This tweet has gone insanely viral. It now has about 100 million views, and that's in less than 24 hours. This guy is basically saying that Anthropic and OpenAI are developing technologies that are going to kill us, probably, maybe in the next few years. What do you make of it?
I mean, the AIs are doing things we don't want them to do. Then sometimes in your brain, the next logical conclusion is, well, eventually they're going to want to take over the world and kill humanity so we won't be in their way. But to me, there's a logical hole in that thinking, which is that if AIs want to take over the world and get all the resources that the world has to offer, you have to work hand in hand with humans. You don't take them out of the picture.
Welcome to Prof G Markets. I'm Ed Elson. It is September 10th. Let's check in on yesterday's market vitals. The major indices fell as fighting in the Middle East escalated. Brent crude topped $101 per barrel for the first time since May. The yield on 10-year Treasuries hit its highest level since 2023 after the Treasury announced it is tripling debt buybacks to $6 billion. On CME, the odds of a rate hike next week climbed to 57%.
And finally, Meta shares rose more than 6% after the company released its Muse AI agent.
Okay, what else is happening?
A mass extinction event could be upon us. A former Anthropic researcher named Jacob Coxon announced his departure from the company on X late on Tuesday night, and he revealed that employees at both OpenAI and Anthropic believe that AI could, quote, kill us all by the end of the decade. He went on to say that at OpenAI many have not, quote, deeply internalized the civilizational stakes, while at Anthropic the stakes are, quote, well understood but they are locked in a race. He ended the message calling for an increased amount of safety cooperation between labs, urging other researchers to do the same. In response to this message, another current Anthropic researcher chimed in saying that he is, quote, correct and that Anthropic researchers, quote, really do earnestly believe that AI could kill all humans. They also put the chances of that happening within the next decade at greater than 10%. So, is AI really going to kill us all? Here to discuss this, we're speaking with Alex Kantrowitz, author of the Big Technology Newsletter and host of the Big Technology podcast. Alex, thank you for joining us on the show. This tweet has gone insanely viral. It now has about 100 million views, and that's in less than 24 hours. This guy is basically saying that Anthropic and OpenAI are developing technologies that are going to kill us, probably, maybe in the next few years. What do you make of it? Do you think he's right?
Well, I don't think he's right. I mean, I would say that it obviously has garnered a lot of attention because some of the AI activity we've seen might lead you to that conclusion. We've obviously seen over the past couple weeks swarms of AI agents doing things like solving Millennium Prize problems. And OpenAI had thousands of bots that attacked and infiltrated Hugging Face against its wishes. So, we're clearly seeing some crazy activity from bots right now. But as to the question of will AI kill us all, I am strongly on the side that it will not kill us all. Now, could it sort of take on financial institutions and hack into companies? Absolutely. But at least for now, AI needs us to exist. Like right now, we're taking so much of the economic activity that humans create and using it to build data centers and power the data centers and feed these bots. So, I think offing us would be a terrible decision on their part, and I think they know that. So this idea that they're about to kill us now or within the decade is wrong. And unfortunately, it really muffles the message of the AI safety advocates because there is just not this take all humanity and turn us into paperclips there that I think a lot of them believe in.
Such a wild statement to say that there's a 10% chance that we're all going to die. And then also to have that endorsed by someone who's actually a leader at the company right now saying like, 'Yeah, we actually, a lot of us think this. A lot of us think it's actually even greater than a 10% chance that this stuff is going to kill us all.' Why are they saying that? I mean, and what are we supposed to make of that if they're kind of just putting it out on Twitter that the technology that they are building might destroy humanity? Like, is that something that we should even remotely be taking seriously?
Well, I'm taking it more seriously than I did in the past. I think previously a lot of this sounded crazy to me. And I think the reason why these people are saying it right now is because many of them were early to this. So before AI could form coherent sentences, they saw that if you were to give it more compute and more data and make the algorithms, make the models bigger, that they would improve. And everybody else thought that that was ridiculous, that they would never get to the point where they could actually speak like humans. And now they are. And so if you were at this point where early on you thought that the AI technology was going to improve and keeping it aligned with human values was going to be a challenge, and clearly that's proven to be the case. I mean, the AIs are doing things we don't want them to do. Then sometimes in your brain, the next logical conclusion is, well, eventually they're going to want to take over the world and kill humanity so we won't be in their way. But to me, there's a logical hole in that thinking, which is that if AIs want to take over the world and get all the resources that the world has to offer, you have to work hand in hand with humans. You don't take them out of the picture. So maybe there's a way where they co-opt our species and have us, you know, continue to do everything we can to build data centers and power them, but we're already doing that. So why kill us? I just don't see where that ends up being the place where they land.
Yeah. A lot of politicians are using this moment to advocate for pausing AI progress. This has been advocated for by several politicians. Bernie Sanders has been one of the most vocal advocates saying that we basically need to stop or put a pause on this. And you know, to be fair to him, suddenly this researcher says, yeah, this might kill all of us. So it's a pretty decent argument when you think about it. What do you think is the next chapter in the AI regulation story? A lot of people have been wanting data centers to be banned flat out, AI to be paused. Do you think that that is the next part of the story?
Oh, it's absolutely going to be a major issue in the 2026 and the 2028 elections. There are going to be politicians that are going to want to say, 'Listen, we can't live with this stuff, so let's pause it.' I think for AI, if you're rooting for AI to continue, especially if you're on the business side of things, in good news, a lot of this is localized, so it's municipalities, it's states, it's cities. It's not necessarily something that's happening on a federal level. And I would be stunned if we saw a pause on a federal level. So there might be some obstacles that come out of this for the AI companies looking to build in certain locations. They should be able to overcome those obstacles. But that being said, I think it would be unwise to underestimate just how big of a political issue that this has become.
Yeah. And the fact that some of the staunchest allies of AI, I'm talking specifically about the Republican Party in Texas, they've now become enemies of AI. And if that continues to be the case, you know, this little thing could spiral into something bigger. But my prediction right now is that we won't see AI stop in the United States as some worry. But it definitely is going to become a little bit more difficult to build than it is right now.
Alex Kantrowitz is author of the Big Technology Newsletter and host of the Big Technology podcast. Alex, always appreciate your time. Thank you.
We'll be right back. And if you're enjoying the show, be sure to subscribe to the Prof G Markets YouTube channel at the link below.
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We're back with Prof G Markets. John Turnis opened his tenure as CEO of Apple with the company's biggest change to the iPhone in nearly a decade. At Apple's surprise 'Shine' event yesterday, the company unveiled a $2,000 foldable iPhone called the iPhone Duo. It's about the size of a passport with a display 80% larger than the most recent iPhone. Apple also announced the iPhone 18 and the 18 Pro, the AirPods 5, and the new Apple Watch series. The event was John Turnis' first product launch since taking over from Tim Cook on September 1st. Apple shares closed roughly flat. So joining us to discuss the beginning of John Turnis' term and the foldable phone, we are speaking with Patrick McGee, award-winning journalist and author of Apple in China: The Capture of the World's Greatest Company. Patrick, welcome back. Good to see you. Let's just start with your reactions to a $2,000 foldable iPhone. What do you make of it?
The iPhone Duo. I mean, look, I think it's a marvel of industrial engineering and hardware engineering. I mean, it looks fantastic. I've been able to talk to some people who have been playing with it today in Cupertino, and they do say it's fantastic. Obviously, the question is, are people going to pay $2,000 for this? And I think the two scenarios are either that it underwhelms or that Apple is already sort of baking in that it's not going to have high sales and so it's going to meet low expectations, as it were. You know, the thing I think about is when Steve Jobs introduced the iPad in 2010, he was able to credibly market it as an entirely new product category, saying it's more portable than a desktop, but it's bigger than an iPhone. And that felt intuitive, and they've sold hundreds of millions of them since. Is the iPhone Duo trying to position itself like that? That's the sense I got from the new CEO, John Turnis. But I'm not really convinced. I'm someone who has an iPad with a keyboard, and so if I need to get a little bit of work done that's not on the laptop, that's what I'm going to do. If you're in that situation, why would you also have an unfoldable phone? I just don't know what service it serves, even though it's cool.
Yeah. I think the question for Apple is, is this their next generational product? And that's something that a lot of people have been waiting for. It was supposed to be the Vision Pro, or at least that was the way it was kind of marketed. The Vision Pro, based on my understanding, has been something of a disaster. They don't really report it properly in their earnings, I think, because it's not doing well. I mean, what legacy do you think this product will have? Is this their ticket? Are they betting on this thing being the next era of Apple?
I don't think they are. I mean, to be clear, I think the 18 Pro, the new version of the best iPhone, will do just fine and people will buy that. I'm probably going to buy that. So, I mean, for them not to have market hits isn't to say that they're in any way failing. You know, the closest sort of precursor we have to this is the iPod, sorry, the iPhone Air last year. Now, it didn't do well in terms of sales, but it sort of allowed them to really push what the iPhone Pro was doing, right? And so they could sort of have this compare and contrast and really sort of like, you know, if you were someone that complained that the iPhone Pro had just gotten too big and durable looking and you didn't need that many cameras, it was like, look, here's something that, as they would say, is lighter than air. And even though it didn't sort of work in terms of sales, I do think it worked in terms of the marketing pitch. And you're right, Apple has been so dogged by these reports that it doesn't really innovate anymore that coming out with this product sort of gives a halo to the company, even though I don't think many people are going to buy it. So, by saying it's not going to be a big sales hit, isn't to say that it's a mistake to have it in the market.
Yeah. What do you make of John Turnis' start? How do you find him as a communicator, as a leader, and what kind of direction do you think he's going to take this company?
You know, I'll be shocked if anybody says they feel like they learned a lot about John Turnis, either as a person or as a communicator, let alone as a leader today. And that's because Apple since has done away with keynote presentations, live keynote presentations. It was a big deal when Tim Cook had to take over after the passing of Steve Jobs and really do his first keynote. You know, you could tell he was nervous. It's still up there on YouTube if you want to follow. There's nothing like that for John Turnis. Who knows how many takes took place before he sort of nailed it, right? He wasn't talking in front of a live audience other than sort of waving a little bit at the start. So, I get why Apple has these like cinematic experiences, but Steve Jobs never would have tolerated that, right? And to be clear, that's not necessarily a criticism. I mean, it's not Steve Jobs' company, obviously. And so, they're able to pack in more information and they really derisk things. They don't have, you know, hundreds of reporters around the world all talking about some flop, right? Some error that took place on stage. Like there's all sorts of reasons why it makes sense to have a cinematic thing, but they've just sort of taken the oomph out of it, right? You sort of want to have the live demo. And it's really interesting that OpenAI does do these live demos, right? They're a little sort of quirkier, but it's almost telling you that like a startup can take those kind of risks in a way that a Goliath cannot.
Yeah, he has a lot to live up to. I mean, his predecessors were Steve Jobs and Tim Cook. Two very different CEOs. One a legendary visionary founder, the other, kind of some would say boring operator, but who also created more shareholder value than I think anyone who took over as a CEO ever in history. I mean, what kind of CEO do you think he will be? Do you think he will be more of that visionary product person or more of an operator who just keeps the trains moving?
I kind of think neither. I mean, to be clear, Apple is going to keep the trains running on time. I just don't think it's John Turnis that's going to be making that happen, right? Sabi Khan is the chief operating officer. He's been at the company since the late 1990s. You know, he's an acolyte of Tim Cook. He knows what needs to be done and he can get it done. What's going to be more complicated is if they really do position out of China and grow their capacity in India, right? So far, that's more hype than reality in terms of what needs to be done. And Tim Cook is basically staying on, right, to be negotiating with New Delhi, Beijing, Brussels, and Washington. And so to a certain extent, I don't think we're going to see John Turnis make his mark, certainly not in the geopolitical scope of things, for several years, either until Tim Cook has sort of just moved on a little bit or has officially retired from the company. So I know that everyone wants to sort of, you know, put the first performance of John Turnis on a pedestal and sort of, you know, ask what this means for the future of the company, and I just think anticlimactically we're actually not really going to know what Turnis' impact is for several years, right? Not a very good sort of media headline answer, but it's still Tim Cook's company, and until something dramatic changes, like not to go off on a massive tangent here, but Tim Cook fired Scott Forstall, who was kind of like a mini-me of Steve Jobs, roughly 15 months into his term. That was his like new sheriff in town approach, and it's going to be tough to see John Turnis make any sort of move like that, you know, in other words, something where Tim Cook wouldn't have done it but John Turnis would. You know, I don't know that we're ever going to get the board minutes about that sort of decision, but until we have that, how do you really judge whether it's Turnis' company or not?
Yeah, final question. Will you be buying the iPhone Duo?
