Tools, not masters

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LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

We’ve already spent some time today and this week considering the promises and risks of artificial intelligence. WORLD commentator Cal Thomas takes up AI from a different angle—by looking back at some earlier predictions of catastrophe.

CAL THOMAS: In the 1964 satire Dr. Strangelove, the Soviet Union has built the ultimate deterrent.

It’s a “Doomsday Machine.”

Attack the Soviets, and the machine automatically destroys life on Earth.

Today, some of the people building artificial intelligence are issuing warnings almost as frightening.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei told CBS Sunday Morning that AI is advancing faster than its safeguards.

AMODEI: What it means, It doesn’t mean we need to panic today. It doesn’t mean we need to shut it all down. … I would say It’s a warning sign, It’s a warning sign that we need to slow down.

Amodei worries about losing control of powerful systems—and about their use in cyberattacks and biological threats.

Other prominent AI leaders, including Sam Altman and Elon Musk, have also called for greater caution.

President Trump isn’t buying the doomsday talk.

During a phone call Monday with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Trump said:

TRUMP: The robots will not be taking over. The AI will not be taking over the rest of the world. The whole thing is a hoax.

Trump did add that America needs to be careful and prudent.

House Speaker Mike Johnson says some guardrails are needed, but warns against giving up America’s technological lead to China.

I have long suspected artificial intelligence has existed in Washington.

It’s called Congress.

But seriously: How frightened should the rest of us be?

Human beings have a long history of predicting doomsday.

Radio preacher Harold Camping repeatedly predicted the end of the world. Each date came and went.

In 1806, an English hen supposedly laid eggs announcing, “Christ is coming”—until its owner was caught faking them.

Halley’s Comet and the Mayan calendar inspired doomsday scares, too.

We’re still here.

But artificial intelligence is not a comet prediction or a message on an egg.

This is real.

AI’s capabilities are advancing quickly. And when some of the very people developing the technology say there are risks, prudence requires listening to them.

That does not require panic.

History has taught us something about doomsday predictions: They get headlines. They don’t always get the future right.

Some guardrails make sense. But there’s a difference between guarding against a danger and regulating a technology into submission.

Dr. Strangelove was funny because the Doomsday Machine was absurd—and because human beings were foolish enough to build it.

Artificial intelligence may do enormous good. It may also cause serious harm.

But artificial intelligence is still a tool.

The machine should serve us. We should not serve the machine.

For WORLD, I’m Cal Thomas.

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