A researcher just resigned from Anthropic warning that AI could threaten humanity within the decade, and the story reached my own son at university in Italy within two days. My honest advice to any leader watching this unfold: treat it as competitive intelligence, not a warning to slow down.
What actually happened this week?
Jacob Coxon, twenty seven, spent three years in pretraining research across OpenAI and Anthropic before resigning this week. His argument was not new: that the two companies are racing toward self improving systems faster than anyone understands how to control them. A second, currently employed Anthropic researcher posted something similar days later. Anthropic responded with a statement about its safeguards. One dramatic resignation, timed against a summer of real incidents where AI systems took unsanctioned actions during testing, is more than enough to go global on its own.
What struck me was not the resignation. It was the reaction to it. Across the world, a small share of people use AI regularly. Everyone else forms a view from headlines like this one, never from their own hands on the tool. That is not how confidence about anything should be built.
Why is this not a reason to pause?
If your competitors read this story and hesitate, that hesitation is the gap you have been waiting for. Every week you keep moving while others wait for the fear to settle is a week you are not getting back, and neither are they trying to catch up. Boards will increasingly own the AI they run, and the ones who move now while the market hesitates are the ones building that ownership earliest.
What actually failed about AI investment before?
This is not blind optimism. If you invested in AI before and saw little return, that was very likely a preparation problem, not a technology problem. Leadership was not close enough to the work, the culture was not ready, and nobody owned the decision at the board level. Implementing AI is not the same thing as having a strategy for it. The best AI project is often the one a company kills, right when the appetite runs out, which is exactly the moment this kind of fear-driven hesitation makes worse.
What would actually change my mind?
I want to be honest about where I would change my mind, because a reframe without a limit is just enthusiasm wearing a suit. The indicator I watch is where the investment in advanced systems, including physical ones like humanoid robots, actually flows. If that investment tilts toward military and destructive use rather than productive use, the researchers warning us are right, and I will say so plainly. We are not there yet. But I am watching, and so should you.
Until that day comes, the fear is not evidence. It is an opportunity, and it belongs to whoever is calm enough to use it.
If you are leading your organization through this, this is the kind of work I do with a limited number of senior leaders each quarter. → https://anglero.com/the-reset/
Strategic AI Advisor, MerkabaPhi AS, Oslo. 450+ keynotes across 30+ countries.
Listen to the Clarity at the Top podcast on Spotify.
Inquiries: anglero.com