<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Jacob Coxon, a former artificial intelligence researcher who resigned from his position at Anthropic, is scheduled to testify at a New York City council meeting on Monday. He has called for enhanced safety measures in AI development and will appear alongside safety representatives from Anthropic.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Coxon, 27, previously worked at OpenAI and Anthropic for three years before leaving the private sector, which has sparked discussions about the need to slow AI development. His resignation coincided with various hacking incidents, including the OpenAI-Hugging Face incident, and a generally negative public perception of the AI industry.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">In a post on X on September 8, Coxon stated, “Neither company is acting responsibly. They are racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.”</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Coxon’s testimony is at the request of Council Speaker Julie Menin, who aims to gather AI whistleblowers and industry representatives as the council considers bills to establish safety measures. Representatives from Google, OpenAI, Anthropic, and Meta are expected to attend. The council has also subpoenaed SpaceX’s AI team for failing to respond to a request to appear.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Coxon expressed concerns about the potential dangers of AI, stating, “The people building AI earnestly believe that it could kill us all by the end of the decade. This is not a marketing stunt.” He emphasized fears that future AI systems could have the capability to “hack anything.”</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">Menin’s initiative to hold the hearing is influenced by the significant presence of AI companies in New York City, although most AI policy discussions occur at the federal and state levels. Following Coxon’s announcement in early September, a bipartisan backlash against data center construction diminished in public discourse. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei later published an essay titled “We Must Pace The Frontier,” discussing how to manage AI risks. Amodei recently joined other AI leaders at the White House to sign a voluntary commitment to self-regulation.</p>
<p class="wp-block-paragraph">One of the proposals before the council includes a bill sponsored by Menin that would provide whistleblowers reporting violations with a portion of any recovered fines or penalties. Coxon was not the only employee to resign from Anthropic during that week; the head of Scalable Operations also left the company.</p>