AI fearmongers forget we could just jail tech execs until model safety improves
AI models don't kill people – people kill people
Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned over fears AI could kill us all by 2030, a view his colleague Evan Hubinger says over 10% of employees share. But the real danger isn't superintelligence—it's companies that ship reckless models without accountability. The article argues for criminal prosecution of executives, citing prison terms for Volkswagen, Takata, and Gree USA, and imagines a Silicon Valley billboard: 'Did Claude rm -rf /*your SSD? You may be entitled to compensation.'
If AI models really are as dangerous and out of control as Anthropic employees suggest, hold people accountable for the harm they cause.
- mattlondon
10% chance of AI killing us all... But how much of a chance of humans killing all humans? It's not like we are in some unprecedented era of peacefulness. I'd wager the chances of a proper nuclear exchange right now are above 10%.
I am not sure how I feel about all this. Yes bad AI might screw some things up. But AI might also find and prevent the software errors that allow such things to even be possible in the first place.
And ultimately, even if we are "locked out" from bad AI taking over the internet, we know where the data centers are. It's not like AI can reasonably "escape" since we know it needs DC-scale power, cooling, chips etc to operate at scale. I am pretty sure that if it came to it, we can just cut the fibre to the data centers or cut the power and let the generators run out of diesel and the AI is literally dead.
- onraglanroad
I'm not sure the submitter, Bender "kill all humans" Rodriguez, is entirely neutral on this.
- _ache_
Ok, so OpenAI is going to compensate RubyGem for the cyberattack on its servers?
- jaydeepg
So if we're treating AI like weapons, does that mean we finally get background checks for tech CEOs?
- skeledrew
Finally, a voice of reason.