# Safety rules could sharply lower Max’s AI risk estimate

Markdown copy of https://realalpha.app/s/safety-rules-could-sharply-lower-maxs-ai-risk-estimate/ on Real Alpha, the best minutes from long interviews with the people building AI. Cite and link the page, not this copy.

- Speaker: [Max Tegmark](https://realalpha.app/people/max-tegmark/) · Max Tegmark is an MIT physics professor, cosmologist and author.
- Host: [Brian Keating](https://realalpha.app/people/brian-keating/) · Host, Into the Impossible With Brian Keating
- Show: Into the Impossible With Brian Keating
- Episode: [Max Tegmark: We’re Building A Replacement Species](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/), Oct 23, 2026
- Moment: 27:52 to 31:10 of the episode (3 min), playing on https://realalpha.app/s/safety-rules-could-sharply-lower-maxs-ai-risk-estimate/; the episode from there: https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1672

## Quote

> “they can only **sell dangerous products** after they've convincingly demonstrated that they can meet certain safety requirements”
> — [Max Tegmark](https://realalpha.app/people/max-tegmark/) at [28:30](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1710) · Into the Impossible With Brian Keating

## Takeaways

1. Require safety evidence before releasing dangerous AI products.
2. Keep useful work, such as medical and physics research, moving.
3. Tegmark says this could sharply lower his estimate of AI risk.

## About this segment

Max Tegmark says the government could require proof of safety before firms release dangerous AI products. He argues that would constrain risky launches without stopping useful research.

From “Max Tegmark: We’re Building A Replacement Species”, Oct 23, 2026. [Watch the full episode](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/)

## Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

[28:00](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1680) Of course, we can lower P-Doom a lot. Yeah, so what are some of the non-catastrophic ways that we can lower P-Doom? He was claiming, you know, we've got to have Asilomar enforced, just like we did with bioweapons. And I said, I've had Annie Jacobson on twice, and she said, you know, their country is violating biological warfare constraints from Asilomar right now on this planet. And he seemed to kind of blow that off.

[28:25](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1705) But what would blow your P-Doom lower? I mean, the obvious thing is to simply start, if the U.S. government decides to just start treating AI companies like they treat any other company, saying they can only sell dangerous products after they've convincingly demonstrated that they can meet certain safety requirements, now the PDOOM goes way, way, way, way down, right? I mean, suppose you decide you're going to open a sandwich shop there in San Diego, right?

[28:56](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1736) And then the health inspector comes in and says, I found 57 rats in your kitchen, Brian. You know, you're not selling any sandwiches. I'd be relieved. What happened to the other 40? I'm joking. Yeah. But you could turn around to this guy from the government and say, you know, don't tell anyone. I'm not going to sell any sandwiches. I'm just going to release an AI girlfriend product for nine-year-olds.

[29:19](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1759) another AI that can help terrorists make bioweapons and I'm gonna release this thing called super intelligence which is gonna basically be a new species and I have a good feeling about this that it's gonna be fine the poor guy from the government will have to tell you yeah actually that's all legal it's fine just don't make any sandwiches right that's how absurd how how absurd corporate welfare we bestow on AI companies they're the only ones who can do crazy shit like this and then have it be completely legal what do you think would happen if one of the pharma companies in San Diego released the new medicine and they're like ah we don't need this clinical trial bs we're just going to sell it anyway in safe way they couldn't do that or if someone released a car and we're not we're refusing to

[30:10](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1810) do any crash testing and yeah we know that five of the half the vehicles their gas tanks caught fire during the first hour driving but we're going to sell it anyway you can't even sell kids toys without some safety testing right so if but yeah i mean i do so much and i just want to make clear that it's not going to stop ai research either it's just going to mean that certain fringe crazy kinds of ai research like how you make more addictive ai girlfriends for nine-year-olds that would stop because they really can't demonstrate right now that it does more good than harm and the race to super intelligence would have to wait until they've figured out come up with some sort of plan for how they're going to contain it but all the good stuff curing cancer and making better, proving more cool things about physics and so on,

[30:56](https://realalpha.app/v/nnYHg0gcWug/?t=1856) would probably be able to continue more or less full speed ahead. Is that part of the motivation for your work with Bernie Sanders that you were mentioning before I hit record?