Yoshua Bengio: 'If you prioritize safety, leave frontier AI companies'
marigo · x · 2026-10-09
Deep learning pioneer and "AI godfather" Yoshua Bengio has published a lengthy exclusive essay in Transformer publicly calling on safety-minded employees at frontier AI companies to leave.
- Confession: Bengio admits he spent years in motivated reasoning, unable to face the idea that his life's work could do harm — until ChatGPT's launch forced the realization that we are far further along the path of uncontrollable capable systems than he'd assumed
- Direct appeal: addressed to "the researchers I trained and the ones who trained on my work" — if you prioritize safety, join the fight for a safer future elsewhere
- Urgency: he argues frontier models are producing new and amplified harms weekly, most predicted by AI researchers years or decades ago
It is rare for a researcher of his stature to publicly urge industry talent to vote with their feet.
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