OpenAI Researcher Resigns Citing Fear Of AI's Rapid Development

An OpenAI researcher has resigned from his position after working four years in the company. His reason? The rapid growth of artificial intelligence. In a post on X, Steven Adler announced that after four years working on safety across OpenAI, he left his job in mid-November.

"It was a wild ride with lots of chapters - dangerous capability evals, agent safety/control, AGI and online identity, etc. - and I'll miss many parts of it,” Mr Adler wrote.

In the next part of the post, he spoke about what "terrified" him the most. "Honestly I'm pretty terrified by the pace of AI development these days. When I think about where I'll raise a future family, or how much to save for retirement, I can't help but wonder: Will humanity even make it to that point?" 

In the follow-up posts, Steven mentioned that the "AGI race is a very risky gamble" as no lab has a solution to its alignment and even if someone wants to develop the technology responsibly, the competitiveness among the peers pushes all to speed up. 

“As for what's next, I'm enjoying a break for a bit, but I'm curious: what do you see as the most important & neglected ideas in AI safety/policy? I'm especially excited re: control methods, scheming detection, and safety cases,” Mr Adler concluded.
 

Some personal news: After four years working on safety across @openai, I left in mid-November. It was a wild ride with lots of chapters - dangerous capability evals, agent safety/control, AGI and online identity, etc. - and I'll miss many parts of it.

— Steven Adler (@sjgadler) January 27, 2025

Not too long ago, Geoffrey Hinton, often called the “godfather” of AI, raised concerns that the technology may lead to human extinction in the next 30 years.

The British-Canadian computer scientist, honoured with the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2024 for his work in the field, said there was a “10% to 20%” chance that AI could result in human extinction in the next three decades. He earlier predicted there was a 10% likelihood of the same. 

Mr Hinton, also a professor emeritus at the University of Toronto, said humans were toddlers compared to advanced AI systems. “I like to think of it as: imagine yourself and a three-year-old. We'll be three-year-olds,” he said.