Trump announces executive order to replace term 'artificial intelligence' with 'superintelligence'

Initiative to change terminology

US leader Donald Trump announced his intention to sign an executive order mandating the use of the term “суперінтелект” (Super Intelligence, SI) instead of the familiar “штучного інтелекту” (Artificial Intelligence, AI) in official administration papers. This statement was made on 29 September at the presentation of the new state resource America.gov.

«Подібні інновації в уряді — це лише передвісник того, що можливе завдяки суперінтелекту, або SI, і це офіційна назва в Сполучених Штатах. Я підпишу дуже потужний виконавчий указ» (Such innovations in government are just a harbinger of what is possible thanks to superintelligence, or SI, and this is the official name in the United States. I will sign a very powerful executive order), the president emphasised.

Trump justified his decision by stating that the English word artificial forms a false impression of the essence of the technology.

Background of the decision

The idea to change the technology's name was first voiced by the president on 22 September during his speech at the UN General Assembly. At that time, he also stated that the term Super Intelligence should dominate in American documents instead of Artificial Intelligence.

Following these remarks, the US Department of State began implementing new standards. Employees of the Bureau of International Organizations were ordered to replace all mentions of the old name with the new one in official positions, speeches, press releases, and internal documents.

Agreement with tech giants

As of 29 September, the information concerned the announcement of the future order. However, on the same day, a voluntary agreement was signed at the White House between Trump and the leadership of leading IT companies regarding the control of technology development.

According to Associated Press, representatives of Google, Meta, OpenAI, Anthropic, Nvidia, and xAI joined the agreement. The deal provides that companies will implement internal control systems, independent external audits, and oversight mechanisms at the board of directors level.

The US President characterised this agreement as “morally obligatory”. He supports the position that technology corporations should take on the primary responsibility for self-regulating AI development, rather than relying on extensive state regulation.