Jacob Coxon resigned from Anthropic and said that Anthropic and OpenAI are acting irresponsibly by racing toward self-improving superintelligence. In a fuller interview, he praised Anthropic's current practices and denied that it was already cutting corners; his criticism concerns the competitive race and the pressures he expects it to create. Responses dispute the evidence and timing of catastrophic-risk forecasts, whether continued work inside AI labs can be justified, and whether governments should pause development or regulate its continuation. The record distinguishes these disagreements from arguments about the rhetoric of public warnings.
Latest evidence
Recent events
Mixed or conditional
Addressed record
Is Anthropic acting responsibly while advancing toward recursive self-improvement?
“There is not yet a viable scientific plan to solve risks from recursively self-improving AI. Please look up!”
Speaker capacity
Anthropic employee; former Google DeepMind employee; explicitly personal capacity.
Editorial rationale
Conditional defense of insider safety work, alongside agreement that the risk remains unresolved.
Is Anthropic acting responsibly while advancing toward recursive self-improvement?
“We need coordination to be able to approach future capability increases with an appropriate degree of caution and humility, and we need it yesterday.”
Speaker capacity
Member of Technical Staff at OpenAI working on alignment and model behavior, according to his MATS mentor biography; personal account, no claimed institutional authority in the post.
Editorial rationale
Supports urgent coordination while crediting OpenAI's recent precautions.
Samuel Marks said robust AI alignment remains unsolved, competitive incentives contribute to continued development, and many frontier-lab staff want a slowdown to improve safety.
““Many AI developer staff desperately want to slow down to figure out how to build AI more safely.””
Speaker capacity
Anthropic safety researcher, explicitly writing in a personal capacity.
Editorial rationale
His personal-capacity statement supports the central criticism but presents continued safety work as a conditional rationale for remaining at Anthropic.
In its June 4 announcement, Anthropic said internal data showed AI accelerating AI development, described a possible path to recursive self-improvement, and said the change was happening faster than it had expected.
“It’s happening faster than we thought, and the implications deserve greater attention.”
Speaker capacity
AI developer organization
Editorial rationale
Pre-existing institutional acknowledgment of a possible future transition and its significance; not a direct response or defense against Coxon.
