--- title: "Numerous Billionaires Preparing for End of Society" description: "Billionaires are (still) doomsday prepping. AI — the tech many of them are building — has them more paranoid than ever." date: "2025-10-12" modified: "2025-10-12" authors: - name: "Maggie Harrison Dupré" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/mharrison" url: "https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/billionaires-preparing-for-end" categories: - "Artificial Intelligence" - "Finance" - "Future Society" - "The Industrialists" --- # Numerous Billionaires Preparing for End of Society ![Billionaires are (still) doomsday prepping. AI — the tech many of them are building — has them more paranoid than ever.]() *Illustration by Tag Hartman-Simkins / Futurism. Source: Getty Images* The tech billionaires are still doomsday prepping. And as the [*BBC* reports](), it seems that AI is making some of them more paranoid than ever that society as we know it might soon crumble. For years now, reports of the wealthiest bracing for the end of the world have dominated headlines. In 2023, [*Wired* reported that]() Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was breaking ground on a roughly 5,000 square foot underground basement facility— which Zuck, [while speaking to *Bloomberg*](), characterized as just a "little shelter," and definitely not a doomsday bunker — on his sprawling compound in Kauai, Hawaii (which notably sits on top of a [historic burial site]().) Back in 2017, it was [reported]() that Palantir founder Peter Thiel had obtained a passport for New Zealand, where he owns a massive property and intends to flee in the case of societal collapse. These days, the race for AI dominance has ignited a new wave of existential fear among the tech elite — particularly among those in the AI industry, who frequently discuss how worried they are that uncontrollable artificial general intelligence (AGI) will cause the current world order to crumble. Figures like OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and former OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever, who now helms the rival AI firm Safe Superintelligence, among others, have [voiced]() their concern that still-unrealized AGI, or an AI system that's generally more intelligent than humans, will send human society into irreparable chaos. "We're definitely going to build a bunker before we release AGI," Sutskever reportedly once told the OpenAI team, [according to the journalist Karen Hao's book *Empire of AI*](). Many of these folks are putting their money where their mouths very often are: Altman, for instance, is known to have a stockpile of guns, gold, sprawling properties, and other resources he can turn to in the event of AI-inflicted armageddon. "I try not to think about it too much," Altman [told *The* *New Yorker*]() of his end-of-the-world dread back in 2016. "But I have guns, gold, potassium iodide, antibiotics, batteries, water, gas masks from the Israeli Defense Force, and a big patch of land in Big Sur I can fly to." To be clear, when — or if — AGI might ever be realized remains unclear. As Wendy Hall, professor of computer science at Southampton University, told the *BBC*, AI industry leaders tend to "move the goalposts" on their superintelligence predictions. "It depends who you talk to," Hall added. "The scientific community says AI technology is amazing, but it's nowhere near human intelligence." But AI also doesn't have to be conscious or achieve human-level intelligence in order to cause chaos in our social world. If the recent release of [OpenAI's video-generating tool Sora 2]() has demonstrated anything, it's that generative AI is turning the web into an increasingly unreal place to spend time; as the gap between what's clearly digitally-generated slop and what's real continues to [close](), AI will [remain]() a [powerful engine]() of misinformation. What's more, public-facing generative AI tools have already wrought profound changes on our interpersonal and even interior worlds, as more and more minors and adults alike turning to assistant-like chatbots like OpenAI's ChatGPT and [AI companions]() like those found on Character.AI for therapy, life advice, conversation, friendship, and romance — and, in many cases, enter into destructive, unhealthy relationships with the emotive AI bot that cause tumult in their real lives. Following [obsessive interactions]() with chatbots, some have ended up [divorced and in custody battles](); others have ended up jobless and even homeless; others have been [involuntarily committed and even jailed](); even more, [minors]() [included](), [have]() [died](). The demands of building, training, and powering AI are also taking [troubling tolls]() on the environment, and mass job loss due to automation is a real threat that's already impacting many workers. But from Altman to [Zuckerberg](), many of the bunker-building, AGI-seeking billionaires have painted [equally rosy](), utopian visions of imagined AI-powered futures, in which all humans, freed of the constraints of work, collect universal basic income and enjoy life as AI saves the climate and cures disease. In other words, according to many of the most dominant forces in the AI marketplace: the tech could destroy humanity as we know it, or it could save us all — and which comes to pass is up to whether their specific company ultimately wins the arms race. And no matter [what happens to the rest of us]()? Rest assured, the billionaires propelling the AI race forward have all the property, passports, bunkers, firearms, and gold they might need to ride the [consequences of their own actions]() out. **More on AI:** *[Sora 2 Is Creating Ads for "Epstein Island" Children's Toys]()* ## Author At Futurism, I've reported extensively on the rise of AI as a cultural and business force shaping the media industry, and more broadly how those dynamics are changing how we all consume and share information and relate to one another. I'm also fascinated by public health policy and ethics, the role of emerging tech in politics and governance — and the powerful people and forces at those intersections — climate change, and the environment. My investigation on Sports Illustrated's use of AI-generated authors with fictional biographies won a 2024 Mirror Award for "Best Story on Media Coverage of Artificial Intelligence in Journalism and the Media" from Syracuse University's SI Newhouse School, I contributed to Niemen Lab's 2025 Predictions for Journalism series, and I've discussed my work for Futurism during appearances on NPR, CNN, the BBC, the CBC, and more. I grew up in rural Pennsylvania and attended the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where I played Division I field hockey for the Minutewomen as a midfielder. Since then, I've lived in New Orleans, Louisiana and Manhattan, New York. I spend my free time running, reading, perusing archival fashion, and searching for the world’s best negroni. I also have a debonair tuxedo cat, Westley, who's named after "The Princess Bride." ### Author social links [Bluesky]()