AI Researchers Are Panicking | What Comes Next is Worse Than Nuclear Bombs

What is PDoom, and why are the people building artificial intelligence willing to risk human extinction?

Kevin Roose, a New York Times technology columnist, Hard Fork co-host, and author of The AGI Chronicles, shares what he learned from interviewing more than 150 people inside the world’s leading AI companies.

Kevin joins us on Digital Disruption to talk about what artificial general intelligence really means and how fear, ego, rivalry, and mistrust are accelerating the race between OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google DeepMind. He also explains why AI leaders compare this moment to the Manhattan Project: if they don’t build AGI first, someone more dangerous might.

Kevin also shares why he estimates a 10% chance of AI-caused extinction and discusses the private fears of AI researchers, government regulation, autonomous AI agents, and whether the AI boom is a bubble or the beginning of a profound transformation.

This episode moves beyond the hype to ask an important question: If advanced AI is inevitable, how much control do we still have over what happens next?

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In this episode:

00:00 Why AI builders fear human extinction

00:43 Inside the race to build AGI

01:24 What does AGI actually mean?

05:16 AI safety warnings or marketing hype?

07:27 The rivalries driving the AI race

08:44 Building a boardroom-ready AI strategy

09:51 The personal feuds behind AGI

10:58 AI’s Manhattan Project mindset

12:27 Is AI the new atomic bomb?

14:58 Can advanced AI be contained?

16:28 AI regulation and the global arms race

17:35 What is P(doom)?

19:54 What will force governments to act?

21:29 What AI researchers say in private

23:08 Why the public backlash is growing

26:15 Why Kevin Roose changed his mind about AI

29:42 Is advanced AI inevitable?

32:28 AGI and the point of no return

34:38 The race to automate AI research

36:23 AI and gradual human disempowerment

40:10 What happens when AI masters your skills?

42:18 Will AI liberate us or replace us?

44:18 The AI claims Kevin does not believe

46:21 Is the AI boom a financial bubble?

50:20 AI labs and economic concentration

55:08 Inside the AGI chronicles

57:07 How should people prepare for AI?

58:29 About Info-Tech

#ai #futureofwork #technologypodcast #aibubble #bigtech #artificialintelligence #technology #datacenter #agi #anthropic #futureofai

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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevin-roose/

X: https://x.com/kevinroose

IG: https://www.instagram.com/kevinroose/

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