Delighted to share that my book, "The New Fire: War, Peace, and Democracy in the Age of AI," co-authored with @BenBuchanan, is out today from @mitpress: 1/13.

What a pleasure it was to host this year's Kalaris Conference on emerging tech opportunities and challenges with @GeorgetownCSS and @CSETGeorgetown. ICYMI, the recordings are now live on the website. Check it out :

Great to chat with @McFarlandKellyM and the @GUDiplomacy team on AI governance. Check out our conversation below 👇.

RT @GeorgetownCSS: The Kalaris Conference is next week! Registration is open for in-person or virtual attendance.

Lots more in the paper. Many thanks to @OJDaniels & @hlntnr and the @CSETGeorgetown team for their partnership & to @samshooda and Jessica Maksimov for stellar research assistance. @jasonmbro and @eriklg provided exceptionally thoughtful comments/feedback.

In short, the policy choice is not simply whether to “conceal or reveal” AI capabilities, but also *how* to reveal them and through which channels.

Given the risks of misperception and inadvertent escalation, leaders in the public and private.sectors should embed signals in coherent strategies and consider incorporating AI costly signals into tabletop exercises and focused dialogues w/ allies and competitors.

AI costly signals come with tradeoffs that need to be managed, including tensions between transparency for signaling purposes and norms around privacy and security.

Not all signals are intentional, and commercial entities may conceptualize the costs differently from governments or industry players in other sectors and countries.

Signals can be inadvertently costly. Governments are not the only actors that matter, and actions intended to convey one message on AI may resonate differently with foreign and domestic audiences.

Costly signals are valuable for promoting international stability, but it's important to.understand their strengths and limitations.

We then explore AI costly signals in three case studies: signaling around military AI applications, govt signaling around democratic AI; and private sector signaling around the development and release of large language models.

In this brief, we highlight four costly signaling mechanisms and apply them to the rapidly evolving field of AI:

Talk is cheap, but inadvertent escalation is costly to all sides. Policymakers can use costly signals to mitigate risks & better communicate intent in times of crisis.

So what are costly signals? Costly signals are statements or actions for which the sender will pay a price —political, reputational, or monetary—if they back down or fail to make good on their initial promise or threat.

Together with @OJDaniels and @hlntnr, I have a new @CSETGeorgetown issue brief out on a crucial AI policy lever: costly signals [THREAD].

RT @GeorgetownCSS: The Kalaris Intelligence Conference is less than a month away! Get to know one of our keynote speakers before the big da….

RT @GeorgetownCSS: Georgetown’s Kalaris Conference is happening on November 1! Registration is OPEN at The conferen….

RT @GeorgetownCSS: Get to know the panelists for “Shaping the Terrain: How the United States Can Promote Innovation and Protect Critical Te….