What are the biggest risks from AI?

“I don't see any step up in the risk of human extinction from AI compared to a few months ago. The theories about this remain the same fantastical, science fiction scenarios as a few months ago.”

How the view has changed. In June 2023 he said he did not understand how AI posed an extinction risk and asked to be pointed to serious arguments; by October 2023 he was calling the fear a tool against open source, and by 2026 he was describing much AI safety work as aimed at regulatory capture.

“Catastrophic risks are a possible or even plausible outcome of advanced AI development.”

How the view has changed. His 2016 paper studied near-term accidents. By January 2026 "The Adolescence of Technology" organized the danger into five categories, from misaligned autonomous systems to economic disruption, while warning readers to "Avoid doomerism," and by September 2026 he wrote that "we are considerably closer to real danger" than in 2023.

“further research is surely required to ensure a safe transition into the era of experience”

“Can we make sure that-- we can keep control of the systems? That they're aligned with our values”

How the view has changed. In 2023 he told the Guardian AI risk should be treated as seriously as climate change; by May 2026 he was describing a "species-level transition" with "little margin for error".

“AGI is a term that famously lacks a precise meaning, and certainly does not refer to any particular imminent technology.”

How the view has changed. In 2023 she described the extinction-risk movement as a "clown car" competing for policymakers' attention; by 2025 she and Hanna were arguing that AGI promises were being used to justify blocking state AI regulation.

“I feel there are other risks that are what I would call catastrophic risks to society that are more pressing and urgent.”

How the view has changed. By 2025 she was framing every technology as "a double-edged sword" on PBS's Firing Line, while still directing policy attention to applications rather than models.

“It’s wholesale deepfaked disinformation, and unreliable but persistent AI systems stealing credentials and launching cyberattacks, at scale.”

How the view has changed. He signed the March 2023 pause letter and told the Senate that year that "we cannot remotely guarantee" current systems are safe; by 2026 he was criticizing "doomers" and optimists alike while calling for a pause of OpenAI.

“You see, we've never had to deal with things more intelligent than ourselves before.”

How the view has changed. He had earlier put the odds at about 10 percent. In December 2024 he said the number was going up "if anything," and in December 2025 he told CNN he was "probably more worried" because progress had been faster than he expected.

“The whole problem is the power.”

How the view has changed. The 2023 Superalignment announcement he co-wrote warned that superintelligence "could lead to the disempowerment of humanity or even human extinction"; by 2025 he was emphasizing that people, including AI researchers, cannot yet imagine how powerful future systems will be.

“2030 is not going to be the end of the world. There is 0% chance that's going to be the end of the world.”

How the view has changed. In 2023 he told a Gensler audience that "No A.I. should be able to learn without a human in the loop"; he did not sign the May 2023 Center for AI Safety statement.

“No AI developer, no safety researcher, no policy expert, no person I've encountered has a reassuring answer to this question.”

How the view has changed. He signed the May 2023 Center for AI Safety statement. In September 2026 he called OpenAI's chain-of-thought tampering disclosure "a pretty serious situation" but told Fortune that Anthropic's 10 percent extinction estimate was "not really a helpful frame."

“Today's challenge requires a similarly broad and ambitious program, in this case to keep AI in check and societies in control.”

How the view has changed. The Coming Wave (2023) framed containment as a ten-step programme for governments; by 2025 and 2026 he was applying it to his own lab, defining humanist superintelligence as AI that is "contained, subordinate, under our control."

“My worst fears are that we cause significant, we, the field, the technology, the industry cause significant harm to the world.”

How the view has changed. His 2015 post said "we should fight it"; his 2025 essays described a "gentle singularity"; in August 2026 he paused some frontier training over alignment and security standards, and in September 2026 he endorsed pacing the frontier.

“Those hypothetical risks are the focus of a dangerous ideology called longtermism that ignores the actual harms resulting from the deployment of AI systems today.”

How the view has changed. The view predates the current debate. In a 2016 Facebook post after NIPS she wrote that she was not worried about machines taking over the world but about "groupthink, insularity, and arrogance in the AI community." By September 2026 she was calling the extinction story a "machine-god narrative" that is "meant to distract us."

“The idea of AI posing an existential risk to humanity is preposterous.”

How the view has changed. He declined to sign the March 2023 pause letter and the May 2023 extinction-risk statement that Hinton and Bengio backed, and has held the position through 2026, while arguing since 2022 that world-model systems with built-in "guardrail objectives" would be safer by construction than today's LLMs.

“Importantly, none of the current advanced AI systems are demonstrably safe against the risk of loss of control to a misaligned AI.”

How the view has changed. Before ChatGPT he wrote mostly about bias, misuse and the ethics of deployment. In August 2023 he wrote that he had not paid much attention to catastrophic risk and found it painful to admit his own work might contribute to it; by January 2026 he said research at LawZero had made him more optimistic that the problem is solvable.