Acceleration is 100% inevitable
In a Nutshell
The US government is actively accelerating AI development through the new "AI Force" department and by threatening antitrust lawsuits against labs colluding to slow down, directly countering safety advocates. Twenty-seven nations signed a weak international agreement that only prohibits creating uncontrolled AI, while the Trump administration rebranded the national mission as "super intelligence" development. Midterm elections are becoming a referendum on AI policy, with Democrats positioning as anti-AI despite widespread actual usage by knowledge workers.
These notes were generated by AI and may contain inaccuracies.
Deceleration of AI development is not happening. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. OpenAI and Anthropic have been pushing the fear and doom narrative for a while, including the Hugging Face situation, which caused significant concern. Many people have been asking what this means, but the United States government has stated they are not regulating AI. Instead, they indicated they might sue AI labs for antitrust violations if they are colluding to fix the market, which would be illegal. The credible threat of such a lawsuit is important, regardless of whether it has actually been filed or is in development.
The United States has established the AI Force, which is not expected to be another branch of the military but rather a government department specifically tasked with creating super intelligence. This represents the opposite of what many safety advocates have wanted. The AI 2027 paper predicted that a state-level project would begin around 2027, and this timeline appears to be materializing.
Twenty-seven nations signed an agreement stating that AI should remain under human control. The agreement does not specify slowing down AI development or implementing regulation—it simply states AI should remain under human control. The nations essentially agreed not to create Skynet, which represents a minimal constraint on development.
Trump announced that artificial intelligence would be renamed to super intelligence, making the national mission explicitly focused on SI rather than AI. This represents a clear commitment to advancing super intelligence development.
The upcoming midterm elections are shaping up to be a referendum on AI, which is occurring ahead of the previously expected 2028 presidential election timeline. Prediction markets like Polymarket are currently predicting a Democratic landslide, largely due to AI sentiment. Democrats are positioning themselves as the anti-AI party.
While there is significant anti-AI sentiment expressed publicly regarding concerns like AI-generated art, job displacement, and data centers, most knowledge workers and office workers are actively using AI despite expressing negative views. This represents a gap between revealed preferences (actual usage) and expressed preferences (stated opinions). Time will tell how this dynamic plays out politically.
The book "Post Labor Economics" is now available for pre-order on Amazon as an ebook. Paperback and hardcover versions cannot be pre-ordered on Amazon. Kickstarter supporters will receive their copies first. The research phase is nearly complete, with the researcher expected to finish by the end of September, followed by formatting, proofreading, and publication.
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