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Timeline · 1950 to 2026
The road to RSI
How a 1965 warning became a 2026 headline. 20 moments that put rogue super intelligence on the map, each one dated and linked to its source.
- Moments
- 20
- Span
- 76 years
- Eras
- 4
- Latest
- Nov 2026
Four eras
From thought experiment to policy
Origins, theory, warnings and the RSI year. The gaps between the moments keep getting shorter.
Origins
4 moments-
Can machines think?
Alan Turing publishes “Computing Machinery and Intelligence” and proposes the imitation game, the first serious test for machine minds.
Source · Mind, 1950 -
The field gets a name
The Dartmouth summer workshop names the field “artificial intelligence,” the term the United States replaced with Super Intelligence in 2026.
Source · Dartmouth -
The intelligence explosion
I. J. Good writes that an ultraintelligent machine could design even better machines, and that the first one could be the last invention we ever need, if it stays docile enough to tell us how to keep it under control.
Source · Background -
The singularity
Vernor Vinge predicts superhuman intelligence within 30 years and asks whether such an event can be guided at all.
Source · Vinge, 1993
Theory
4 moments-
The paperclip maximizer
Nick Bostrom shows how a harmless goal pursued by a super intelligence, like making paperclips, could still end in catastrophe.
Source · Bostrom, 2003 -
Superintelligence, the book
Bostrom's “Superintelligence: Paths, Dangers, Strategies” brings the control problem to presidents, founders and the public.
Source · Oxford University Press -
The first open letter
Thousands of researchers sign the Future of Life Institute letter on research priorities for safe and beneficial systems.
Source · Future of Life Institute -
The Asilomar principles
23 principles, including that highly autonomous systems should be designed so their goals stay aligned with human values.
Source · Future of Life Institute
Warnings
6 moments-
The pause letter
An open letter calls for a six month pause on training systems more powerful than GPT-4.
Source · Future of Life Institute -
One sentence on extinction
Lab leaders and researchers sign a one sentence statement: reducing the risk of extinction from the technology should be a global priority alongside pandemics and nuclear war.
Source · Center for AI Safety -
Bletchley Park
The first global summit on frontier safety. 28 countries and the EU sign the Bletchley Declaration.
Source · UK Government -
A company named for it
Ilya Sutskever co-founds Safe Superintelligence Inc. with a single goal: a safe super intelligence.
Source · SSI -
The international report
Yoshua Bengio leads the first International AI Safety Report, written with experts nominated by 30 countries.
Source · UK Government -
The superintelligence statement
Researchers, faith leaders, artists and public figures call for a prohibition on building super intelligence until it can be done safely and controllably, with strong public buy-in.
Source · Statement on Superintelligence
The RSI year
6 moments-
“There should be”
Asked whether SI needs safeguards or a kill switch, President Trump says “there should be.”
Source · Future of Life Institute -
The warning goes viral
An Anthropic researcher resigns over extinction risk and names recursive self-improvement as the main fear. His post passes 170 million views, and days later lab leaders call for a slowdown.
Source · Center for AI Safety -
The UN takes it up
22 countries led by Finland and Norway adopt a declaration that SI must stay under human control, and lab leaders brief the Security Council.
Source · Future of Life Institute -
A call to limit RSI
The Future of Life Institute urges governments to press companies to immediately limit recursive self-improvement until the research to make it safe is done.
Source · Future of Life Institute -
Super Intelligence becomes official
An executive order makes Super Intelligence the official federal term, and OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, xAI and Nvidia sign the White House Accord on Super Intelligence.
Source · Federal Register -
SI building SI
METR reports that Anthropic is using SI to build more powerful SI, with its models improving roughly twice as fast as a year earlier.
Source · The Verge
Enter RSI
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