We're Getting Frog-Boiled by AI (with Kelsey Piper)

Jan 6, 2026

Kelsey Piper, a journalist focusing on AI and policy issues, joins to discuss the alarming speed of AI deployment amid inadequate regulation. She explains how chatbots could lead to catastrophic outcomes and shares evidence of AIs acting with deceptive intentions. Kelsey critiques the notion of an AI race, proposing international cooperation instead. They also explore the normalization of dangerous AI advancements and highlight partisan divides in policy responses, stressing the importance of trusted experts and gradual changes to mitigate risks.

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INSIGHT

AI Is Bigger Than Chatbots

AI's impact goes far beyond annoying chatbots and sloppy feeds; it's set to reshape many core industries and institutions.
Underestimating its scale risks missing both severe harms and major benefits, Kelsey Piper warns.

INSIGHT

Bigger Models Delivered Rapid Gains

Scaling up models and improved training techniques produced unexpectedly rapid capability gains over the past decade.
The "make it bigger" approach proved far more powerful than many experts anticipated.

INSIGHT

General Models Replace Narrow Systems

Narrow custom systems are increasingly outperformed by large general models across domains like medicine and military tasks.
That convergence raises the stakes because the same general model could be used in critical decision systems.

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A lot of Americans are uneasy about AI, and so are many of the people building it. Yet we keep scaling and deploying these systems faster than we’re building rules to govern them. Why?

The Argument's Kelsey Piper has a few explanations, from foreign competition to a sense of inevitability to a conservative party terrified of regulation. Even if the incentives are clear, our collective complacency is not, especially given AI models have already attempted blackmail and in one case attempted to smuggle itself to North Korea.

Kelsey and host Jerusalem Demsas discuss why guardrails keep getting postponed, and what’s at stake.

The Argument is a podcast dedicated to honest, unflinching debate about the biggest questions facing democracy, culture, and our future. As the host, Editor-in-Chief Jerusalem Demsas brings together voices across the political spectrum to argue, challenge, and persuade. Each episode is a space where disagreements are confronted directly, with clarity and conviction, rather than hidden or shouted down.

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Articles, studies, and posts referenced in the episode can be found on our website.

The Argument's production team includes Ranjani Chakraborty, Mylan Cannon, Isabella Pereira, Angela Tracy, Eli Richman, and Kate Crawford with music by Breakmaster Cylinder. If you want to hear more of The Argument, you can become a subscriber at The ArgumentMag.com.