Bannon, Rice, Bengio sign FLI's pro-human AI declaration

The Future of Life Institute released a Pro-Human AI Declaration on March 4, backed by more than 40 organizations and signed by an ideologically improbable roster that includes Steve Bannon, Susan Rice, Ralph Nader, Glenn Beck, Richard Branson, Nobel economist Daron Acemoglu, and AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio, according to The Verge.

The document was hammered out at a closed-door meeting in early January at a New Orleans Marriott, where roughly 90 political, community, and thought leaders gathered under Chatham House Rules. Church leaders sat next to labor union reps; progressive organizers shared air with MAGA-aligned media figures. MIT professor and FLI co-founder Max Tegmark issued the invitations. Big Tech was not on the list.

"The pro-human movement is an immune response to Silicon Valley's reckless race-to-replace humans," FLI president Anthony Aguirre said in the statement. Emilia Javorsky, who directs FLI's Futures Program, told The Verge that excluding industry representatives was "a very deliberate design choice."

The declaration sets out 33 principles across five themes: Keeping Humans in Charge, Avoiding Concentration of Power, Protecting the Human Experience, Human Agency and Liberty, and Responsibility and Accountability for AI Companies. Accompanying polling found 83% of respondents agreed that "humanity must remain in control of AI," and 77% agreed companies must not be allowed to exploit children through AI. A separate $8 million "Protect What's Human" campaign is launching in Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, and North Carolina. Two experts in our Who's Who directory shared the piece.