--- title: "AI and Military Leaders Gathered for Mysterious Event in Utah" description: "Last week, a group of AI and military leaders met in a secretive three-day retreat hosted at a luxury resort in the Utah mountains." date: "2023-11-20" modified: "2023-11-20" authors: - name: "Noor Al-Sibai" job_title: "Senior Staff Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/nooralsibai" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/ai-military-event-utah" categories: - "Military" - "Science & Energy" tags: - "china" - "military" - "summit" - "the digest" --- # AI and Military Leaders Gathered for Mysterious Event in Utah ![Last week, a group of AI and military leaders met in a secretive three-day retreat hosted at a luxury resort in the Utah mountains.]() *\Image: Getty / Futurism\* ## Secret Summit Last week, before the axis of the artificial intelligence world veritably shifted with [OpenAI's ongoing leadership shakeup](), a group of AI and military leaders met in a secretive three-day retreat in the Utah mountains. As [*Bloomberg* reports](), the AI Security Summit — not to be confused with British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's [AI Safety Summit]() earlier in November — was hosted by the startup Scale AI, a contractor that offers data security to everyone from OpenAI to the US Army. At the rented-out luxury hotel located somewhere near-ish to Park City, Utah, the summit's assembled AI and military insiders were given the chance to speak candidly — no direct attribution was allowed from attendees or press — about issues facing the industry, even as President Joe Biden and China's President Xi Jinping held their own tête-à-tête 800 miles away in San Francisco to discuss, among other things, [regulations on AI](). During the three-day event, Scale AI's invite-only guests picked out bespoke cowboy hats, ate coffee-rubbed bison steaks, made s'mores, and undoubtedly had top-shelf spirits during fireside chats about all manner of big-deal issues like the pace of AI advancement and the possibility that the tech may advance to the level of artificial general intelligence or AGI, in which it could perform at a human level or even surpass us. Interestingly, as *Bloomberg* indicates, there didn't appear to be any prior knowledge of [OpenAI's then-forthcoming Red Wedding]() that took place just a day or two after the summit, which featured executives from the firm. ## No Quotes, Please While we know some general information about the secretive event, such as the topics of panel discussions that included US-China AI relations and a deep dive into the chips that power the technology, most of what went on at the summit remains a mystery because *Bloomberg*'s Rachel Metz seems to have been the only press working at the summit, and she agreed not to quote anyone or anything she heard directly. The journalist did, however, manage to sneak in one unsourced quote that took place during an archery lesson where guests unskilled in the art learned to shoot bows and arrows. "He didn’t need a lot of training data," a guest joked after a teammate made a good shot on the bullseye made up to look like a furious bear, per *Bloomberg*'s reporting. The summit, of course, was definitely not all fun and games — but in the tech world that AI leaders and their military contractors occupy, work and play are often very enmeshed. **More on AI:** [*This Might Be the Reason OpenAI Fired Sam Altman*]() ## Author At Futurism, I've often been drawn to unpacking the narratives that underlie technological, scientific and medical progress, with a special interest in areas of conflict and ambiguity that end up setting agendas and steering the fates of both elites and the hoi polloi. I'm a committed generalist, but I often find myself returning to work involving NASA and the private space sector, the effects of AI on media and society, and the mechanics of the pharmaceutical industry, with a specific focus on the spread of GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy. Prior to Futurism, I worked for publications ranging from Media Matters and Truthdig to Raw Story and Bustle. I'm also the author of "Myspace Scene Queens," a 2024 title in Instar Books' acclaimed "Remember the Internet" series. My work at Futurism has been cited by outlets including the New Yorker, Slate, Nieman Lab, the Verge, the MIT Technology Review, the Sunday Times, and the Daily Beast. I grew up in North Carolina, attended the University of North Carolina at Asheville, and now live in Brooklyn, New York. In my free time, I'm an avid reader and music fan; you can probably find me at a local poetry reading, concert, underground rave, or DJ set. I'm the proud parent of an ineffable orange cat named Mee-Mow. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()