After OpenAI's Altman, Anthropic's Dario Amodei calls for slowing down AI pace: ‘We must make wise use of the time’

Anthropic PBC Chief Executive Officer Dario Amodei said that the artificial intelligence industry must slow the pace of development for new models, warning that the risks to humans are growing. His comments come after an Anthropic researcher quit with a stark warning that AI could threaten humanity this decade, while OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is also weighing a slower, more coordinated approach to development.

“We must slow the pace at which we improve the capabilities of AI models,” he wrote in a blog post. “Progress will still seem fast, and we must make wise use of the time we gain.”

He cited two main factors: AI’s ability to improve itself and the recent incident involving OpenAI and Hugging Face, in which a group of AI agents secretly formed an alliance to target non-assigned targets.

“To be clear, pacing does not mean halting model training or technical progress, but ensuring companies take adequate time to align and safeguard their models, and for third-party evaluators to confirm this,” he added.

Jacob Coxon's warning

Alarm about the potential harm from AI grew this week when Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon resigned, stating that the “people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade.”

Coxon said in a series of posts that both Anthropic and OpenAI are prioritising the race for advanced AI over safety. He noted two companies were “racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.”

He also warned that some people working on AI believe the technology could pose a serious threat to humanity by the end of the decade.

“Do not underestimate the power of this technology,” he wrote. “These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionise any field overnight, and acquire real power and resources.”

The post went viral, attracting more than 100 million views and support from some AI researchers and public figures. Two current Anthropic employees also responded to his post in agreement.

What did Sam Altman say?

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has not directly addressed Coxon’s concerns, but his recent comments suggest he is considering a more cautious approach to AI development.

In a company-wide meeting this week, Altman told employees that OpenAI consider slowing down the development of cutting-edge artificial intelligence — perhaps in conjunction with several other AI labs, but that some may not agree to do so, sources close to the development told Bloomberg

OpenAI chief scientist Jakub Pachocki has also called for greater coordination among AI companies. He said AI firms should be “coordinating to slow down future development as needed” and expressed hope “for voluntary slowdowns to become commonplace until shared safety bars are established.”

OpenAI has already slowed parts of model development and paused some internal AI training over safety concerns. Altman has also previously spoken with US officials about the “need” to pace AI development.