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Anthropic's CEO suddenly called for a complete pause in AI research. The news is explosive enough. A leading company at the forefront of the wave, valued at hundreds of billions, slams on the brakes for itself. This doesn't seem like a publicity stunt—it's more like a top engineer shouting "Stop" in the control room after building the first nuclear reactor that might catch fire. The fear is real, because no one knows whether angels or demons will fly out once Pandora's box is opened. What they f
Analysis
Anthropic's CEO suddenly called for a complete pause in AI research. The news is explosive enough. A leading company at the forefront of the wave, valued at hundreds of billions, slams on the brakes for itself. This doesn't seem like a publicity stunt—it's more like a top engineer shouting "Stop" in the control room after building the first nuclear reactor that might catch fire. The fear is real, because no one knows whether angels or demons will fly out once Pandora's box is opened. What they fear might not be technology spiraling out of control, but the irreversible consequences of technology becoming too "successful."
But the flip side of the story is always somewhere else. At the very same time, across the ocean, regulations for the housing provident fund were open for public comment, with details considering payments for rent, property fees, and even renovation allowances. A pragmatic policy concerning the daily survival of every working person and a philosophical alarm about the direction of human civilization ran parallel in the same day's news flow. On one side, the specter of AGI that might end human labor; on the other, the meticulous calculation for a square meter of housing security. This is the complete picture of our times: grand technological fantasies and the small struggles of daily life advancing in sync with an absurd rhythm.
The trending news sketches the concrete form of this sense of disconnection. Analysts revealed Apple cut its Vision Pro product line, Jensen Huang is going on a variety show, and the CEO of Fenbi apologized for calling university students "deserving of unemployment." You see, capital markets are adjusting their expectations for grand narratives like the "metaverse," while a CEO in the education and training industry still treats his users—those young people anxious about finding jobs—with the most primitive form of humiliation. On one side, top tech companies recalibrating the future; on certain practitioners' arrogance and disregard for present reality. The world is flat, but the cognitive divide is as deep as a canyon.
Therefore, Anthropic's call appears particularly lonely and stark. In a frantic arena where the vast majority of players are accelerating, raising funds, and competing over whose model has more parameters, suddenly someone shouts "safety first"—which sounds almost like a "politically incorrect" move. But this is precisely the most scarce quality in this era of technological recklessness: awe for complexity, foresight into unforeseeable consequences, and—most importantly—the humility to admit we might not know what we're doing.
We often think technology follows a linear narrative of progress, but in reality, it is riddled with breakpoints, paradoxes, and self-doubt. While housing provident fund administrators ponder how to make regulations more humane, AI researchers might be standing at the edge of an ethical cliff. Both are dealing with "systems"—one manages money, the other might redefine "intelligence" itself. And ordinary people are caught in the middle: on one hand, calculating whether they can withdraw a bit more provident fund for rent; on the other, glimpsing headlines like "AI will replace humans" in their phone notifications, then putting the phone down to catch tomorrow's subway.
Anthropic's call won't stop the wave, just as housing provident fund reform won't make housing affordable for everyone. But it's like a depth charge, detonating the undercurrents beneath the calm surface. It forces all of us, amid our sprint, to pause for just a second and think: Where are we actually going? And when we arrive there with all our effort, will we discover it's not the destination we wanted at all? Technology and people's livelihoods, the distant future and the present moment, reverence and greed—all placed on the scale on this June 5th. And the scale's pointer trembles violently.
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