Demis Hassabis, Google DeepMind and the Battle Over AI Safety
From On with Kara Swisher by Vox Media
May 28, 2026 · 1h 2m
About this episode
Kara speaks with journalist Sebastian Mallaby about Demis Hassabis and the challenges of AI safety.
Kara speaks with journalist and author Sebastian Mallaby about his new book, "The Infinity Machine," and its central figure: Demis Hassabis, the CEO and co-founder of Google's AI research lab, DeepMind, and a Nobel Prize winner in chemistry. Sebastian argues that Hassabis is one of the original scientist-entrepreneurs of modern AI. And although he's extremely competitive and research-driven, Sebastian says Hassabis is also one of the few big names in AI development who genuinely cares about public safety. However, despite his best intentions, Hassabis doesn’t have the power to change the race dynamic driving AI’s rapid, and potentially unsafe, development. Kara and Sebastian break down DeepMind's relationship with Google, the push toward artificial general intelligence, and whether the government can regulate the technology before something goes wrong. Questions? Comments? Email us at on@voxmedia.com or find us on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Threads, and Bluesky @onwithkaraswisher. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
People in this episode
Host: Kara Swisher
Guest: Sebastian Mallaby
Topics covered
- AI safety
- DeepMind
- artificial general intelligence
- public safety
- technology regulation
Keywords
- AI
- DeepMind
- Demis Hassabis
- Sebastian Mallaby
- public safety
- technology regulation
- artificial intelligence
Mentioned in this episode
Organizations: Google, DeepMind
Books & works: The Infinity Machine
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