Yea wow, hadn’t thought about how resonant the guns debate is with this (I’m not a USian). But very on point.
I can’t help but wonder about great filters and with AI, if it is a great filter (if they even exist), it’s not so much the invention of AI as it is the improbability of arriving at its invention only after sorting through and solving a bunch of social prerequisites, and how there’s a natural tension between technological progress and social safety and caution such that who ever invents AI first will also be less “safe”, a little like the inevitable mutations that lead to cancer.