A federal order has given artificial intelligence a new name: “Super Intelligence.” A month into the change, some agencies are using the term, while others still say “AI.” The uneven adoption raises a bigger question than vocabulary: whether the words people choose will become a signal of political allegiance.
A government-wide change, with uneven results
At the end of September, President Trump signed an executive order directing government agencies to refer to artificial intelligence as “Super Intelligence.” The term had been chosen over “Extreme Intelligence” and “Supreme Intelligence,” which the president had offered in a poll on X a couple of weeks earlier.
The administration’s stated rationale is that current systems “amplify human ingenuity” rather than simply “imitate” intelligence. The order says it does not apply to previously issued regulations or documents, and that may help explain why “AI” remains embedded in offices, initiatives, and programs created in recent years.
Still, the new wording is showing up in government solicitations and on websites. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, for example, asked companies to develop “SI-powered” surveillance for ICE detention facilities. The National Institutes of Health has added a banner warning visitors that both the new and old terminology may appear during the transition.
Adoption has not been consistent. Project Meridian, a Pentagon initiative announced a day after the order, used the old terminology. A Federal Trade Commission press release used “superintelligence” rather than the capitalized, two-word form. Recent Health and Human Services press releases showed no sign of the change. Even Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth used “AI” in an interview on October 3.
Pressure to use the preferred term reaches beyond agencies
The administration’s other naming efforts suggest the goal may extend beyond updating federal language. On October 27, Trump criticized the Wall Street Journal for not using “Super Intelligence,” saying it was “the name which virtually everyone else is using, or soon will be.” He also suggested that a new rule could ban “artificial intelligence” from government documents.
The Wall Street Journal is not the only outlet that has kept using the older term. Newsmax, whose founder described it as “supportive of the President and his policies,” has not adopted the president’s preferred wording either.
The technology industry’s response has been mixed, too. On the day Trump signed the order, he also released the nonbinding White House Accord on Super Intelligence, a statement on AI safety signed by Sundar Pichai of Google, Dario Amodei of Anthropic, Mark Zuckerberg of Meta, Greg Brockman of OpenAI, Elon Musk of xAI, and Jensen Huang of Nvidia.
But signing the accord has not meant using the new term consistently. CNBC’s analysis of third-quarter earnings calls found that Zuckerberg and Musk were the only signatories who used it consistently. Meta had already been saying “superintelligence” since last year, while Musk’s companies appear to use the term most often. Musk pledged to rename SpaceXAI to SpaceXSI, though he still uses both “SI” and “AI” in posts on X.
Executives from Amazon, Microsoft, and Alphabet used “AI” on their calls. Microsoft’s recent letter to shareholders referred to the “Super Intelligence era.” Huang has used the new term while continuing to say “AI.”
The practical cost of a terminology shift
Companies can choose their own names and direct staff to adopt them. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, for instance, can decide that SIForce is a better name than AIForce. A federal rebrand also takes government workers’ time: employees are writing guides to help departments navigate the change.
The executive order calls for federal agency leaders to draft a legislative definition of “Super Intelligence” and submit it to the president by the end of this month. That work makes the shift more than a simple replacement of words on websites. It asks agencies to coordinate around a new term and define what it means.
But the more consequential effect may be on public discussion. People already have differing views about AI, including outright hostility, and conversations often turn to concerns about jobs or AI-powered warfare. Yet those differences do not necessarily fall along partisan lines. People can debate how the technology affects their lives without first agreeing on what to call it.
Why the words could shape the debate
If saying “Super Intelligence” becomes a test of loyalty, a conversation about chatbots and mental health could become harder to have. Someone using “AI” might be treated as taking a political position, while someone using the new term might be read as signaling support for the administration. That interpretation could crowd out the substantive question both people wanted to discuss.
The article notes that Americans report interacting with AI multiple times a week, and that voters say the subject matters to them in the midterm elections. The technology is already part of everyday life and public debate. Turning its name into a political marker risks making those conversations more divisive before they have had time to develop.
Whether “Super Intelligence” catches on across agencies, companies, and newsrooms remains uncertain. The early record shows a patchwork: official documents and websites have changed in some places, while public statements and corporate calls continue to use “AI.” Whatever term prevails, the country’s discussion of the technology will be more useful if people can focus on its effects rather than treating vocabulary as a loyalty signal.