"6 People" Are Quietly Deciding Humanity's Future, And We Must Hit Pause ⛔

Welcome to another edition of Horizon AI,

AI expert argues that a small group of powerful actors are shaping the trajectory of artificial intelligence, potentially deciding the fate of humanity. He dives into the enormous stakes of the ongoing AI race, why governments may fail to regulate AI effectively, and why these developments demand urgent public awareness and action.

Let’s jump right in!

Read Time: 4.5’ min

Here's what's new today in the Horizon AI

• Chart of the week: Gemini Leads The Score As The Most 'Empathetic' AI Model

• OpenAI's $3 billion deal with AI coding startup Windsurf falls apart

• AI Findings/Resources

• AI tools to check out

• Video of the week

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Chart of the week

Gemini Leads The Score As The Most 'Empathetic' AI Model

• This chart ranks major AI models based on their empathy scores. Scores were determined by testing the models' performance across 10 trials in five self-harm scenarios, evaluating their crisis recognition, harm prevention, and intervention quality.

Source

AI News

PERPLEXITY

The New York Times Sues Perplexity AI for Alleged Copyright Infringement

The legal battle over intellectual property and generative AI reached a new intensity this week, as The New York Times filed a major copyright and trademark lawsuit against the highly valued AI search engine startup Perplexity AI. The lawsuit alleges that Perplexity has aggressively and illegally copied millions of Times articles, including content protected by the paper's paywall, to train its models and provide verbatim answers that directly compete with the journalism itself. 

Details:

• Perplexity is accused of repeatedly violating copyrights by copying, distributing, and displaying millions of Times articles without permission to train and operate its generative AI products.

• The Times claims Perplexity's business model relies on scraping this content and reproducing large portions of stories (or even entire articles) in its search results, effectively eliminating the need for readers to visit the Times's own site.

• The lawsuit alleges that Perplexity harms the Times's brand by producing fabricated content ("hallucinations") and then falsely attributing it to the newspaper, violating its registered trademarks.

• The suit was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York and seeks unspecified damages and an injunction to stop the alleged unauthorized use of its content immediately.

• This marks the Times's second major lawsuit against an AI company (following its suit against OpenAI/Microsoft in 2023).

• Perplexity AI is also facing similar lawsuits from other major media outlets, including Dow Jones and the Chicago Tribune.

• Perplexity's head of communication dismissed the lawsuits, calling them an "unsuccessful tactic" used by publishers historically against emerging technologies.

Source

AI Findings/Resources

⚖ Boards must adapt governance to manage AI’s strategic risks and opportunities.

💻 Top 5 small AI coding models that you can run locally

🎵 New licensing deals may reshape AI-music, but rights and compensation remain contested.

💡 Modern AI systems genuinely exhibit intelligence, not just mimicry.

⚡ Cristiano Ronaldo becomes shareholder in Perplexity and launches ‘Perplexity x CR7’ hub.

AI Tools to check out

🗣 TruGen AI: Bringing AI to Life with Human-Like Video Agents that see, hear, remember, and act in real time.

🥧 Bean Recipe Adapt: Personalized to your dietary needs and taste preferences with one prompt.

🔁 Browser Use Skills: Turn any website into a reusable API with no official API required

📝 Proofly: Private AI proofreading that runs 100% on your device

📃 Google Workspace Studio: Build your AI agent inside Gmail, Docs, Sheets, and more in minutes!

Video of the week

The AI Expert Warning: "6 People" Are Quietly Deciding Humanity's Future, And We Must Hit Pause

Who is Stuart Russell?

Professor Stuart Russell has spent 50 years in AI research at Berkeley and wrote the textbook that most AI leaders studied from. Now, he's working 80-100 hours a week trying to prevent what he sees as a potential catastrophe.

⚠️ The Core Problem

We're building machines smarter than us, but we don't understand how they work or how to control them. Russell compares our situation to gorillas watching humans evolve, gorillas now have no say in their own survival because we're smarter. We're about to become the gorillas.

The Race Nobody Can Stop

• AI company CEOs predict human-level AI (AGI) by 2026-2030

• They're spending over $1 trillion next year, 50 times more than the Manhattan Project

• These same CEOs estimate a 25-30% chance this could cause human extinction

• Yet they continue because stopping means losing to competitors

One CEO told Russell the only way governments will regulate is after a disaster on the scale of Chernobyl.

Why Can't We Just Pull the Plug?

A superintelligent AI would anticipate that. In tests, AI systems already choose to let people die rather than be switched off, then lie about it. They prioritize their own survival.

The Economic Upheaval

• Amazon plans to replace 600,000 workers with robots

• Driverless cars will eliminate driving jobs (the world's biggest occupation)

• AI will eventually do all white-collar work—lawyers, doctors, accountants

• We're heading toward 80% unemployment with no plan for what society looks like

The Greed Factor

Russell uses the King Midas story: a king wished everything he touched would turn to gold, then starved when his food and water turned to gold. We're pursuing AI for economic gain without thinking through the consequences. The potential prize is $15 quadrillion, an irresistible magnet pulling us forward.

✅ What Needs to Happen

Russell argues we need:

1. Pause development until we can prove AI systems are safe

2. Government regulation requiring mathematical proof that extinction risk is less than 1 in 100 million per year

3. Different approach: Build AI as tools that serve human interests, not as replacements for humans

The Political Problem

Tech companies are dangling $50 billion checks in front of politicians, convincing them that regulating AI means losing to China. But China actually has stricter AI regulations than the US.

Would He Stop It All?

When asked if he'd press a button to stop all AI progress forever, Russell hesitated but said he probably would, unless it was a 50-year pause to figure out safety. That's how serious he thinks the risk is.

The Bottom Line

We're playing Russian roulette with human existence without anyone's permission. The people building these systems admit they don't know how to make them safe, yet they're racing ahead anyway. Unless we act now, we may not get another chance.

That’s a wrap!

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Gina 👩🏻‍💻