AI CEOs say they need to slow the pace of development. But will they?

After apocalyptic warnings about the threats posed by AI, leaders like Sam Altman and Elon Musk backed Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's calls to 'slow the pace' Facing a public uproar over Anthropic researchers' repeated warnings that artificial intelligence could kill all of humanity by 2030, the AI company's CEO Dario Amodei issued a proposal at the weekend to slow down the technology's advancement to ensure public safety. In a rare display of unity, the heads of the largest US artificial intelligence companies all agreed immediately. The OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Google DeepMind chief Demis Hassabis and xAI owner Elon Musk posted support for Amodei's proposal for slowing AI development, titled "We Must Pace the Frontier," with Altman stating he would match Amodei's commitment to embedding outside evaluators within his company to verify safety practices. "I agree with Dario that we need to pace the frontier," Altman posted Saturday on X. "Committing to having independent evaluators with employee-like access is a great idea, and we will do the same." "Dario's essay points towards the right path forward," said Hassabis. Musk simply wrote: "Dario is right." The AI CEOs' warnings and promises open up a host of questions about how AI might be regulated, what risks it poses and whether the industry will actually slow down the fevered race to advance its technology. While lawmakers and the tech industry consider how to address growing fear and distrust of AI, many of the hurdles impeding comprehensive AI regulation remain the same as before last week's apocalyptic declarations from a young Anthropic researcher. The US federal government is committed to a global AI arms race. Previous proposed AI legislation has wilted under intense, well-financed corporate lobbying. AI startups face the enormous pressures to release new, more powerful products ahead of upcoming trillion-dollar public offerings. Amodei's pacing proposal has drawn heavy skepticism from critics and researchers…