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The Political Scene | The New Yorker

The Political Scene | The New Yorker

How, Exactly, Could A.I. Destroy Humanity?

Sep 17, 2026 · 58m

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The New Yorker staff writer Joshua Rothman joins Tyler Foggatt to discuss recent calls from industry leaders to slow the development of A.I. technology for safety reasons. They talk about an industry-wide fear that A.I. could disrupt or even end human life within a decade, what an A.I.-related extinction event might look like, and whether the people developing the technology can be trusted to play a role in regulating it. They also explore recent incidents involving A.I. models going “rogue” and the difficulty of making increasingly capable autonomous systems trustworthy and controllable. This week’s reading: “The Long Doomsday of A.I.,” by Joshua Rothman “My Weekend with an A.I. Agent,” by…