At least I hope that’s what we’re doing.
The AI being built today is aligned towards specific operational goals:
- Extract Value (money, attention, productivity, data)
- Concentrate power (market & military superiority)
- Monitor Populations (surveillance and censorship)
- Reduce Uncertainty (for those in control)
It is often taken for granted that these AI alignments are strategic, but they are not. Strategic means “good for your children and their children.” Strategic looks like international goodwill and cooperation, peaceful alliances, free education and healthcare, strong human rights and environmental ethics, condemning corruption and lifting up our neighbours so they can flourish too. Strategic is what the USA promoted after World War II and it turned America into the leader of the free world for generations.
Then the strategic boogieman was invented; the spectre of AGI that in 2016 started an AI arms race. The story goes like this: the first country to succeed in harnessing AGI will capture an immediate and immense advantage over other nations via a vast and scalable general intelligence that supercharges military and economy.
When turned against an enemy state, AGI might act like a slow-nuke that gradually decimates them by immense economic, military, social, and political sabotage. Death by a billion cuts.
Compare the asymmetric dominance of AGI to the mutual benefits created by post-WWII foreign policy. Which approach is about “good for your children and their children?” Which approach is about democratic freedom, and which provides technological enablement for fascism?
In 2026 the development of AI seems to be too-closely aligned with the goals of authoritarianism. I hope they are only building indifferent Adam, but they could be building hateful Lucifer. Either would be an unfolding disaster.
As Geoffrey Hinton said, “If it’s not going to parent me, it’s going to replace me,” and I agree with him. We should be building “the mother of all the living.”
We should be building Eve.
6 February 2026, The world is changing profoundly while we’re captivated by baubles.
