Departing Anthropic researcher details split with leadership over race inevitability
haydenfield · x · 2026-09-16
Asked why he left Anthropic despite agreeing on safety issues, Hilbert Spaess laid out the splits: the core disagreement was over whether an AI race is inevitable; he thinks leadership is too paranoid about the US government and China; Anthropic largely initiated the recent RSI race — forcing OpenAI to shed projects like Sora — and even if their pessimism is right, he rejects their consequentialist philosophy: if the race is inevitable, you shouldn't contribute.
Related event: Ex-Anthropic researcher slams leadership's racing logic in AMA(3 posts)→
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