Davos: UN Introduces AI as “The next existential threat”

Essay by Eric Worrall

Climate crisis move aside, there is a new fake emergency in town.

At Davos, Guterres slams backsliding on climate commitments

22 January 2025

The world’s political and business elite present in Davos on Wednesday faced an uncompromising address from UN chief António Guterres as he rounded on a lack of multilateral collaboration in an “increasingly rudderless world” at risk from two existential dangers: climate change and unregulated Artificial Intelligence (AI).

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‘Fossil fuel addiction’

Likening fossil fuel addiction to Frankenstein’s monster – “sparing nothing and no one” – the Secretary-General noted the irony that 13 of the world’s biggest ports for oil supertankers are set to be overwhelmed by rising sea levels, a consequence of rising temperatures and sea ice melt, caused overwhelmingly by burning coal, crude oil and natural gas.

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AI’s untold promise 

The next existential threat, AI, is a double-edged sword, Mr. Guterres continued, as it is already revolutionizing learning, diagnosing illnesses, helping farmers to increase their yields and improving the targeting of aid.

But it comes with profound risks if it is left ungoverned: it can disrupt economies, undermine trust in institutions and deepen inequalities, the Secretary-General warned.

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Read more: https://news.un.org/en/story/2025/01/1159271

OK, maybe by “the next existential threat”, the UN just meant “another existential threat”. But it is an interesting turn of phrase.

Of course, it has been obvious for some time the UN would need a new crisis to replace the faltering climate crisis.

I predicted back in 2017 that AI would be the next fake crisis;

George Soros endorsed the AI crisis in 2023;

The fake AI crisis has long been an obvious replacement for the fake climate crisis, because of its potentially bipartisan appeal. Hollywood has prepped us with lots of scary movies about AI run amok.

So how do we know the AI crisis is fake?

The tell of course is the people pushing AI crisis narratives are the same people who pushed all the other fake crisis.