If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All
Review Quotes: "This book offers brilliant insights into history's most consequential standoff between technological utopia and dystopia, and shows how we can and should prevent superhuman AI from killing us all. Yudkowsky and Soares's memorable...
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Review Quotes: ELIEZER YUDKOWSKY is one of the founding researchers of the field of AGI alignment, which is concerned with understanding how smarter-than-human intelligences think, behave, and pursue their goals. He appeared on TIME magazine's list of the 100 Most Influential People In AI, was one of the twelve public figures featured in The New York Times's "Who's Who Behind the Dawn of the Modern Artificial Intelligence Movement," and was one of the seven thought leaders spotlighted in The Washington Post's discussion of "AI's Rival Factions." He spoke on the main stage at 2023's TED conference and has been discussed or interviewed in The New Yorker, Newsweek, Forbes, Wired, Bloomberg, The Atlantic, The Economist, and many other venues. He has close to 200,000 followers on X, where he frequently dialogues with prominent public figures including the heads of frontier AI labs. NATE SOARES is the President of MIRI. He has been working in the field for over a decade, after previous experience at Microsoft and Google. Soares is the author of a large body of technical and semi-technical writing on AI alignment, has been interviewed in Vanity Fair and the Financial Times, and has spoken on conference panels alongside many of the AI field's leaders.Review Quotes: " If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies may prove to be the most important book of our time. Yudkowsky and Soares believe we are nowhere near ready to make the transition to superintelligence safely, leaving us on the fast track to extinction. Through the use of parables and crystal-clear explainers, they convey their reasoning, in an urgent plea for us to save ourselves while we still can."-- Tim Urban, cofounder, Wait But Why Review Quotes: "Soares and Yudkowsky lay out, in plain and easy-to-follow terms, why our current path toward ever-more-powerful AIs is extremely dangerous."-- Emmett Shear, former interim CEO of OpenAI Review Quotes: "The best no-nonsense, simple explanation of the AI risk problem I've ever read."-- Yishan Wong, former CEO of Reddit Review Quotes: "A timely and terrifying education on the galloping havoc AI could unleash--unless we grasp the reins and take control."-- Kirkus Review Quotes: "A clearly written and compelling account of the existential risks that highly advanced AI could pose to humanity. Recommended."-- Ben Bernanke, Nobel laureate and former chairman of the Federal Reserve Review Quotes: "A sober but highly readable book on the very real risks of AI. Both skeptics and believers need to understand the authors' arguments, and work to ensure that our AI future is more beneficial than harmful."-- Bruce Schneier, Lecturer, Harvard Kennedy School and author of A Hacker's Mind Review Quotes: "You're likely to close this book fully convinced that governments need to shift immediately to a more cautious approach to AI, an approach more respectful of the civilization-changing enormity of what's being created. I'd like everyone on earth who cares about the future to read this book and debate its ideas."-- Scott Aaronson, Schlumberger Centennial Chair of Computer Science, The University of Texas at Austin Review Quotes: "[An] urgent clarion call to prevent the creation of artificial superintelligence...A frightening warning that deserves to be reckoned with."-- Publishers Weekly Review Quotes: "This book outlines a thought-provoking scenario of how the emerging risks of AI could drastically transform the world. Exploring these possibilities helps surface critical risks and questions we cannot collectively afford to overlook."-- Yoshua Bengio, Full Professor, Université de Montréal; Co-President and Scientific Director, LawZero; Founder and Scientific Advisor, Mila - Quebec AI Institute Review Quotes: "Fascinating and downright frightening...argues that AI companies' unchecked charge toward superhuman AI will be disastrous, lays out some theoretical scenarios detailing how it could lead to our annihilation and suggests what might be done to change our doomed trajectory...[Yudkowsky and Soares] make a pretty convincing case that we are playing with fire."-- AARP Review Quotes: "[Yudkowsky and Soares's] diagnosis of AI's potential pitfalls evinces a sustained engagement with the subject...they have a commendable willingness to call BS on big Silicon Valley names, accusing Elon Musk and Yann LeCun, Meta AI's chief scientist, of downplaying real risks."-- San Francisco Chronicle Review Quotes: " If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies makes a compelling case that superhuman AI would almost certainly lead to global human annihilation. Governments around the world must recognize the risks and take collective and effective action."-- Jon Wolfsthal, former special assistant to the president for national security affairs Review Quotes: "Essential reading for policymakers, journalists, researchers, and the general public. A masterfully written and groundbreaking text, If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies provides an important starting point for discussing AI at all levels."-- Bart Selman, professor of computer science, Cornell University Review Quotes: " If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies isn't just a wake-up call; it's a fire alarm ringing with clarity and urgency. Yudkowsky and Soares pull no punches: unchecked superhuman AI poses an existential threat. It's a sobering reminder that humanity's future depends on what we do right now."-- Mark Ruffalo, actor Review Quotes: "A serious book in every respect. In Yudkowsky and Soares's chilling analysis, a super-empowered AI will have no need for humanity and ample capacity to eliminate us. If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies is an eloquent and urgent plea for us to step back from the brink of self-annihilation."-- Fiona Hill, former senior director, White House National Security Council Review Quotes: "The definitive book about how to take on 'humanity's final boss'--the hard-to-resist urge to develop superintelligent machines--and live to tell the tale."-- Jaan Tallinn, philanthropist, cofounder of the Center for the Study of Existential Risk, and cofounder of Skype Review Quotes: "A.I. is coming, whether we want it or not. It's too late to stop it, but not too late to keep this handy survival guide close and start demanding real guardrails before the edges start to fray."-- Patton Oswalt, actor Review Quotes: "An incredibly serious issue that merits -- really demands -- our attention. You don't have to agree with the prediction or prescriptions in this book, nor do you have to be tech or AI savvy, to find it fascinating, accessible, and thought-provoking."-- Suzanne Spaulding, former undersecretary, Department of Homeland Security Review Quotes: "The most important book I've read for years: I want to bring it to every political and corporate leader in the world and stand over them until they've read it. Yudkowsky and Soares, who have studied AI and its possible trajectories for decades, sound a loud trumpet call to humanity to awaken us as we sleepwalk into disaster."-- Stephen Fry, actor Review Quotes: "Everyone should read this book. There's a 70% chance that you--yes, you reading this right now--will one day grudgingly admit that we all should have listened to Yudkowsky and Soares when we still had the chance."-- Daniel Kokotajlo, OpenAI whistleblower and executive director, AI Futures Project Review Quotes: " If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies is a sharp and sobering read. As someone who has spent years pushing for responsible AI policy, I found it to be an essential warning about what's at stake if we get this wrong. Yudkowsky and Soares make the case with clarity, urgency, and heart."-- Joely Fisher, National Secretary-Treasurer, SAG-AFTRA Review Quotes: "If we build superintelligent machines without guardrails, we're not just risking jobs or art, we're risking everything. This book doesn't exaggerate. It tells the truth. If we don't act, we may not get another chance."-- Frances Fisher, actor Review Quotes: "A shocking book that captures the insanity and hubris of efforts to create thinking machines that could kill us all. But it's not over yet. As the authors insist: 'where there's life, there's hope.'"-- Dorothy Sue Cobble, Distinguished Professor Emerita, Labor Studies, Rutgers University Review Quotes: " If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies is an urgent, well-reported and persuasive warning about the grave danger humanity faces from reckless AI development."-- Alex Winter, actor and filmmaker Review Quotes: "If you want to be able to assess the risk posed by AI, you will need to understand the worst-case scenario. This book is an exceptionally lucid and rigorous account of how very wrong humankind's quest for a general AI could go. You have been warned!"-- Christopher Clark, Regius Professor of History, University of Cambridge Review Quotes: "Once only the realm of sci-fi, superintelligence is almost at our doorstep. We don't know for sure what is going to happen when it arrives, but I'm glad we at least have this book raising the tough questions that needs to be asked while the rest of the industry buries its head in the sand."-- Liv Boeree, philanthropist and poker champion Review Quotes: "While I'm skeptical that the current trajectory of AI development will lead to human extinction, I acknowledge that this view may reflect a failure of imagination on my part. Given AI's exponential pace of change there's no better time to take prudent steps to guard against worst-case outcomes. The authors offer important proposals for global guardrails and risk mitigation that deserve serious consideration."-- Lieutenant General John (Jack) N.T. Shanahan (USAF, Ret.), Inaugural Director, Department of Defense Joint AI Center Review Quotes: "A clarion call...Everyone with an interest in the future has a duty to read what [Yudkowsky] and Soares have to say."-- The Guardian Review Quotes: "A landmark book everyone should get and read."-- Steve Bannon, The War Room Review Quotes: "A fire alarm for anyone shaping the future. Whether one agrees with its conclusions or not, the book demands serious attention and reflection."-- Booklist (starred review) Review Quotes: "Surprisingly readable and chillingly plausible."-- The Guardian Publisher Marketing: INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER The New Yorker's Best Books of 2025 The Guardian's Best Books of 2025 A 2025 Booklist Editors' Choice Pick The scramble to create superhuman AI has put us on the path to extinction--but it's not too late to change course, as two of the field's earliest researchers explain in this clarion call for humanity. "May prove to be the most important book of our time."--Tim Urban, Wait But Why In 2023, hundreds of AI luminaries signed an open letter warning that artificial intelligence poses a serious risk of human extinction. Since then, the AI race has only intensified. Companies and countries are rushing to build machines that will be smarter than any person. And the world is devastatingly unprepared for what would come next. For decades, two signatories of that letter--Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares--have studied how smarter-than-human intelligences will think, behave, and pursue their objectives. Their research says that sufficiently smart AIs will develop goals of their own that put them in conflict with us--and that if it comes to conflict, an artificial superintelligence would crush us. The contest wouldn't even be close. How could a machine superintelligence wipe out our entire species? Why would it want to? Would it want anything at all? In this urgent book, Yudkowsky and Soares walk through the theory and the evidence, present one possible extinction scenario, and explain what it would take for humanity to survive. The world is racing to build something truly new under the sun. And if anyone builds it, everyone dies. "The best no-nonsense, simple explanation of the AI risk problem I've ever read."--Yishan Wong, Former CEO of Reddit Review Citations:
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