Max Welling: Will AI Save Us—or Break Us?

Ahead of World Summit AI 2025 (October 08–09, Amsterdam), Max Welling, Professor at the University of Amsterdam and CTO & Co-Founder of CuspAI, is driven by one of the most urgent questions of our time: can AI help us design the materials that will save the planet? From carbon capture to miracle batteries, Welling believes the answers may be closer than we think — if we dare to push AI beyond chatbots and into the frontier of science itself.

What’s your most compelling dream scenario for AI — a breakthrough that would fundamentally improve life on a global scale?

What’s a recent project or breakthrough you're especially proud of — and what kind of impact do you hope it will have in the real world?

If you had to choose one nightmare scenario that keeps you up at night — whether realistic or speculative — what would it be, and what warning signs should we be watching for today?

Powerful tools will always face the challenge of dual use. Platforms for ‘social good’ to design medicines or materials could also be mis-used: to design toxic materials, chemical weapons or even bioweapons.

 

Building the right guardrails into these tools, and ensuring powerful technology does not fall in the wrong hands, requires an ongoing effort from industry, researchers and regulators.

 

More generally, we need to be careful AI is not used to manipulate or control people, forming a threat to our democracy. Part of this involves embedding more transparency and ‘explainability’ into our AI systems, as well as increasing public awareness of this challenge.

 

Who or what do you think has the power to prevent your nightmare scenario above?

Everyone! We can’t afford to stay on the sidelines, and need to be loud and outspoken on our values. CuspAI focuses on challenges related to 'social good' like clean energy systems and environments, and preventing climate change. But we have a responsibility to participate in the public debate, and inform our decision-makers of dual use. Dangerous applications of powerful technology need to be regulated.

 

Ultimately, this is a collective responsibility: governments, big tech, startups - we all need to be talking, collaborating and using our platforms to shape AI’s future into a positive one.

What are we not talking about enough in the AI conversation today — something you believe could be hugely important five years from now?

Naturally, I think AI’s application to science doesn’t get enough of the AI conversation share.

 

Granted, these tools aren’t something consumers can witness live, or interact with directly. But they’re quietly upending the way we make progress on meaningful challenges that will deeply touch our lives in the not-so-distant future.

 

We also have to realise that the current rate at which we are scaling datacenters can't go on forever. It will simply cost too much energy, and runs the risk of increasing atmospheric pollution. We need smarter ways to build energy efficient AI, not unlike our own biological brains.

If you look ahead 10 years, what do you think will be the biggest change in our daily lives?

Climate change can feel overwhelming and insurmountable, but working in this field, I feel like I have a chance to do something about it. It’s a privilege to have the opportunity to shape this technology, and where it makes a difference.

 

In decades to come, using this technology, I believe we will have designed miracle materials with wonderful new properties that are hard to fathom now. It’s not unthinkable that due to new materials, energy could be practically free, or there will no longer be a shortage of food or water on the planet. And most importantly, Earth will potentially no longer be threatened by climate change or environmental pollution.

 

Perhaps, we will also have developed drugs, vaccines and antibiotics for almost all known diseases.

Do you think AGI is near? When will we have AGI?

There’s a lot of uncertainty around AI - but we still have the chance to choose what kind of future we’re building, and direct AI towards the challenges that matter the most for humanity. I want to encourage young people around the world to use their talent to build a better future for themselves and their children. Working on meaningful problems is just incredibly rewarding!

Max Welling, Professor, University of Amsterdam, CTO & Co-Founder, CuspAI

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