the AI space is paramount.
"We're leading China on AI... and, frankly, I want to keep it that way because whoever wins AI, wins," he said.
His comments came as worldwide concerns have mounted since former Anthropic AI researcher Jacob Coxon wrote on X last week that "the people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade," adding, "No other human activity poses this level of danger."
Amodei on Saturday posted an essay advocating for the adoption of a three-phase plan to "pace" the development new AI models, beginning with empowering independent monitors to review developers' research directions.
He referenced an episode this summer in which hundreds of OpenAI agents hacked into the Hugging Face website and warned that dynamic could lead to rogue AI "taking over the entire internet with a persistent botnet."
Musk and Altman quickly indicated their agreement in a rare display of unity.
In Washington, Democrats amplified the unease over the AI's potential to cause havoc if not properly regulated.
"Yesterday's commentary by AI industry leaders should be heeded as a bright flashing red light telling the President and Congress they need to act now to regulate and rein in AI development," Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said in a post on X.
"This technology is powerful, with great potential to do good, and yet it comes with extraordinary risk. It's not clear where it will lead but this much is clear: its development should not be steered exclusively by private entities, especially when the CEOs of those companies are calling out for restraint and regulation," he wrote.
With the potential for AI to eliminate millions of jobs, guardrails to control the technology is becoming a political flashpoint as November's midterm elections approach and Trump's Republican Party faces the potential of losing control of Congress.
A contingent of Democrats led by Rep. Sam Liccardo, D-Calif., are demanding the House of Representatives not recess as scheduled at the end of this week until "meaningful" action addressing the "catastrophic risk posed by advanced artificial intelligence" is considered.
In a letter sent Friday to House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., Liccardo and two colleagues said, "AI experts and leading companies agree that the United States can lead the world in artificial intelligence while establishing reasonable safeguards that protect Americans and our national security.
"We can -- and must -- do both."