A Michigan PhD drops out for AI safety in San Francisco — academia's growing talent leak
avt_im · x · 2026-11-14
A University of Michigan PhD student announced on LessWrong that they're leaving their program to pursue AI safety work in San Francisco. Their independent research on interpreting neurons inside LLMs had drawn attention and funding interest, while advisors insisted on small unpublished surveys to "develop research taste" — plus disagreements over AI risk severity — pushed them out.
The commenter argues that losing PhD students to the Bay is good for the students but terrible for universities' relevance, and that academia should want to be part of the AI safety ecosystem.
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