"But China!": Robert Wright on the AI Race and Our Coming Cosmic Reckoning

Robert Wright’s new book, *The God Test*, reframes the AI revolution not as a technological race but as a species-level moral reckoning. Drawing on the visionary ideas of Jesuit paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Wright argues that artificial intelligence is not merely a tool we build—it’s a form of evolution, a planetary mind emerging from human networks. The real danger isn’t AI turning rogue, but humanity failing to evolve morally fast enough to govern it. Wright warns that the U.S.-China AI race, fueled by fear and nationalistic paranoia, is self-defeating: it accelerates dangerous innovation, undermines safety protocols, and deepens mutual distrust. The real solution? Not dominance, but a radical shift toward global cooperation—what he calls 'organic transparency'—where scientists, businesses, and governments from both nations engage openly to slow the race, build trust, and avoid catastrophic miscalculation. The book’s central thesis is urgent: we’re not just building AI; we’re being tested on whether we can become better people in time. Wright’s argument hinges on cognitive empathy—the disciplined effort to understand others’ perspectives, not just feel for them. He shows how this skill is essential to avoid the 'attribution error' bias, where we dismiss an enemy’s good deeds and excuse their bad ones. Yet, he warns, many so-called 'empathy' efforts are actually projections of our own fears.