Ideas diffuse through society in a wavelike fashion, much like a rock thrown into a lake. Those closest to where the rock meets the water experience the wave first; they are the first-comers. Then the wave works its way out, reaching a wider radius with time. Your exposure to an idea depends just as much as where you are in the pattern of diffusion as it does on how “smart” you are (though: where you have situated yourself may indeed correlate with your intelligence).
Awareness of AI as a genuinely transformative technology—not as the next “internet platform technology” but as something deeply more powerful than that—comes in waves, just like any other idea. The big difference between this metaphorical wave and a real wave is that real waves weaken with time; the AI wave, by contrast, gains amplitude as it diffuses. When the wave hits you, it can be shocking. It is the moment when you realize that of course there is going to be a major role for the state to play in the future of AI, and that some portion of that role will come from the most restrictive and inhibitory ward of the state—the national-security apparatus. Getting hit by this wave is not quite the same thing as being “AGI-pilled,” but it surely sets one on that path.
Like all waves, there will be multiple peaks and troughs. But a few weeks on, and surveying the public and private landscape in Washington, it is clear that Mythos—the as-yet non-public model from Anthropic with extraordinary hacking capabilities—has become one such wavelike moment. It will not be the last. But right now, a whole host of newcomers—some of them quite powerful—have arrived on the scene. They have been hit by the wave, and so they have taken notice of “advanced AI” and its risks. As a result, a reset in AI policy and politics appears to be underway. Its direction, however, remains up in the air.
