Reid Hoffman—Dismissed calls to pause AI development as 'foolish' and 'anti-humanist'
At the Fortune Brainstorm AI conference in December 2023, Reid Hoffman publicly dismissed calls to pause advanced AI development, calling such ideas 'foolish' and 'anti-humanist.' He argued the focus on AI risks was overblown, stating 'the real important thing is to not fumble the future.' This positioned him against the March 2023 open letter signed by thousands of AI researchers calling for a six-month pause on training systems more powerful than GPT-4, and against broader precautionary approaches to AI safety.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| AI Oversight | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| AI Safety | -against | secondary | -0.50 |
| Overall incident score = | -0.483 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (medium ×1) × confidence (0.64)
Evidence (2 signals)
Hoffman told Fortune Brainstorm AI that pausing AI is 'foolish' and the priority is to 'not fumble the future'
At the Fortune Brainstorm AI conference in December 2023, Reid Hoffman dismissed calls for AI development pauses as 'foolish' and 'anti-humanist.' He said 'There's so much dialogue about risks of all sorts. Yes, we need to pay attention, but the real important thing is to not fumble the future.' This was in response to growing calls from AI researchers for precautionary approaches.
Hoffman praised Biden's AI executive order as 'very good start' while opposing development pauses
Hoffman praised President Biden's October 2023 executive order on AI as a 'very good start' requiring companies to share safety test results with the government, calling it 'exactly the kind of approach we should be taking on critical technologies like AI.' However, he simultaneously opposed any pause on AI development, framing regulation and acceleration as compatible while dismissing precautionary approaches.