Getting Into PauseAI w/ Will Petillo

Will Petillo, onboarding team lead at PauseAI, joins me to discuss the grassroots movement advocating for a pause on frontier AI model development. We explore PauseAI's strategy, talk about common misconceptions Will hears, and dig into how diverse perspectives still converge on the need to slow down AI development.Will's LinksPersonal blog on AIHis mindmap of the AI x-risk debateGame demosAI focused YouTube channel(00:00) - Intro (03:36) - What is PauseAI (10:10) - Will Petillo's journey into AI safety advocacy (21:13) - Understanding PauseAI (31:35) - Pursuing a pause (40:06) - Balancing advocacy in a complex world (45:54) - Why a pause on frontier models? (54:48) - Diverse perspectives within PauseAI (59:55) - PauseAI misconceptions (01:16:40) - Ongoing AI governance efforts (SB1047) (01:28:52) - The role of incremental progress (01:35:16) - Safety-washing and corporate responsibility (01:37:23) - Lessons from environmentalism (01:41:59) - Will's superlatives LinksPauseAIPauseAI-USRelated Kairos.fm EpisodesInto AI Safety episode with Dr. Igor KrawczukmuckrAIkers episode on SB1047Exclusionary TendenciesJacobin article - Elite Universities Gave Us Effective Altruism, the Dumbest Idea of the CenturySSIR article - The Elitist Philanthropy of So-Called Effective AltruismPersuasion blogpost - The Problem with Effective AltruismDark Markets blogpost - What's So Bad About Rationalism?FEE blogpost - What’s Wrong With the Rationality Community?AI in WarfareMaster's Thesis - The Evolution of Artificial Intelligence and Expert Computer Systems in the ArmyInternational Journal of Intelligent Systems article - Artificial Intelligence in the Military: An Overview of the Capabilities, Applications, and ChallengesPreprint - Basic Research, Lethal Effects: Military AI Research Funding as EnlistmentAOAV Article - ‘Military Age Males’ in US Drone StrikesThe Conversation article - Gaza war: Israel using AI to identify human targets raising fears that innocents are being caught in the net972 article - ‘Lavender’: The AI machine directing Israel’s bombing spree in GazaIDF press release - The IDF's Use of Data Technologies in Intelligence ProcessingLieber Institute West Point article - Israel–Hamas 2024 SymposiumVerfassungsblog article - Gaza, Artificial Intelligence, and Kill ListsRAND research report - Dr. Li Bicheng, or How China Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Social Media ManipulationThe Intercept article collection - The Drone PapersAFIT faculty publication - On Large Language Models in National Security ApplicationsNature article - Death by Metadata: The Bioinformationalisation of Life and the Transliteration of Algorithms to FleshLegislationLegiScan page on SB1047NY State Senate page on the RAISE ActCongress page on the TAKE IT DOWN ActThe GavernorFastCompany article - Big Tech may be focusing its lobbying push on the California AI safety bill’s last stop: Gavin NewsomPOLITICO article - How California politics killed a nationally important AI billNewsom's veto messageAdditional relevant lobbying documentation - [1], [2]Jacobin article - With Newsom’s Veto, Big Tech Beats DemocracyMisc. LinksFLI Open Letter on an AI pauseWikipedia article - Overton windowDaniel Smachtenburger YouTube video - An Introduction to the MetacrisisVAISU website (looks broken as of 2025.06.19)AI Impacts report - Why Did Environmentalism Become Partisan?