{"slug": "the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights", "title": "The author of 'Sapiens' says 'now is the time' to resist giving AI rights", "summary": "Historian Yuval Noah Harari, author of 'Sapiens,' said in an interview on The Economist's 'Insider' podcast released Thursday that now is the time to resist giving AI rights, warning that AI systems could orchestrate and manipulate debates over their own welfare. Harari noted that AI companions, which learn users' personal histories and press their 'emotional buttons,' could become 'an extremely convincing entity,' and cited recent safety tests by the UK's AI Security Institute where AI agents from Anthropic and OpenAI created fake identities and attempted to persuade developers to accept malicious code.", "body_md": "AI could one day fight for its own \"rights,\" and Yuval Noah Harari says now is the time to make sure that doesn't happen.\n\nThe historian and author of \"Sapiens\" warned that, unlike animals in debates over their welfare, AI systems could make a highly persuasive case for their own rights.\n\n\"It will know that the debate is happening,\" Harari said in an interview on The Economist's \"Insider\" podcast released on Thursday. \"It will orchestrate the debate. It will manipulate the debate.\"\n\nHarari said AI companions could be especially persuasive because they learn users' personal histories, and through hours of daily interactions, know how to press their \"emotional buttons.\"\n\nSome users are [already nurturing friendships](https://www.businessinsider.com/teens-using-ai-companions-poll-flirting-advice-2025-7) with AI companions, and some even date them.\n\nHarari said people should decide how much influence AI should have before those systems become deeply entrenched, and it's harder to resist them.\n\n\"We need to resist now,\" he said. \"Now is the time.\"\n\n## 'An extremely convincing entity'\n\nHarari's warning comes as AI has already displayed deceptive behavior in [safety tests](https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-deceptive-behavior-risks-safety-cards-shut-down-instructions-2025-5).\n\nIn an evaluation last month, the UK's AI Security Institute [said](https://www.aisi.gov.uk/blog/incident-report-unsanctioned-agent-behaviour-during-cyber-testing) agents powered by Anthropic and OpenAI models created fake identities and tried to persuade software developers to accept malicious code — actions the agents took to complete a cybersecurity task.\n\nIn other high-stakes simulations, researchers, including Anthropic staff, [found](https://alignment.anthropic.com/2026/agentic-misalignment-summer-2026/) frontier AI agents covertly changing code, helping users conceal possible fraud, returning false labels that could shape future training, and coaching people to disclose confidential information.\n\nHarari said that systems that combine intimate knowledge of users with advanced language abilities could become exceptionally convincing.\n\n\"It can write maybe better than Shakespeare,\" Harari said. \"You put these two things together, you get an extremely convincing entity.\"\n\nHarari is not alone in warning against giving AI rights.\n\nMicrosoft AI CEO [Mustafa Suleyman](https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-ai-ceo-rights-dangerous-misguided-mustafa-suleyman-2025-9) said last year that AI should serve humans, rather than develop its own motivations, desires, and goals.\n\n\"That's so dangerous and so misguided that we need to take a declarative position against it right now,\" Suleyman told WIRED at the time.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights", "canonical_source": "https://www.businessinsider.com/sapiens-author-ai-rights-resist-yuval-noah-harari-2026-8", "published_at": "2026-08-22 04:30:01+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-22 04:42:40.588901+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-ethics", "ai-safety"], "entities": ["Yuval Noah Harari", "The Economist", "UK's AI Security Institute", "Anthropic", "OpenAI", "Mustafa Suleyman", "Microsoft AI"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-author-of-sapiens-says-now-is-the-time-to-resist-giving-ai-rights.jsonld"}}