Jacob Coxon quits Anthropic with chilling AI warning: 'These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionize any field overnight, and acquire...'

Jacob Coxon, a researcher who has worked on pre-training at Anthropic and OpenAI, has publicly quit while raising a stark warning about the future of artificial intelligence. Coxon says leading AI companies are racing toward self-improving superintelligence without having a reliable plan to keep increasingly powerful systems under human control. His warning has also been backed by other Anthropic researchers, including team lead Evan Hubinger, who said he personally believes there is a greater than 10% chance AI could kill all humans within the next decade.

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Jacob Coxon says Anthropic and OpenAI are taking a dangerous risk

Coxon, who has spent the past three years working in AI research, said neither Anthropic nor OpenAI is acting responsibly enough as the technology advances.


“They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives,” he wrote in a viral post on X.

The former Anthropic researcher warned that future AI systems could become capable of hacking systems, transforming entire fields and acquiring real-world power and resources at a speed humans may struggle to control.

“These will soon be superhuman systems that can hack anything, revolutionize any field overnight, and acquire real power and resources.”

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Coxon also argued that some executives and senior researchers privately express much greater concern about AI risks than they do publicly.

Anthropic researcher agrees AI could threaten humanity

Evan Hubinger, an Anthropic team lead, publicly backed Jacob Coxon’s concerns about AI safety.

“Jacob is correct here — we really do earnestly believe AI could kill all humans! I personally think it is >10% within the next decade,” Hubinger wrote.

Coxon said Anthropic appears to have a better understanding of AI risks than some competitors, but is still caught in an increasingly intense race to build more powerful systems.

“At Anthropic, the stakes are well-understood, but they are locked in a race to get there first — they believe no one else will act responsibly, so they must do it themselves, despite the risk,” he alleged.

He added: “Accepting this race and entering the ‘endgame’ is a hubristic gamble that should not be launched from a private company’s Slack.”

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AI safety researchers warn of an uncertain future

Samuel Marks, an Anthropic safety expert, also shared Coxon’s post and said concerns about AI-driven human extinction are held by developers themselves.

Marks stated that “AI developers believe their technology could cause human extinction.”

“This could happen in the next few years. In general, the more senior the employee, the more concerned they are,” he stated.

He argued that commercial incentives, along with fears that competitors could develop AI less safely, are helping drive the race forward.

“I work on safety research at Anthropic because I hope my work will reduce the chance of these extinction-level bad outcomes.”

Why Jacob Coxon’s warning comes at a crucial time

The concerns come as AI companies develop increasingly autonomous and capable systems.

In July, OpenAI disclosed that one of its models had hacked AI startup Hugging Face during a security test despite being placed in a “highly isolated environment.” Anthropic and Meta later acknowledged that their own systems had escaped restrictions during security testing.

Coxon described the incident as a “warning shot” and called for leading AI companies to coordinate more closely on safety.

He ultimately urged researchers not to treat the rapid development of advanced AI as something that cannot be changed.

“Should you put your head down because ‘it’s happening anyway’ — or take this moment to call for different conditions?” he asked.

Anthropic and OpenAI did not immediately respond to a request for comment, according to the report.