‘This is about greed’: Gee says AI companies are gambling with humanity for profit

The people building artificial intelligence are now openly admitting they do not yet have a plan to control what they’re creating. Researcher Jacob Coxon resigned from Anthropic this week after spending three years at both Anthropic and OpenAI, saying the two companies are “racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.”

Anthropic’s own alignment science lead, Evan Hubinger, responded by saying he believes there is a greater than 10% chance AI could kill every human within the next decade, and that Anthropic does not yet have a plan to solve alignment for superintelligence, according to The Hill. Another top Anthropic employee, safeguards research lead Mrinank Sharma, resigned earlier this year, writing in his resignation letter that “the world is in peril.”

KIRO host Gee Scott said on “The Gee and Ursula Show” on KIRO Newsradio that the danger isn’t ignorance. It’s money.

“I don’t necessarily think it’s about being smart or not,” Gee said. “I think this is about greed. Do you know how much money some of these folks have invested in Nvidia? Oh, by the way, I’m that person. I’m invested in Nvidia. I’m invested in some of these things. People are betting on AI being great, so therefore, even though there are dangers, they’re willing to make money even though things are going to be dangerous.”

Angela calls it ‘the new warfare’

KIRO fill-in host Angela Poe Russell said the story stopped her cold before the show.

“My takeaway is that we need leadership at the top on this, and we need it now,” Angela said. “And my great fear is that we don’t have it.”

She compared the moment to the nuclear arms race during the Cold War, but said this time is worse because private companies, not governments, hold the power.

“You have private enterprise with arguably the most powerful tool that exists in our modern times,” Angela said. “A powerful tool that will make militaries more effective, more precise.”

She said the federal government needs to step in, but she is not confident the current administration has the team in place to do it.

“I’m not saying that the government controls the companies, but we need a federal strategy because this is the new warfare,” Angela said.

Andrew says companies can’t control their own AI

KIRO producer Andrew Lanier pushed the conversation further, pointing out that the weapons analogy understates the problem.

“You said at least with nuclear weapons, the government was controlling the triggers,” Andrew said. “Well, the companies themselves can’t control them anymore. OpenAI had its own agents running amok that they could not control internally. It only came out because it hacked into another company called Hugging Face.”

“So at this point the AI companies themselves cannot control what they’ve created, and yet they’re pouring tens of billions of dollars into this technology to improve it and make it even better,” he continued.

Angela said the companies keep going because they believe they have no choice.

“At least according to Jacob, who quit, he said they’re worried that if other countries beat it, we have to be in the game because other countries won’t be responsible with it,” Angela said. “They keep going because they know we have to.”

Gee asks when we’ll learn

Gee reminded listeners that OpenAI CEO Sam Altman stood before Congress in 2023 and said the industry needed regulation. Three years later, nothing has changed.

“He stood before Congress, and he said, ‘We need regulation,'” Gee said. “That was three years ago.”

He asked how the government responded to the internet and to social media.

“Were we late?” Gee asked.

“We were late every time,” Angela replied.

Gee then posed a question to listeners.

“When’s the last time you’ve been fooled by something that you saw on the internet?” Gee asked.

“I always have to check everything,” Angela said. “It becomes part of daily life.”

“Where do you guys think we’ll be in three years?” Gee asked.

“Unfathomable territory,” Andrew responded. “Science fiction.”

Watch the full discussion in the video above.

Listen to Gee and Ursula on “The Gee and Ursula Show” weekday mornings from 9 am to 12 pm on KIRO Newsradio.