Can the U.S. Outpace China in AI Through Chip Controls?

Open to Debate

Education, Society & Culture, News, Government, Politics

4.5 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 16 May 2025

⏱️ 52 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

The AI revolution is underway, and the U.S. and China are racing to the top. At the heart of this competition are semiconductors—especially advanced GPUs that power everything from natural language processing to autonomous weapons. The U.S. is betting that export controls can help check China’s technological ambitions. But will this containment strategy work—or could it inadvertently accelerate China’s drive for self-sufficiency? Those who think chip controls will work argue that restricting China’s access gives the U.S. critical breathing room to advance AI safely, set global norms, and maintain dominance. Those who believe chip controls are inadequate, or could backfire, warn that domestic chipmakers, like Nvidia and Intel, also rely on sales from China. Cutting off access could harm U.S. competitiveness in the long run, especially if other countries don't fully align with U.S. policy. As the race for AI supremacy intensifies, we debate the question: Can the U.S. Outpace China in AI Through Chip Controls? Arguing Yes: Lindsay Gorman, Managing Director and Senior Fellow of the German Marshall Fund’s Technology Program; Venture Scientist at Deep Science Ventures Will Hurd, Former U.S. Representative and CIA Officer Arguing No: Paul Triolo, Senior Vice President and Partner at DGA-Albright Stonebridge Group Susan Thornton, Former Diplomat; Visiting Lecturer in Law and Senior Fellow at the Yale Law School Paul Tsai China Center Emmy award-winning journalist John Donvan moderates This debate was produced in partnership with Johns Hopkins University. This debate was recorded on May 14, 2025 at 6 PM at Shriver Hall, 3400 N Charles St Ste 14, in Baltimore, Maryland. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:33.1	This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Hi, everybody from Baltimore. For an episode, we are pleased to be producing in partnership with the SNF Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University. That's where we are. We're on this beautiful Hopkins campus. And we're also in the middle of a still unfolding global and tech-centered situation centered on the growing rivalry between China and the U.S.
0:54.4	Where one of the front lines in that rivalry, where the stakes appear to be among the highest,
0:58.9	is the contest to be first in artificial intelligence.
1:02.3	Not long ago, we saw a wild card thrown into the mix with Deep Seek, the Chinese AI model
1:07.5	that they are claiming they produce at a fraction of the cost of chat GPT and the like.
1:11.6	That rattled a lot of people here who are looking for ways to make sure that China doesn't ever catch up.
1:17.6	One idea is to keep China from getting its hands on the most advanced semiconductor chips
1:21.6	upon which the currently most advanced AI is built.
1:24.6	Indeed, in one of his last acts in office, Joe Biden greatly expanded a regimen of export
1:30.3	controls. Now, President Trump is announcing that he's rescinding some of those controls and
1:35.6	replacing them with different rules, also aimed at limiting China's access. So, this idea of
1:41.2	stopping exports, does that make sense?
1:44.5	Is there a downside?
1:45.9	Is there a better way to stay ahead in the AI race?
1:49.7	That's what we're going to be getting at in this debate, framed around this question.
1:53.3	Can the U.S. outpaced China in AI through chip controls?
1:58.1	Let's meet our debaters, answering yes to that question. I first want to welcome
2:01.9	Lindsay Gorman. Lindsay is managing director and senior fellow at the German Marshall Funds
2:06.2	Technology Program and venture scientist at Deep Science Ventures. Lindsay Gorman, thanks so much
2:10.7	for joining us. Great to be here, John. Your partner, Lindsay, is a former member of the House
	...

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