Can Anyone Slow Down the AI Race?

Dario Amodei wants to slow the race to build the most powerful AI. Sam Altman has supported embedded evaluators, and Elon Musk has endorsed Dario’s argument. But can companies competing to win that race actually slow down? We explain what “pacing the frontier” means, why the proposal appeared now, and what could prevent it from working. Then we test the idea against history: the unsuccessful 2023 AI pause, the Asilomar response to genetic-engineering risks, Cold War arms control, and the agreement that helped secure AT&T’s dominant position. Could this protect the public—or make it harder for smaller companies to compete? We finish with five tests for a credible plan. If you value careful, well-researched explanations of AI and science, subscribe to The Science Examined. WATCH NEXT Why Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned:    • Anthropic Researcher Quits—and Warns AI Co...   CHAPTERS 00:00 The AI race—and the missing brake 00:30 Why AI leaders are calling for a slowdown 01:39 What “pacing the frontier” actually means 03:59 Why now? 06:28 The US–China competition 07:48 Why companies struggle to slow down 09:28 The AI pause that never happened 10:30 When scientists did slow down: Asilomar 12:16 Can rival countries cooperate? 13:54 Safety—or protection from competition? 15:40 Five tests for a credible slowdown 18:58 Will this proposal work? SOURCES & FURTHER READING Dario Amodei — We Must Pace the Frontier https://darioamodei.com/post/we-must-... Future of Life Institute — The 2023 pause letter https://futureoflife.org/open-letter/... International AI Safety Report 2026 https://internationalaisafetyreport.o... NIEHS — Research ethics timeline, including recombinant-DNA research https://www.niehs.nih.gov/research/re... US Department of State — INF Treaty https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/avc/trt... FCC — Historical discussion of AT&T and the Kingsbury Commitment https://docs.fcc.gov/public/attachmen... INTERVIEWS & ARCHIVE CLIPS CNN — Dario Amodei:    • Anthropic CEO reacts to 'AI could kill us ...   CNN — Jack Clark:    • Anthropic co-founder actually wants AI to ...   CNN — Geoffrey Hinton:    • AI kill switch won't work in the long run:...   DeepLearning.AI — Andrew Ng and Yann LeCun:    • Yann LeCun and Andrew Ng: Why the 6-month ...   Sky News — Ed Conway:    • Why AI can't be stopped   MS NOW — Roger McNamee:    • 'They are in PANIC mode': Why AI CEOs are ...   Additional image credits: Elon Musk photograph by Gage Skidmore, CC BY-SA 3.0; Asilomar photograph courtesy of Science History Institute; historical telephone-switchboard image from the Library of Congress. Some explanatory visuals are AI-generated illustrations, not footage of actual events. #ArtificialIntelligence #AISafety #Anthropic Sources and further reading: Subscribe to The Science? for evidence-based commentary on science, philosophy, politics, and culture. Question certainty. Examine the evidence.