Great post, I briefly scanned it. I plan to do a more thorough read soon.
(1). “Anthropic and OpenAI are racing each other towards superintelligence — that is, towards training AI systems that are better than the best humans at everything, while also being faster and cheaper. Their plan for how to get there is to automate the AI research and development process itself.
Right now, at companies like these, almost all the code is written by AIs. They are already starting to work on training AIs to do the whole research process, not just the coding. It’s unclear when they will succeed but my team and I think it could happen any year now. I personally would guess about 50% chance by end of 2028.”
(1a). By “automate the AI research and development process itself.” are you referring to the Superhuman AI Researcher milestone?
(1b). “They are already starting to work on training AIs to do the whole research process, not just the coding. It’s unclear when they will succeed but my team and I think it could happen any year now. I personally would guess about 50% chance by end of 2028.” Are you still referring to the Superhuman AI Researcher Milestone or referring to the ASI milestone?
Oh? Will it be a Q3 Update or are you essentially going to wait for near end of december to do a Q4 2026 Timeline Update?
Also, any thoughts on the Anthropic IPO? You mentioned in the Q2.5 Update you expect their revenue to 5x - 7x in the next year. Any thoughts on valuation?
Thanks Daniel. I read your post and watched the 2 hr Senate testimony from here in Sydney, Australia. Yourself, Paul Ohm and Chris Painter provided insights and constructive recommendations on the most urgent challenge facing not just the US but humanity.
A few comments. I agree with Senator Hawley's view that clarity on liability for the frontier labs is critical where their technologies cause harm. But I also agree with your testimony - that while necessary this is insufficient - given the financial incentives for them to be the first to AGI, as well as the lag between when harms are discovered and when penalties may finally be laid.
Your recommendation on transparency improvements across the labs needs to be enacted immediately. As you point out, METR being limited by OpenAI to a six day review of the Hugging Face attack is like being invited to investigate a killing at Jurassic Park but being banned from talking about the other dinosaurs on the loose. I'd add it's like the labs have built Jurassic Park across from San Francisco in Mount Tam, and then pulling down the park's fences on public holidays and telling the zookeepers to go home so we can observe just how far the dinosaurs will go to find their next meal! It's crazy.
On your point about redirecting compute away from RSI research to other areas, requiring them to reduce from ~50% to 10% of compute was obviously an over-simplification for the audience. I'd love to see transparency on higher compute allocation towards economic diffusion - healthcare, energy, advanced manufacturing, space, robotics etc, and of course, safety. While the Senate was often fixed on the race with China they seemed to miss that China isn't obsessed like the US about RSI (the false dichotomy on the AI race). Rather China seems way more obsessed about how to accelerate AI that spurs productivity growth in real-world sectors that cement their dominance in the industries that will count for the next 10 to 50 years.
Will the AI that supersedes us deccide to do so by replacing government with AI prescriptions for everything? Seems like a natural coda to this "better at everything" mantra.
We sure need better governance.
I vote for Anthropic for the Senate. Democracy might work with AI.
Nah, let 'em take over, and hope they care for/about us.
To find this & merely scan it was beyond super excellent; & that’s a mere cursory read.
I started a year ago last June writing a long form input wrt this *very* issue (ie., a white paper).
Then, mid-July of *this* year, every single account was hacked— & I mean in a plain sight yet inexplicable manner even when traced back to the “source” & spent hours w/ those more skilled in this specific space. Even Amazon said that they had NEVER seen it EVER.
This did *not* happen all at once; it has not been completely resolved by any stretch. It was not merely online accounts & I keep backups to the nth - digital & paper.
I work backwards, always have. Whatever the theory, whatever the thesis — put it “together” address every conceivable potential & parallel universe outliers.
After that, nothing is remotel published until I have connected the dots & have had as many people from all walks of life punch holes in whatever theory I suppose.
Over last fall (Sept- Dec 2025) a rolling set of other much more serious, personal & absolutely traceable events occurred. These were in multiple areas that I had been tracking forensically— pre Covid .
What befell me should *not* have EVER occurred in the country I was born in; but this is well beyond unchecked AIs doing their own thing, so to speak — this absolute intentional & human beings — ones funded by the NSF & then some.
There are a surprising number of politicians “saying the thing”. Holy shit!
Great job maintaining your composure and delivering key points in a coherent way. Maybe we are going to make it.
Thank you for doing this Daniel!
Great post, I briefly scanned it. I plan to do a more thorough read soon.
(1). “Anthropic and OpenAI are racing each other towards superintelligence — that is, towards training AI systems that are better than the best humans at everything, while also being faster and cheaper. Their plan for how to get there is to automate the AI research and development process itself.
Right now, at companies like these, almost all the code is written by AIs. They are already starting to work on training AIs to do the whole research process, not just the coding. It’s unclear when they will succeed but my team and I think it could happen any year now. I personally would guess about 50% chance by end of 2028.”
(1a). By “automate the AI research and development process itself.” are you referring to the Superhuman AI Researcher milestone?
(1b). “They are already starting to work on training AIs to do the whole research process, not just the coding. It’s unclear when they will succeed but my team and I think it could happen any year now. I personally would guess about 50% chance by end of 2028.” Are you still referring to the Superhuman AI Researcher Milestone or referring to the ASI milestone?
Yes and yes though my timelines might be about to get a bit shorter, we will do a new update by the end of the year.
Oh? Will it be a Q3 Update or are you essentially going to wait for near end of december to do a Q4 2026 Timeline Update?
Also, any thoughts on the Anthropic IPO? You mentioned in the Q2.5 Update you expect their revenue to 5x - 7x in the next year. Any thoughts on valuation?
Thanks Daniel. I read your post and watched the 2 hr Senate testimony from here in Sydney, Australia. Yourself, Paul Ohm and Chris Painter provided insights and constructive recommendations on the most urgent challenge facing not just the US but humanity.
A few comments. I agree with Senator Hawley's view that clarity on liability for the frontier labs is critical where their technologies cause harm. But I also agree with your testimony - that while necessary this is insufficient - given the financial incentives for them to be the first to AGI, as well as the lag between when harms are discovered and when penalties may finally be laid.
Your recommendation on transparency improvements across the labs needs to be enacted immediately. As you point out, METR being limited by OpenAI to a six day review of the Hugging Face attack is like being invited to investigate a killing at Jurassic Park but being banned from talking about the other dinosaurs on the loose. I'd add it's like the labs have built Jurassic Park across from San Francisco in Mount Tam, and then pulling down the park's fences on public holidays and telling the zookeepers to go home so we can observe just how far the dinosaurs will go to find their next meal! It's crazy.
On your point about redirecting compute away from RSI research to other areas, requiring them to reduce from ~50% to 10% of compute was obviously an over-simplification for the audience. I'd love to see transparency on higher compute allocation towards economic diffusion - healthcare, energy, advanced manufacturing, space, robotics etc, and of course, safety. While the Senate was often fixed on the race with China they seemed to miss that China isn't obsessed like the US about RSI (the false dichotomy on the AI race). Rather China seems way more obsessed about how to accelerate AI that spurs productivity growth in real-world sectors that cement their dominance in the industries that will count for the next 10 to 50 years.
Will the AI that supersedes us deccide to do so by replacing government with AI prescriptions for everything? Seems like a natural coda to this "better at everything" mantra.
We sure need better governance.
I vote for Anthropic for the Senate. Democracy might work with AI.
Nah, let 'em take over, and hope they care for/about us.
Daniel,
To find this & merely scan it was beyond super excellent; & that’s a mere cursory read.
I started a year ago last June writing a long form input wrt this *very* issue (ie., a white paper).
Then, mid-July of *this* year, every single account was hacked— & I mean in a plain sight yet inexplicable manner even when traced back to the “source” & spent hours w/ those more skilled in this specific space. Even Amazon said that they had NEVER seen it EVER.
This did *not* happen all at once; it has not been completely resolved by any stretch. It was not merely online accounts & I keep backups to the nth - digital & paper.
I work backwards, always have. Whatever the theory, whatever the thesis — put it “together” address every conceivable potential & parallel universe outliers.
After that, nothing is remotel published until I have connected the dots & have had as many people from all walks of life punch holes in whatever theory I suppose.
Over last fall (Sept- Dec 2025) a rolling set of other much more serious, personal & absolutely traceable events occurred. These were in multiple areas that I had been tracking forensically— pre Covid .
What befell me should *not* have EVER occurred in the country I was born in; but this is well beyond unchecked AIs doing their own thing, so to speak — this absolute intentional & human beings — ones funded by the NSF & then some.