Experts warned that a pandemic was inevitable. Preparing would have cost the US around $1billion. Instead, it will now cost $8 trillion, and over 200,000 deaths.
We explore the greatest existential threats – AI, nuclear and biological – and how coronavirus points to our extinction.
Voiced by Stephen Fry
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Sources and resources:
The coronavirus pandemic will cost the US around $8 trillion (Congressional Budget Office):
In 2015, Bill Gates called for a $1b budget to prepare for a pandemic:
(Many experts have issued similar warnings.)
Steven Salzberg, Professor of Biomedical Engineering, Johns Hopkins University, warns of dangerous research on potentially pandemic pathogens.
Cambridge Working Group Consensus Statement on the Creation of Potential Pandemic Pathogens (PPPs):
Janelle Shame on working with AI:
Art in the age of machine intelligence, with Refik Anadol.
Is AI a species-level threat to humanity? Max Tegmark, Elon Musk, Michio Kaku, Steven Pinker.