The game theory of an AI pause

The issues go well beyond China:

What might countries such as Israel or Japan do if their most important ally decides to pause work on AI? Might this not lead to a proliferation of GPT-like models across more countries — exactly what the pause advocates were trying to avoid?

And if the goal is to “Pause Giant AI Experiments,” which is what the letter is titled, what of smaller ones? What if a small company has an ongoing experiment but is nowhere close to having an effective product? A six-month suspension would damage their future business prospects and serve to entrench the incumbents. What if one of those new upstarts is working to come up with very good safety and alignment procedures? What if its AI might help cure cancer?

There is little evidence that proponents of a delay have thought through the major secondary effects of their 600-word proposal. Maybe they could have made a stronger argument if they they’d had more time to prepare — say, another six months?

Here is my full Bloomberg column.