President Donald Trump has made good on his promise to form a new Super Intelligence Force, which he says will be led by national intelligence director Jay Clayton and other members of his administration. Because nothing says "cutting-edge technology policy" like a task force named after a comic book.
"The Super Intelligence Force is tasked with coordinating the effort of the Federal Government to ensure that America continues to lead the World in Super Intelligence, which many say is bigger than the Industrial Revolution, and the Internet, and will protect the interests, and improve the lives, of all Americans," Trump said in a Sunday morning post on his social network Truth Social, deploying his signature approach to punctuation and capitalization.
Back in September, in response to an AI safety debate the president has largely dismissed as a hoax created by "Radical Left Dumocrats," Trump said he would nevertheless form an AI Force and appoint an AI czar ("Only High I.Q. individuals need apply!"). Since then, he signed an executive order seeking to rebrand AI as "super intelligence" - a term seemingly embraced, with some stumbles, by the tech executives who gathered at the White House this week to sign a non-binding safety pledge. (The pledge included an impressive typo, which is reassuring for something meant to signal competence.)
So it's only natural that Trump's new task force is named in accordance with this new branding. The Wall Street Journal reports that Clayton will chair the Super Intelligence Force, effectively making him the new AI/SI czar, with Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson, Undersecretary of War for Research and Engineering Emil Michael, and Office of Personnel Management Director Scott Kupor serving as vice chairs.
The task force will reportedly have 120 days to create a report on the risks and opportunities presented by AI. Clayton, who previously said it would be irresponsible for the United States to "back away" from AI while countries like China advance, made similar comments to the WSJ, insisting that one of the biggest risks is "not being first." Which is, historically, a great reason to do anything.
The task force's charter reportedly says it will "develop plans for responding to SI-enabled threats to our society, while preventing overregulation and regulatory capture that would stifle innovation and competition." In other words: they'll look into it, and get back to you in 120 days.
The Good Times
News in your inbox.
One sardonic roundup, delivered on your schedule. Free. Unsubscribe whenever your tolerance for wit runs out.
Already subscribed but we never reach your inbox? Check your spam folder and hit 'Not spam' (or 'Remove from spam') to bust us out of junk-mail purgatory. You'll be helping everyone else too.
Don't open any of our emails for a month and you'll be automatically removed from the mailing list.
Rewrite Article
Select parts to regenerate with a fresh AI pass. Translations will be updated automatically.
Generate AI Image
Creates a sardonic version of the article image using OpenAI.