Trump wants to rename Artificial Intelligence Super Intelligence but something else worries me

Date:
Tue, 22 Sep 2026 18:15:10 +0000

Description:
US President wants to rename Artificial Intelligence to 'Super Intelligence', but no matter the name, he won't be regulating it.

FULL STORY ======================================================================Copy link Facebook X Whatsapp Reddit Pinterest Flipboard Threads Email Share this article 0 Join the conversation Follow us Add us as a preferred source on Google Newsletter Subscribe to our newsletter If there's one thing President Donald Trump is good at, it's misdirection: focusing your attention on what doesn't matter so he can actively ignore the most distressing problems. So it comes as little surprise that he is now campaigning to rename Artificial Intelligence to "Super Intelligence". In the meantime, he's downplaying concerns and promising to give AI... er... SI "free rein".

Trump rolled out the name change during his annual United Nations General Assembly address in Manhattan on Tuesday, admitting that he doesn't know if
he has the power to rename an entire science, technology discipline, and industry. But naturally, the guy who bulldozes buildings first and never asks questions later is willing to try. "Welcome to the world of super intelligence, dash, SI, SI, " Trump declared. "Let's see if that sticks.
Let's see if that goes. It sounds much better, and it's much more accurate." He even plans to change the usage across all government documents, which should only foster mass confusion. Latest Videos From TechRadar Watch full video here:

The rationale here is that "there's nothing artificial about it," whatever that means. Trump loves his superlatives, like "greatest ever," "beautiful," "tremendous," "huge" (or "Yuge"). "Super" fits the mold. But it's also inaccurate. AI is not super intelligence. It's not yet human intelligence
with extra juice. Consider it this way: Superman, though an alien, is called "Super " because he appears as a man but with extraordinary powers.

Artificial intelligence is so named because it's made like an artificial sweetener. There's nothing natural about it. It's not a genius or super-smart person. It's computers, programs, algorithms, models, and training that can create the appearance of human-like intelligence, which, in some instances, can be far greater than our own. But there's nothing remotely human about it. You may like Trump wants to launch a new "AI force" - but I can't imagine Salesforce is particularly happy about the name 'Whoever wins AI, wins!'
Trump warns 'traitors and leakers' to 'beware' claims AI only needs him 5 things you need to know about the big AI 'slowdown' battle Trump tells the UN he is officially changing the name of Artificial Intelligence to "Super Intelligence" and says all US government documents will now be changed to refer to "SI" pic.twitter.com/LEWbc5tn3B September 22, 2026 The other confusing part of this is that the timeline of AI does allow for "Super Intelligence," but not as the same thing. Instead, it's something down the line that far exceeds human cognition. It's also what some call Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Whatever you call it, experts think that it's
fast approaching and we should be deeply concerned.

The so-called Godfather of AI, Geoffrey Hinton , just issued a fresh warning that the U.S. Congress has maybe a year, but not much more than a year, to regulate AI before we lose control. He's particularly concerned about AI that doesn't need human intervention for improvement: "AI has now reached the
point where AI is designing better AI, said Hinton last week after his congressional testimony. "Thats called recursive self-improvement." He added that it could get out of control, and warned "We need to slow down. Get daily insight, inspiration and deals in your inbox Sign up for breaking news, reviews, opinion, top tech deals, and more. Contact me with news and offers from other Future brands Receive email from us on behalf of our trusted partners or sponsors By submitting your information you agree to the Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policy and are aged 16 or over. AI unleashed Look, I know Trump has had some luck with renaming bodies of water (at least from the US perspective), but I'm hoping the AI industry and those covering AI reject Trump's proposal out of hand, and focus instead on the more existential AI problem and Trump's declaration, "We will only encourage super intelligence. We're going to encourage it, not rein it in."

If anyone was hoping that rising concerns over human ability to keep track of and maintain control of AI plus recent well-documented incidents of AI jumping out of sandboxes would prompt some self-reflection and action on the part of the White House, they are surely disappointed.

It's not a surprising stance for him. Trump has publicly worried about
falling behind China in the AI (or SI) race. Even those who have voiced concerns about AI's aforementioned recent attacks on third-party systems, recursive development, and inscrutable language have noted the need to both regulate and control AI while still competing with China. The prevailing idea is to create internal independent watchdogs and some sort of a global body that will help everyone, including China, work together on regulating AI.
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As long as Trump is President, the US will clearly have no part in that.

Which leaves us with unfettered AI (or SI or whatever) and no clear path for continued safe use. Instead, the US will be encouraging AI companies to work fast, and as the old Facebook once did, break things along the way, all in a quest to maintain global AI dominance. If there's any glimmer of hope here, it's that Trump, as he insisted AI is not "fake" (no one says it is, but
Trump thinks "artificial" is synonymous with "fake"), did say "we have to be careful." He also said that the US "rejects any attempt to construct a globalist scheme to control... artificial intelligence."

So, sure, let's talk about Super Intelligence and, I guess Super General Intelligence(?) but also not forget that Trump is stepping aside so the freight train of AI development can race by, careening into an uncertain future where AI becomes, maybe not sentient, but also likely completely out
of our control.

That doesn't seem super intelligent. Follow TechRadar on Google News and add us as a preferred source to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds.



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Link to news story: https://www.techradar.com/ai-platforms-assistants/trump-wants-to-rename-artifi cial-intelligence-super-intelligence-but-his-real-message-is-that-he-doesnt-wa nt-to-regulate-it-and-thats-what-worries-me


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