Insider warnings over AI fall flat with some in Silicon Valley
Each September, a who's who of executives from across Silicon Valley descends on San Francisco's Palace Hotel to charm investors at a conference hosted by the investment bank Goldman Sachs.
Coxon, a 27-year-old who worked at OpenAI before joining its chief rival Anthropic, said on Tuesday that people building artificial intelligence (AI) believed the technology could destroy humanity.
Coxon is by no means the first AI insider to publicly sound the alarm. There have been a string of high-profile resignations from both Anthropic and OpenAI in recent years over apparent safety concerns, and some current Anthropic employees even echoed Coxon's post.
While Coxon said explicitly in his posts that his warnings were "not marketing", some executives and investors in Silicon Valley have reacted with scepticism to a recent flurry of insiders sounding the alarm.
Anthropic's boss, Dario Amodei, has come under fire for saying AI technology could wipe out half of entry-level white-collar jobs and will "test who we are as a species".
He called them "dangerous" and said they had prompted him to instruct some engineers at the LGBTQ+ dating app to stop using Anthropic's technology.
"Maybe they actually believe it," Arison said. "Or you could argue they're saying it because it's a great way to gin up more investor support, because the only way to justify these valuations is to actually claim: 'I'm going to take over every industry and I'm going to take over every job, and my AI is going to be doing all that work.'"
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Grindr chief executive George Arison told the BBC he believed some of the stark public warnings about AI were "dangerous"
Nvidia boss Jensen Huang also discussed Coxon's comments before a crowd at the conference, multiple people in the group told the BBC. They said he dismissed them as untrue.
Dive deeper
- Each September, a who's who of executives from across Silicon Valley descends on San Francisco's Palace Hotel to charm investors at a conference hosted by the investment bank Goldman Sachs.
- Coxon, a 27-year-old who worked at OpenAI before joining its chief rival Anthropic, said on Tuesday that people building artificial intelligence (AI) believed the technology could destroy humanity.
- Coxon is by no means the first AI insider to publicly sound the alarm. There have been a string of high-profile resignations from both Anthropic and OpenAI in recent years over apparent safety concerns, and some current Anthropic employees
- While Coxon said explicitly in his posts that his warnings were "not marketing", some executives and investors in Silicon Valley have reacted with scepticism to a recent flurry of insiders sounding the alarm.
- Anthropic's boss, Dario Amodei, has come under fire for saying AI technology could wipe out half of entry-level white-collar jobs and will "test who we are as a species".