AI leaders urge slowdown and warn UN of rapid development
At an emergency UN Security Council session, OpenAI chief Sam Altman warned that the speed of artificial‑intelligence progress could outpace institutions and concentrate power, calling for extreme care. Anthropic chief Dario Amodei said his company would decelerate development whenever safety demands it and outlined an essay proposing independent evaluators, capability thresholds and shared standards, stressing the need for U.S.–China cooperation.
Hugging Face founder Clément Delangue also stressed tighter safeguards against misuse. The meeting followed the resignation of former Anthropic staffer Jacob Coxon, who had raised concerns about unchecked AI advancement. Leaders from firms such as DeepSeek and Moonshot were slated to attend, and President Donald Trump posted a comment asserting presidential oversight.
How this was covered
- Coverage peaked at 20 outlets in a single hour
Why it matters
The debate could shape how AI systems are built and regulated, influencing security and societal risks.
How this story developed
- Jul 28 AI leaders urge U.S. to back global framework for slowing automated AI progress
- Sep 15 Democratic senators organized briefings and proposed bills while bipartisan senators advanced a legislative path.
- Sep 15 President Donald Trump rejected the CEOs' appeals and senior Republicans signaled reluctance, while Senator John Kennedy introduced a “kill switch” proposal.
- Sep 15 Trump and Xi are unlikely to agree to an AI slowdown at the upcoming summit.
- Sep 16 While a recent poll shows two-thirds of Americans fear AI could end humanity, conference goers largely dismissed imminent extinction. Attendees such as Dean Levita and Henry Sandles said they trust safeguards and focus on labor displacement, while Sara Jamison and Ashleigh Kaye highlighted the environmental toll of data centers. Others, like Deep Karia and Soumya Nimmu, worried about privacy, mental-health strain and misuse of AI in deepfakes and weapons.
- Sep 16 Jacob Coxon resigned from Anthropic after issuing the warning.
- Sep 17 In response to recent high-profile incidents involving rogue AI agents, CEOs and founders such as Dario Amodei, Sam Altman, Demis Hassabis, Satya Nadella and Elon Musk signed a joint statement calling for slower progress. The proposal outlines three steps: third-party safety auditors, industry coordination on standards, and global cooperation among democratic governments. Companies like Anthropic have already pledged to allow external evaluators access to their models.
- Sep 17 President Donald Trump met President Xi Jinping in Washington to discuss AI safety.
- Sep 18 Mark Zuckerberg and Jensen Huang publicly opposed a unified slowdown, emphasizing market incentives.
- Sep 18 Lawmakers have begun focusing on updating Section 230 and school‑board decisions related to AI.
- Sep 19 Microsoft released a humanist AI code of conduct after Suleiman’s warning.
- Sep 22 David Sacks was installed as the president’s senior AI adviser, shaping a deregulatory White House policy.
- Sep 23 UN Security Council hearing featured CEOs Altman and Amodei warning of AI risks.
- Sep 23 Jacob Coxon resigned from Anthropic, prompting Amodei’s essay calling for a paced AI development approach.
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