OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has a Nobel Peace Prize pitch: get Donald Trump and Xi Jinping to sign a one-page AI safety treaty. That’s it. One page. Two signatures. A Nobel Prize and, possibly, the survival of the species.
In an interview with Fortune, Altman laid out the case that the leaders of the world’s two dominant AI superpowers could earn the ultimate diplomatic honor by agreeing on mutual standards for AI safety.
The case for a one-page treaty
The US and China are locked in an AI arms race with stakes that extend well beyond market share. AI experts now estimate there is over a 10% chance that artificial intelligence could lead to human extinction within the next decade.
The Nobel Prize framing is clever incentive design. Trump has never hidden his desire for the award. Xi, for his part, would benefit from the soft-power signal that China takes AI governance seriously on the world stage.
