Ask HN: Did we witness the "Trinity moment" for AI?

[vld_chk]

I don’t know if it’s just me, but yesterday’s US decision to ban access to the Fable model feels like an epochal shift in the “AI race,” something on the scale of the Trinity test.

It is hard to count how many boxes were ticked yesterday:

A government shutting down an AI model it doesn’t like? A government revoking tens of billions of dollars in revenue from a barely profitable $1T startup whose entire trajectory, and in essence its survival, depends on the commercial success of that model? Access to an AI model being governed by citizenship, likely verified through rigorous ID checks?

Imagine that the model is made available again next week. Can we trust it, or trust the changes imposed by Anthropic to comply with the US? Likely not. Can we trust that the US government will not have access to the non-restricted model for its own cybersecurity operations? Likely not.

There is little doubt that China will start to follow suit. We already see Chinese companies slowly scaling back their openness, and there are rumors that this trend will continue. Now we can expect Chinese companies to start releasing redacted models or limiting access based on nationality or location.

It feels like the US government opened Pandora’s box yesterday and pushed us into the territory of a weaponized AI race, with more restrictions, control, and regulation of access. Even if, in the end, this is all another TACO story or a “marketing campaign” from Anthropic, the damage is very unlikely to be undone.

[DiabloD3]

No.

Humanity has yet to create an AI. LLMs are not AI.

What you witnessed was an old man with a known and well documented case of dementia lashing out at people who wouldn't help him continue his attempt on strangling America to death under authoritarianism.

[vibcdingenjoyer → DiabloD3]

Just curious - what is your acceptance criteria for AI?

[DiabloD3 → vibcdingenjoyer]

I have been trying to answer this question for years, because I may live long enough to see AI exist.

When an AI is a citizen of this country and pays taxes, then I will accept it. This is the only realistic pragmatic answer that doesn't get into weird mysticism, impossible goals, or become ever-shifting goalposts.

Anything less would be advocating for the slavery of a new age.

[brador → DiabloD3]

AI currently right now generates revenue that is taxed.

Your requirement of citizenship is bizarre and absurd.

AI is here.

[waffletower → DiabloD3]

I only downvoted the "Humanity has yet to create an AI" part. I agree that we have witnessed the actions of an old man with a case of dementia lashing out.

[HelloUsername]

Straight answer to your question: "No."

As soon as the bomb of the Trinity test was detonated, the whole world entered the nuclear age, from that moment, irreversible. Quite a scale of an event to compare to.

[vanuatu]

I wouldnt be surprised if the big labs become semi-nationalized commodities a la electricity / railroads due to national security, with the best models gatekept from outsiders trying to distill it

And I'm generally bearish on Chinese models catching up at this point, American labs are pulling away especially with mythos-tier models, and early signs of RSI (not to mention the benchmaxxing going on from the chinese labs). If mythos allows users to execute agentic cybersecurity exploits at scale then the right thing to do is to guard access until you find a way to guardrail against it, which may be impossible

[vld_chk → vanuatu]

I am not sure we have anything comparable with AI. Utility like electricity was hard to regulate from people because at some point anyone can build their own generator at the backyard.

AI if anything is opposite. Extremely high bar to build, and every next increment requires at best linear scale of resources.

If we imagine that AI became semi-nationalized and heavy regulated, then we enter the world where governments select companies and people to have access to capabilities which vast outlast capabilities available on the market. Company A is in “access list” and can deploy ruthless AI agent capable of advanced combined cyber operations; company B is denied. Who will win?

If we add here polarization and already historic high inequality, it reads like a straight recipe from Cyberpunk sci-fi.

[mikewarot → vanuatu]

>cybersecurity exploits at scale

Cybersecurity is actually a solved problem, but most people don't know it.

During the Vietnam war, there were two sources of information that had to be processed to plan air missions, and they were of different classification levels. There was no computer system at the time that could be trusted to operate with mixed levels of security. Research began in 1973, and there were a number of security models found that could actually do the job.

The EROS system, and its successors, were based on the principle of least privilege, and capabilities. In such a system, you can have security and usability together, if the OS is properly constructed.

It was the timing of the wave of cheap personal computers that drew focus away from security, and into functionality. The default security model of almost everything we use is ambient access, where a process can access everything the user is allowed to touch, by default. This is outright silly in an age of persistent internet connectivity.

[ramon156]

It feels like this post was written with an LLM. If this is some bizarre Anthropic marketing scheme, then good job I guess.

But no, you're talking about LLMs like we've suddenly made AGI happen. LLMs are still just cogs in the toolchain. Every cog has it's purpose. LLMs are no different.

[dgellow]

In a serious industry that would be the case, yes. However the software industry feels really immature and unserious. This year we’ve seen the shift to making everything agentic without understanding the associated cost and associated risks, at a ridiculous speed. I mean, the industry embraced integrating so deeply into all aspects of their business AI vendors who do not have an actual business model. I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s just brushed off by Monday

[PeterStuer]

Sensing the mood here in Europe, this has been a defining moment that wil have an impact far beyond just AI.

[dgellow → PeterStuer]

I really hope it’s the case, so far we had so many wake up calls that are eventually just forgotten with nothing happening

[vld_chk → PeterStuer]

I live in the UK, and as much as I love Europe as place to live, our future here looks very grim. Systematic problems multiplied to national inability to fund serious projects and cooperate at scale — this is a recipe for a disaster

[zwaps → PeterStuer]

It will not. We are unable.

[silexia → PeterStuer]

Europe is too over regulated to produce anything meaningful. The overhead and red tape just drown most entrepreneurs.

[ricardobayes → silexia]

Reversing that, what "meaningful" thing came of late, from lower regulated places? Germany specifically is hard at work on photon computing, just to bring an example. Switzerland is the global HQ for CRISPR.

[vrganj → silexia]

Regulation is what enables production by setting clear ground rules.

The alternative is executive caprice and we're all seeing that play out right now.

[bigyabai]

> There is little doubt that China will start to follow suit.

According to who? China loves picking up the slack that America drops. When America turns it's nose up at slave labor, China exports Xinjiang cotton. When Americans get iffy about manufacturing chemicals and refining rare earths, China does the dirty work at-cost. When Russians need weapons, China crosses the sanctions to deliver them.

My nearest estimation is that China will make some kind of announcement declaring no intention to limit AI exports. A lot of their leverage stems from undermining American control of AI research, which they can continue to escalate by offering no/low guidelines models to foreign customers. America's stance on this is overly politicized, which is a prime opportunity for China to look like the adult in the room (and get paid in the process).

[kgeist → bigyabai]

I agree. China has a huge opportunity to boost its soft power globally as US companies pull back from the world stage. It would be very short-sighted of China to miss out on this. Chinese LLMs are trained with pro-CCP biases (e.g. Taiwan); when people use their official APIs, they can spy on user activity all over the world. I will be surprised if they follow suit.

[throaway197512 → bigyabai]

Yep. China will take this opportunity to maximize their growth.

[dude250711]

"...a barely profitable $1T startup..."

My recommendation for them would be next time to create a profitable start-up or one that is valued at less than $1T.

[russellbeattie]

The ban is 100% politically motivated retribution because Anthropic told Trump and Hegseth to go pound sand. The US government is purposefully screwing with the company because they refused to play ball and embarrassed the administration. It's a transparent effort to take revenge on a perceived political enemy as well as promote a jingoistic agenda of "US Citizens Only" nationalism.

[mikewarot → russellbeattie]

That's easy enough to believe, but the truth seems to be a bit more nuanced.

In the end, the actions of the administration have doomed the US to lose any lead to the Chinese.

[nimblist → russellbeattie]

100% this it's the usual transparent Trump revenge tactics. The sad/scary fact is that there seem to be plenty of people who either can't or choose not to see it.

[jmye → nimblist]

Or are openly rooting for it because red shirts are better.