Book Review: If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies

The cause of AI safety deserves better than this

If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies: Why Superhuman AI Would Kill Us All. Eliezer Yudkowsky and Nate Soares, Hachette, 2025.

Every chapter of If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies (hereafter IABIED) opens with a parable, so this review will as well.

In an imaginary kingdom, there lived an adventurer who explored the ruins of the desert. Deep within a crumbled edifice, the walls of which were inscribed in obscure tongues, this adventurer discovered a treasure-vault. Upon a pedestal of black stone rested a vessel of brass, sealed with leaden marks of binding. To the adventurer’s surprise, beside the pedestal sat an ancient sage, the keeper of the ruins, who silently watched her approach.

She bowed with respect, then said “O venerable one, I have studied the inscriptions of this place. Within this vessel dwells a djinn of surpassing power. If I were to break these seals, the djinn would emerge, and I could give it direction. It could end the wars that plague our lands. It could cure the plagues that take our children. It could bring forth prosperity beyond measure: sufficient grain that none would hunger, sufficient water that the desert might bloom.”

“All that you say is true,” replied the sage, his voice heavy with sorrow. “The djinn would grant these wishes. It would end your wars and heal your sick and make the desert flower. And then, when it has done these things, why, then it would destroy every living soul in this world, and all would perish in fire and darkness.”

The adventurer said nothing for a time. But she had not come so far to turn back at a mere story, so finally she spoke, with courtesy but firmness. “O wise one, I honour your learning, but I do not understand it. Why would the djinn desire our destruction? We would ask only for good things: peace, health, abundance. How would these wishes lead to our doom?”