Silicon Valley Doesn't Get Why the Public Distrusts AI
New polling shows a large share of Americans are wary of artificial intelligence, while industry leaders publicly disagree over what's fueling the backlash.
The artificial intelligence industry is increasingly trying to understand growing public backlash against the technology, but so far with limited success. A Pew Research Center survey published this week found that more than half of Americans under 30 say they are more concerned than excited about AI, a figure that has grown 24 percent over the past five years. Across all age groups, more than 70 percent of respondents believe AI will lead to fewer jobs.
Other recent polling suggests public anxiety extends well beyond jobs and data centers. Many Americans believe AI could harm young people's ability to form meaningful relationships and damage students' critical thinking skills, and think tech companies should compensate creators whose work was used to train AI models.
Popular culture has also found ways to capitalize on anti-AI sentiment. Beverage brands Liquid Death and Garage Beer teamed up with former NFL player Jason Kelce on a campaign inviting people to send urine-filled bottles to AI data centers, with one creative lead calling data center backlash something that unites Americans across the political spectrum.
Industry leaders themselves disagree on the root cause. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently published a lengthy essay outlining an optimistic vision of AI-powered personal assistants, while taking an indirect swipe at Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei for what he called overly doom-laden rhetoric about AI. Amodei pushed back publicly, arguing the backlash reflects a decades-old crisis of trust in companies and governments generally rather than messaging from AI firms specifically, though he acknowledged AI companies have yet to deliver on big promises, such as curing cancer.
A separate survey from the Searchlight Institute found that exposing people to different messaging about AI barely changed their views on its societal impact, suggesting the problem runs deeper than communication or branding — and points instead to concerns about how AI is already reshaping everyday life.
