I’m your host, Blake Montgomery, US tech editor at the Guardian, writing to you while reading and disagreeing with Jenny Odell’s 2019 book How to Do Nothing. Today in tech, we’re discussing the upcoming meeting between Donald Trump and Xi Jinping, in which AI will likely feature prominently. Last week, the world freaked out about an AI apocalypse.
Now the two most powerful men, running the countries with the two most advanced AI industries, are going to discuss that possible doomsday. Donald Trump and Xi Jinping are set to greet one another on Wednesday and meet for talks in Washington DC, and artificial intelligence will be high on the agenda. Though their meeting reflects concern for AI at the highest levels of government, which is a generally positive sign, early indicators are not signalling that either nation is willing to put regulatory checks on the technology.
The US and Chinese leaders have stressed in recent days that a slowdown of AI development is unnecessary. Any AI slowdown would need buy-in from the US and China, but the rival nations see each other as the strongest argument against such a pause. Trump wants AI to go full steam ahead, fortified in that conviction by Silicon Valley leaders who’ve long been wary of Chinese ambitions.
Even Dario Amodei, while calling for a global coordinated pause, repeatedly called China a threat. China, meanwhile, sees appeals for a slowdown as a way for the US to solidify American companies’ lead. Would you accept a hobbling proposal from your first-place opponent?
That doesn’t mean Beijing shares none of Anthropic’s concerns. Last week, China released the third iteration of its AI safety governance framework. Included in the updates are risks posed by agents, cybersecurity threats from frontier models and the issue of self-improving AI.
Amodei has, likewise, highlighted risks on all three fronts. The combative stance between the trans-Pacific rivals doesn’t mean nothing will happen, Trump’s administration is putting on a positive face in the lead-up to the meeting. The US treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, has already met with his Chinese counterpart, He Lifeng, to discuss the threat of powerful AI.
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