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Monday, October 13, 2025

Techies are building bunkers at the end of the world. We should all be worried

Mark Zuckerberg reportedly began building the 5.5-sq. km. Koolau Ranch on the Hawaiian island of Kauai in 2014

The compound will feature a shelter with its own source of energy and food. It is known mainly from rumours, because the builders working there are forbidden to disclose details.

A two metre high wall hid the construction from interesting views from the neighbouring road.

When asked last year if he would build a bunker at the end of the world, the Facebook founder replied with an emphatic “no”. The underground space of about 500 square metres. metres is “just a little shelter, a basement”, he explained.

However the rumours didn’t stop him, primarily after he purchased 11 properties in Palo Alto, California with an underground space of 650 square metres. metres.

Techies are building bunkers at the end of the world. We should all be worried

Author photo by Bloomberg Via Getty Images

Although his building permits mention basements, some neighbours call it a bunker, according to the New York Times. Or a spawn for a billionaire.

There are similar rumours about some other Silicon Valley billionaires, who seem to be buying up plots of land with underground rooms that can be turned into multi-million dollar luxury bunkers.

Trump Apocalypse. He previously claimed that almost half of the world’s superstoreys are being built, and New Zealand is a popular destination for bunker houses.

So, are they really preparing for war, the effects of climate change, or any other catastrophe the rest of us don’t already know about?

Techies are building bunkers at the end of the world. We should all be worried

Photo by the author, Getty Images News

Over the past few years, artificial intelligence has only completed the list of potential existential threats. is deeply concerned about the speed of this progress.

One of them is Elijah Infuse, chief scientist and co-founder of Open AI. That year, Infuse said that scientists were close to developing general artificial intelligence (SSI), the stage at which machines would reach the level of human intelligence.

At the meeting, Strand suggested that colleagues dig underground shelters for the world’s top scientists. companies before this powerful technology is released to the world.

Techies are building bunkers at the end of the world. We should all be worried

Author photo, AFP Via Getty Images

He added: “We will definitely build a bunker before we release general artificial intelligence.” Though whether he means “we” is unclear.

This sheds light on a paradox – scientists and technology leaders working hard to create artificial intelligence seem to be afraid of what it will be capable of one day.

So will such intelligence emerge, and if so, when? And could it really become that dangerous for ordinary people? In December 2024, Sami Altman of OpenAi said it would happen “faster than most people in the world”. intelligence, could emerge in 2026.

Other doubts. “They change the rules all the time,” said Wendy Hall, a professor of computer science at the University of Southampton. “It depends on who you’re talking to.” We’re on the phone, but I can almost feel her rolling her eyes.

“The scientific community says this technology is amazing,” he adds, “but it’s a far cry from human intelligence. Artificial intelligence is a rapidly evolving technology, and it’s in the process that many companies around the world are competing to develop their own versions.

But one of the reasons why it is so glamorised by some in Silicon Valley is that AI is seen as a precursor to something more advanced. The Singularity, which was posthumously attributed to Hungarian-born mathematician John von Neumann.

The singularity is the moment when computer intelligence goes beyond human comprehension.

Techies are building bunkers at the end of the world. We should all be worried

Photo by the author, Getty Images

Recently, the 2024 Genesis, written by Eric Schmidt, Craig Mundy and the late Henry Kissinger explored in the book 2024 Genesis. It becomes so effective in decision-making and leadership that we eventually surrender control to it

. They claim they will help find new cures for deadly diseases, solve climate change and create an inexhaustible source of clean energy.

Elon Musk has even claimed that the unexpected shon could usher in an era of “general abundance”.

R2-D2 and C-3PO” (Star Wars character works).

“Everyone will have access to better medicine, food, transport and more. Could the technology capture terrorists and use them as powerful weapons? obliged firms to share test results with the federal government. Although President Trump has rescinded part of that order, calling it an “obstacle” to the British. intelligence, a government-funded research body. Mol, we know something,” Relus Hoffman previously stated. The same is apparently true of the bin laden.

But there is the human factor.

I once met a former security guard for a billionaire who had a bunker. To get to the bunker. Him.

“Every business needs its own transport. I fly an Airbus A350 to Kenya, and I walk to my car every day, and walk to the neighbourhood cafe… There is no universal vehicle for all of this.” ” wot; feel “no matter how convincing their answers are”.

Wink Lynch, CEO of California-based IV.

AI, is also wary of exaggerated claims about SSI.

“It’s great marketing,” he says. – ‘If you’re a company building the smartest thing that’s ever existed, people will want to give you money.’

He adds: “It’s not something you can expect in two years’ time. It takes so much calculation, so much human creativity, so much trial and error. Improved.

However, no matter how smart cars become, biologically the human brain wins. information.

“If you tell a person who has discovered life beyond Earth, they will realise this information and it will affect their world view in the future. Instead, a large linguistic model (such as Chatgpt) will only be aware of it until you repeat the fact,” says Cognizant Hodgati

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