Ep. 27: The scientist trying to save humans from AI
with Nate Soares, President of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute
Nate Soares, president of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute, believes that AI has potential to annihilate humanity. He knows this sounds hyperbolic, but as he explains in his new book “If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All,” just because this outcome may be dramatic, doesn’t make it any less true.
In our conversation, Nate shares how little we actually know about how AIs work, and why it’s hard — if not impossible — for us to fully predict their behavior, even though we’re the ones programming them. Together, we discuss what could happen if humanity continues to invest so heavily in AI (spoiler: it’s terrifying). Imagine humans being pets of AI, AI overrunning our natural resources, and other sci-fi like doomsday scenarios. But also, Nate offers some hope. He reminds us that we are, in fact, capable of reshaping the future. The first step to doing so is understanding what’s at stake.
About Nate Soares:
Nate Soares is the President of the Machine Intelligence Research Institute. He has been working in the field for over a decade, after previous experience at Microsoft and Google. Soares is the author of a large body of technical and semi-technical writing on AI alignment, including foundational work on value learning, decision theory, and power-seeking incentives in smarter-than-human AIs. Follow Nate on X @
