Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) published the article Scientists call on the President of the European Commission to retract AI hype statement, with reference to the open letter [*], that can be signed by other AI experts.

From the article:

Through freedom of information, ICCL Enforce learnt that the President relied on the marketing claims of tech CEOs around “AGI” and “superintelligence” when she claimed that AI would approach human reasoning by next year. The letter asks the President to retract the statement, diligently evaluate marketing claims of AI products and seek impartial scientific evidence in the future.
As the letter says, “these tech CEOs claims concerning “superintelligence” and “AGI” are manifestly bound with their financial imperatives and not rigorous science.”
AI hype promoted by the President has consequences. The leaked Omnibus documents show that the Commission proposes to dismantle personal data protection for AI. This will not improve the EU’s competitiveness, but is instead a gift to US tech companies.

ICCL Enforce Senior Fellow, Dr Kris Shrishak, one of the signatories of the letter, said today:
“Citizens already face AI harms: discrimination, privacy-violations, psychological and environmental harms. Instead of effectively addressing these harms and stopping companies from exploiting workers and stealing creative work, the President is promoting AI hype that serves these companies.”

“Leaders of EU institutions have a responsibility to citizens. By promoting AI hype in the midst of a dangerous bubble, the European Commission risks proposing harmful policies, wasting public funds and being complicit in AI harms.”

Open letter
The open letter, that was also signed by many Dutch scientists, states:

We, experts in artificial intelligence (AI) and its societal impacts, are deeply concerned about your unscientific and inaccurate statement that AI is nearing human reasoning. You claimed in your budget speech in May “we thought AI would only approach human reasoning around 2050. Now we expect this to happen already next year.”
We understand from Commission disclosure, which followed a lengthy process to obtain this information, that you relied on the statements of Dario Amodei, Jensen Huang and Sam Altman as the basis for your statement about AI nearing human reasoning. These are marketing statements driven by profit-motive and ideology rather than empirical evidence and formal proof. In short, these tech CEOs claims concerning “superintelligence” and “AGI” are manifestly bound with their financial imperatives and not rigorous science.
For the President of the European Commission to repeat the misleading marketing language of US technology firms without independent scientific verification undermines Europe’s credibility as a reliable and trusted source of scientific knowledge. This is particularly so amidst a significant speculative bubble to which baseless AI hype is contributing.
It also undermines the ability of Commission staff to evaluate the claims of AI vendors at a time when the Commission regulates them and procures AI services.
The Commission has the duty to diligently assess claims made by industry and to determine with impartial and scholarly analysis where best the objectives of the Union should be pursued. The scientific development of any potentially useful AI is not served by amplifying the unscientific marketing claims of US tech firms.

We call on you to:
1. retract your statement on AI approaching human reasoning next year;
2. diligently evaluate other such marketing claims about AI products; and
3. ensure you have the benefit of the necessary impartial scientific advice in future.

Kris Shrishak published in the EUObserver the article Von der Leyen caught in AI hype trap while Tech bros cash in in which he criticises the AI belief within the European Commission.

Addition 24 January 2026
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