“Warning Shots: A Theory” by David Scott Krueger

Many people take it for granted that government won’t do anything to address societal scale AI risk unless or until there is a catastrophic “warning shot,” where an AI goes rogue and causes some serious damage. Something like Chernobyl or 9/11, where a bunch of people die. Many people have told me they hope for such a warning shot. This is grim. Fortunately, I don’t think we need a warning shot. Why not? Well, here are a few reasons: My personal experience over the past >15 years is that over time, more and more people become more and more concerned about the problems. This might not happen fast enough, but it's been very fast since the start of 2026. Job loss or other societal effects of AI could create political will to stop AI, even absent any loss-of-control type catastrophe. It seems like the problem is not the people don’t care, it's that they aren’t paying attention and/or don’t understand the situation. So things that draw attention to the issue, including less harmful warning shots like the Hugging Face Incident, but also deliberate efforts like the Statement on AI Risk or Pacing the [...] --- First published: August 27th, 2026 Source: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/nrTP75Z67YdcJTR9g/warning-shots-a-theory --- Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.