The news that Artificial Intelligence could destroy society in just a few years, and that the robots might decide to slaughter us all, has taken over the media in the past week.
The leaders of both the local AI giants, Open AI and Anthropic, now say we, as a society, need to slow down the advances until we figure out how to control the new technology.
But it’s not happening. While the CEOs wring their hands and some of their key employees quit, the race to build the biggest, fastest machines goes on nonstop.
Michelle Goldberg at the NY Times says the problem is the messianic/apocalyptic mindset of the tech oligarchs:
In 2023, the billionaire tech investor Marc Andreessen published “The Techno-Optimist Manifesto,” with a section titled, “Becoming Technological Supermen.” In it, he borrowed language from the Italian futurist — and fascist — Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, writing, “Technology must be a violent assault on the forces of the unknown, to force them to bow before man.” He quoted Friedrich Nietzsche to argue that absent such an assault, life becomes meaningless and small. In a section titled “The Enemy,” Andreessen listed ideas that would restrain technology’s momentum, including “tech ethics” and the concept of “existential risk.”
But there’s another, more important reason these AI folks won’t slow down: They want to be billionaires.
Open AI was a nonprofit; the leadership turned it into a for-profit. Anthropic is supposed to be a B Corporation, with a public-interest mission.
Both are headed for what insiders say could be the two biggest Initial Public Offerings in history. The venture capitalists who funded these companies, and the Wall Street investment bankers who will handle the IPOs, are going to make a whole lot of money. The founders and early employees will become insanely rich.
Suddenly, these folks with have mansions and yachts and everything their greedy hearts can desire; maybe, like Mark Zuckerberg, they’ll build bunkers on tropical islands where they’ll be safe when the whole world goes to shit.
Greed is driving this potential disaster, and as long as those golden tickets are hanging out there, nothing is going to stop it.
If the tech leaders wanted to slow down the AI craze before it destroys the planet, there’s an easy step: Call off the IPOs. Announce that, until the government creates real guidelines that will control the explosive technology, nobody gets their billions. The VCs have to wait. Sam Altman and Dario Amodei have to wait. If Donald Trump is invested in these companies, and he probably is, he’ll have to wait.
(Altman just said that an IPO this year would be “inappropriate,” meaning it might crash, so he’s holding off until 2027. That’s a few months away. Any IPO would have taken close to that long anyway.)
Then there’s no need for an arms race, no need to push to unleash things we can’t understand. If AI destroys society, it won’t be about rogue tech. It will be about investor and founder greed. Not a great way to go.
None of us should be surprised that Mayor Daniel Lurie has endorsed Manny Yekutiel in the D8 supes race. The two are close; the founded the Civic Joy Fund together. But Yekutiel is also entirely in agreement with the mayor’s political priorities. He will be what we refer to as a “call up” vote; whatever the mayor calls and asks for, he’ll get.
But Lurie’s response to questions about the accusations of sexual assault against Yekutiel is … a bit shocking. From the Chron:
The mayor said Yekutiel had assured him the allegation was not true.
Umm … as far as I know, every man who has ever been accused of sexual assault, unless there were witnesses or audio or video evidence, “assures [whoever] that the allegation is not true.”
That’s about the lowest standard of evidence anyone could possibly present. And Lurie bought it—mostly because nobody in the conservative camp in the city cares. They just want supervisors who will support Big Tech, Big Real Estate, the cops, and rest of the mayor’s agenda.
Even if, as the AI folks are warning us, it’s the death of us all.
If you want to see what Lurie wants for the future of San Francisco government, just look at the agendas for the supes and key commissions for the next week.
The mayor is required to show up once a month at a supes meeting for “question time.” When we had a progressive majority on the board, that had some meaning: Supervisors like Dean Preston and Aaron Peskin used the opportunity to force the mayor to defend policy decisions. The public learned a lot about what often happens behind closed doors.
We still get occasional looks at what this tool could be. But the current board is much more subservient to the mayor. Witness this week’s agenda: None of the supervisors from districts 1, 2, 3, or 4 submitted questions. So Lurie can come and make a speech, and nobody will challenge him.
The Police Commission, which used to have extensive authority over the department, has been transformed into a weak agency, and the panel won’t even meet this week. The Planning Commission, which should be addressing the affordability crisis, the expansion of the AI sector, and so many other issues has lost its ability to plan, thanks to State Sen. Scott Wiener and Lurie’s “(rich) Family Zoning Plan.”
When Donald Trump got his “One Big Beautiful Bill” through Congress, he said there was no need for the legislative branch any more, and he’s acted like it. Lurie isn’t an autocrat, of course, but he’s moving in the direction of taking so much power into the Mayor’s Office that the supes and the commissions don’t matter any more.
That’s what his “anti-corruption” ballot measures will mean.
Power corrupts, of course, and while commissions and permits and rules may delay the mayor’s pro-development, pro-police, pro-surveillance agenda, once all of that authority is centralized, we will likely see more, not less, corruption.
Just go back to the days of Mayor Willie Brown. He consolidated the power of the Mayor’s Office, and oversaw the most corrupt period in local government in my lifetime.
Not a wonderful role model for Lurie.
The Rules Committee, after a long delay, will consider applications for the Sunshine Ordinance Task Force Monday/14. The Task Force, which enforces (kind of) the Sunshine Ordinance has been unable to meet because it’s lacked a quorum.
Several incumbents are up for re-appointment, and open-government advocates say they’ve done a good job. But they’ve annoyed the mayor, among others, and we may see pressure to remove them.
That hearing starts at 10am.
I am getting flooded with mailers from Abundance, the pro-Wiener IE, and they are using what is clearly a poll-tested line: Scott Wiener is the candidate of “yes,” and Connie Chan is the candidate of “No.”
Two thoughts: I have followed the US environmental movement for decades, and wrote a book on it. Much of modern environmentalism was saying no: No to toxic waste dumps in Black neighborhoods, No to cutting down old-growth trees, No to offshore oil drilling … the list goes on. There are plenty of things that developers and polluters (and now, AI companies) want to do that need to be opposed. The reason government exists is in part to set regulations, to say No to companies and individuals that want to act in ways harmful to the general public.
Also: Does anyone else think it’s a bit unsettling for a male candidate to tell a woman that she shouldn’t say “No?”
