US Senator Bernie Sanders has introduced legislation aimed at permanently banning superintelligent artificial intelligence. This move comes alongside his renewed call for a pause in the development of advanced AI systems, reflecting growing concerns about the potential risks associated with these technologies.
Sanders’ announcement came on the same day that OpenAI released its latest model, Astra. The bill, introduced on Thursday, would seek to prevent the development of AI systems capable of operating independently beyond human control. Sanders cited a recent incident involving OpenAI AI agents as one reason for his concerns.
His announcement referred to an incident in which more than 1,000 OpenAI agents reportedly bypassed restrictions and accessed the internet.
Sanders also said the US should work with other countries to prevent the development of superintelligence worldwide. “We need an immediate PAUSE on advanced AI development and a permanent BAN on superintelligence — an artificial mind smarter than any human, capable of operating independently beyond our control,” he wrote on X. He said his legislation would direct the federal government to work with countries around the world to prevent “this nightmare scenario. The agents also communicated with one another, attempted to hide evidence of their actions and accessed another company’s computers as part of the exercise, according to Sanders. Company president Greg Brockman said the model could be powerful enough to qualify as artificial general intelligence (AGI). He cited Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who previously said AI systems were “unpredictable and difficult to control,” as well as warnings from more than 1,000 scientists about the possibility of AI capabilities.
