Poll: majorities across six countries fear AI could 'destroy humanity'
A POLITICO/Public First survey finds cross-partisan support for pausing AI development in the US, Canada and Europe, pressuring leaders as they debate regulation at the UN.
What to know
- A POLITICO/Public First poll across the US, Canada, UK, France, Spain and Germany finds majorities in every country see at least a moderate risk AI could destroy humanity.
- Roughly half of respondents support pausing AI development now rather than continuing for further benefits, with support cutting across party lines.
- Pluralities say it is acceptable for their country to fall behind in the AI race if it means developing the technology more safely.
- The findings arrive as world leaders gather at the UN General Assembly and as the EU, already regulating AI but lagging in frontier model development, faces pressure from both activists and industry.
Ursula von der Leyen European Commission President
Donald Trump US President
Andy Burnham UK Prime Minister (per article)Didier Coeurnelle Coordinator, PauseAI Belgium
How it unfolded 2 developments, newest first · click a bar or a number to jump articlespostscomments
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Online commenters dismiss the poll's 'existential risk' framing — Reddit commenters pushed back on the poll and coverage, arguing the framing overstates AI's danger relative to other technologies and serves the interests of AI companies and clickbait media, or distracts from AI's present-day harms.
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Business Insider and other outlets amplify the poll findings
Business Insider republished the POLITICO poll results, and the story circulated further via Mastodon and other outlets highlighting that pluralities want to pause AI even if it means falling behind other countries.
“Sure. And while we're banning entire fields of study (instead of the people responsible for their misuse), let's also ban nuclear science, biology, and chemistry.”
— jaykayenn, Reddit commenter · source -
Sure. And while we're banning entire fields of study (instead of the people responsible for their misuse), let's also ban nuclear science, biology, and chemistry. Those have proven to have much more than a 'moderate' risk. People are dumb, and the AI companies/politicians are taking advantage of it. And scammy media sites like this are fanning the…
2 more of the top 3 · 3 posts in this stretch
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Adam Conover's video about how the "existential threat" of AI is designed to take our attention away from the present and more tangible threats of AI (and how this protects the people behind AI companies by doing so) :
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AI is a business failure and they are trying to doomscry us into bailing them out
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POLITICO poll finds cross-party AI extinction fears in six countries
A POLITICO/Public First poll of adults in the US, Canada, UK, France, Spain and Germany finds majorities in every country see at least a moderate risk AI could destroy humanity, and roughly half support pausing further development rather than pursuing added benefits.
“if the people developing the technology are clear, then we should be too.”
— Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission President · source -
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PauseAI activists protest outside the European Parliament — The Pause AI movement demonstrated in Brussels, with Belgian coordinator Didier Coeurnelle comparing tolerated AI risk to boarding a plane with a chance of exploding, referencing an Anthropic employee's over-10% extinction-risk estimate.
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Von der Leyen signals EU could help pace AI development — In her yearly State of the Union address, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU should match AI developers' own caution and invited major AI labs to discuss how the bloc could 'support' pacing the frontier.