The Doomsday Clock Jumps Closer to Midnight. AI Is a Big Reason Why
There is no shortage of explanations for why the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moved its metaphorical “Doomsday Clock” up by a whopping 4 seconds Tuesday, to 85 seconds to midnight. For instance, world leaders are openly talking about testing and using nuclear weapons, and the US is taking the threat of fossil-fuel-driven climate change even less seriously than it did last year. But underlying all of the existential threats we’ve created for ourselves is a lack of cooperation, made far worse by AI’s acceleration of deepfakes and the erosion of trust in information systems. “AI is a significant and accelerating disruptive technology,” Daniel Holz, chair of the Bulletin’s Science and Security Board that sets the Doomsday Clock and a professor of physics at the University of Chicago, said during the announcement. “AI is also supercharging mis- and disinformation, which makes it even more difficult to address all of the other threats we consider. But instead of working toward international standards governing AI safety, we are running headlong into an AI arms race with what …
