Could AI kill all humans by 2036? Anthropic researcher says risk is above 10%

Evan Hubinger, Alignment Science Lead at Anthropic, shared his assessment on X, writing: “We really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans! I personally think it is >10% within the next decade.”

Hubinger also raised concerns about the industry's preparedness to address the risks posed by increasingly powerful AI systems.

“I believe Anthropic is trying its best, but we do not yet have a plan to solve alignment for superintelligence and are not clearly on track to,” he wrote.

Who is Evan Hubinger?

Hubinger is currently an Alignment Science Lead at Anthropic. According to his X profile, he has previously worked with OpenAI, Google, Yelp and Ripple.

He made the remarks while responding to an X post by Jacob Coxon, who recently resigned from Anthropic.

Coxon had also raised concerns about the potential risks posed by advanced AI systems.

“The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade. This is not a marketing stunt. If anything, many executives and senior researchers will couch their phrasing in the press to sound sensible - but I hear the same people express fear privately. No other human activity poses this level of danger,” Coxon wrote on X.

In a separate post, Coxon said he had resigned from Anthropic after spending three years conducting pretraining research at both OpenAI and Anthropic.

“I resigned from Anthropic today. I spent the last three years doing pretraining research at both OpenAI and Anthropic. Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives,” he wrote.

Coxon also warned against underestimating the capabilities that future AI systems could develop.

“Do not underestimate the power of this technology. These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionize any field overnight, and acquire real power and resources. We have all witnessed the progress in each of these domains, and progress is not slowing,” he said.

The remarks have renewed debate over AI safety and the challenge of ensuring that increasingly capable artificial intelligence systems remain aligned with human interests.