Ex-Anthropic Researcher Quits Over AI Extinction Fears — SkimNews
Get the Tech newsletter
Daily tech — startups, AI labs, chips, the launches that shape the next decade. Free.
- Jacob Coxon, a 27-year-old former Anthropic researcher who previously worked at OpenAI, resigned and told the BBC that AI staff are "genuinely frightened" about AI's pace and that without slowing down "we could all die in the immediate future," with some colleagues "considering buying land" due to fears of instability.
- Dario Amodei, Anthropic's CEO, called in a Saturday essay for AI development to slow down, arguing the risks are "serious" while development itself isn't in question, and proposed independent monitoring and industry-wide regulation.
- Sam Altman of OpenAI and Elon Musk of xAI both backed Amodei's proposal for deceleration and regulation, though Coxon warned any slowdown must be coordinated with China to avoid "a race at an international scale."
- Anthropic scientist Evan Hubinger said he personally puts the chance of AI killing all humans within the next decade at greater than 10% — a figure Nobel laureate Geoffrey Hinton told the BBC was "not unreasonable."
- Clement Delongue (Hugging Face), Grindr's George Arison, and Nvidia's Jensen Huang publicly pushed back — Delongue compared asking Coxon about AI extinction to asking an AC guy about climate change, Arison said the statements drum up investor support for sky-high valuations, and Huang dismissed them as untrue at a Goldman Sachs conference.
- Anthropic is reportedly preparing for a potentially record-setting IPO, while OpenAI — most recently valued at $852bn — postponed its own IPO this year, with Altman citing AI safety concerns; other critics accuse Anthropic of seeking a regulatory duopoly with OpenAI.
- Donald Trump told reporters Sunday the US was "leading China in AI" and "whoever wins AI wins," while former UK PM Rishi Sunak, a paid adviser to Anthropic, wrote in the Sunday Times that he too worries about AI risk to humanity.
Why it matters: The coordinated warnings from a quitting researcher, Anthropic's CEO, and the heads of OpenAI and xAI represent the most unified industry push yet for binding AI regulation — but with Anthropic reportedly prepping a record-setting IPO and skeptics like Nvidia's Huang and Grindr's Arison calling it investor theater, the sincerity of the alarm is now openly contested inside Silicon Valley.
Ask SkimNews
