Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Tuesday said AI labs already have a “strong incentive to prevent” their models from causing harm, appearing to distance himself from Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s push for a global slowdown in the development of AI.
In a lengthy post on X, Zuckerberg said, “Every lab has the responsibility and incentive to move at the pace required to train its models safely, and the ability to take its own actions to ensure that happens.”
Zuckerberg added that most AI companies will need to focus on alignment anyway, sharing his view that those who fail to do so risk becoming irrelevant.
“There is a lot of debate about slowing progress on capabilities until alignment catches up,” he said. “My view is that trust and alignment are quickly becoming the most important capabilities that will differentiate agents and models. Any lab that doesn’t focus on alignment will fall behind.”
Zuckerberg is the latest major tech CEO to weigh in on the risks of rapid AI development after a former Anthropic researcher warned that “the people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade,” putting a spotlight on the industry.
Amodei over the weekend shared a nearly 4,000-word essay arguing that addressing the dangers of the technology requires “pacing the rate of capabilities advancement so that risk prevention has time to keep up.”
“We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models. Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain,” he said.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, xAI CEO Elon Musk and Google DeepMind Chair Demis Hassabis backed Amodei’s assessment.
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But Zuckerberg clearly disagrees.
The Meta chief said companies are already motivated to prioritize safety, adding that “labs face significant liability if their models cause harm, so they have a strong incentive to prevent this.” His post did not explicitly mention Amodei or any other AI rival.
He said Meta chose to postpone the release of its AI agent Muse to ensure its safety and security.
“We didn’t call for everyone else to do this before we would,” he added.
Zuckerberg is not alone. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang argued that AI giants do not need to choose between innovation and safety.
“So run as fast as you can, but if you feel at any given point in time the company’s out of control or the product’s not going to be safe, take a pause and make sure you get it right,” Huang said at a conference hosted by Salesforce on Tuesday.
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President Donald Trump has also dismissed the growing concerns around AI, pouring cold water on calls for regulation.
Huang, who received a call from Trump while he was onstage during Day 1 of the conference, put the president on speaker.
“It’s a hoax,” Trump said. “The robots are not going to be taking over the world. That’s not going to happen.”
This is not the first time Zuckerberg has appeared skeptical about efforts to rein in AI. In August, he expressed reservations about the creation of a national AI regulatory body during a call with Trump, Politico has previously reported.