Yuval Noah Harari warns AI could worsen political delusions

In short: Yuval Noah Harari says politics is being thrown off track by bad information, and AI could make it spread faster and feel more believable.

What's going on

Yuval Noah Harari, the best-selling author of Sapiens and Nexus, argues that today’s political problems are not mainly caused by people suddenly becoming worse. He says the bigger issue is the information surrounding them, especially stories that are persuasive but untrue.

In his Nexus framework, the danger is not only “false facts.” It is the wider system that carries information, like the pipes and pumps of a city’s water supply. If the system is polluted, even well-meaning people can end up acting on fiction as if it were real.

Harari also argues that information is often used to create connection and loyalty, not to find the truth. That helps explain why myths, propaganda, and emotionally strong narratives can spread faster than careful, accurate reporting. He points to past examples like Nazism and Stalinism to argue that modern societies are still vulnerable to mass delusion.

A key warning is about AI systems. Harari says AI could create new “networks of delusions” by producing cheap, convincing messages at huge scale, making it harder for people to even recognize what is false.

What to watch

Harari links democracy to the tools people use to communicate, and he argues that big shifts in those tools can lead to political upheaval. A practical question for the next few years is whether governments, media companies, and AI makers can limit persuasive false content without limiting normal speech and debate.

Source: NYTimes