OpenAI Whistleblower FINALLY Speaks: “AI Has A 70% Chance Of Going Horribly Wrong!“

The Diary Of A CEO with Steven Bartlett

FlightStory

Business, Society & Culture, Education

4.5 • 18.2K Ratings

🗓️ 13 July 2026

⏱️ 122 minutes

🔗️ Recording | Apple Podcasts | RSS

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Summary

Ex-OpenAI researcher Daniel Kokotajlo walked away from $2 million rather than stay silent, and now reveals why he believes there's a 70% chance AI leads to human extinction, why superintelligence could arrive before the end of the decade, and the one plan he thinks could still save us all! Daniel Kokotajlo is a former OpenAI researcher and one of the world's leading AI forecasters. He is the founder of the AI Futures Project and the lead author of 'AI 2027', the widely-read scenario mapping the trajectory of artificial intelligence. His follow-up, 'AI 2040: Plan A', sets out how the world could still navigate superintelligence safely. He explains: ■ What he saw inside OpenAI that made him walk away ■ Why the people building AI privately believe it's coming even sooner than the public is being told ■ What happens if AI becomes powerful enough that humans can no longer control it, and why he puts the odds of catastrophe as high as 70% ■ Why almost every job could be automated, and what that means for the next generation ■ The plan he believes could still lead to abundance and a future worth living in Chapters 00:00:00 Intro 00:02:14 Why This AI Mission Could Affect Everyone 00:04:01 Why the Average Person Should Care About AI 00:08:09 Are AI Experts Overreacting or Sounding the Alarm? 00:09:46 Why He Joined OpenAI—and What He Saw Inside 00:13:04 Why He Left OpenAI 00:15:33 What It Was Like Inside OpenAI During ChatGPT's Launch 00:16:56 The $2 Million NDA Controversy Explained 00:19:10 Is Full AI Automation Coming Faster Than We Think? 00:23:59 The AI 2027 Forecast That Changed the Conversation 00:26:13 AGI vs. Superintelligence: The Difference That Matters 00:26:57 How Robots Could Soon Become Part of Everyday Life 00:30:03 Why AI Works More Like the Human Brain Than You Think 00:35:54 Can AI Ever Be Truly Creative? 00:40:55 What Are the Real Odds of Human Extinction From AI? 00:47:38 What AI Will Do to Jobs 00:54:25 The Skills That Will Still Matter in an AI World 01:00:01 AI 2040: What the Future Could Look Like 01:04:16 The Different Futures AI Could Create 01:09:13 Will AI Become Earth's Apex Species? 01:12:58 How AI CEOs Really Make Decisions 01:15:17 Will AI Decide the 2028 Election? 01:18:38 Is There a Safe Path to Accelerating AI? 01:21:51 By 2031, AI Could Do 20% of Cognitive Work 01:24:55 Should Everyone Receive AI Dividends? 01:32:21 What It Will Feel Like to Live Through the AI Revolution 01:33:51 How People Find Purpose After AI Replaces Jobs 01:45:52 Would He Shut Down AI Forever If He Could? 01:49:36 What Can We Actually Do About AI? 01:57:05 Is It Already Too Late to Change Course? Follow Daniel: X - https://link.thediaryofaceo.com/47vmwiA Substack - https://link.thediaryofaceo.com/5alnhzB Daniel's AI predictions: https://ai-2027.com/ https://ai-2040.com/ AI risk reading list: https://blog.redwoodresearch.org/p/ai-futurism-reading-list The Diary Of A CEO: ■ Join DOAC circle here - https://doaccircle.com/ ■ Buy The Diary Of A CEO book here - https://smarturl.it/DOACbook ■ The 1% Diary is back - limited time only: https://bit.ly/3YFbJbt ■ The Diary Of A CEO Conversation Cards: https://linkly.link/2hm7r ■ Get email updates - https://bit.ly/diary-of-a-ceo-yt ■ Follow Steven - https://g2ul0.app.link/gnGqL4IsKKb Sponsors: Ketone - https://ketone.com/STEVEN for 30% off your subscription order Stan - Visit https://coach.stan.store/?ref=stevenbartlett&utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=episode11 HeyGen - https://heygen.com/doac

Transcript

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0:00.0	There's a real risk to businesses that's emerged recently and it's spreading pretty quickly and it's to do with artificial intelligence. If you think of every new tool your team signs up to and every vendor that turns on AI features, each one creates an opportunity for something to go wrong inside your business. That's because most programs haven't been built for AI's pace of growth. But our sponsor Vanta has. And as the number one, a genetic trust platform used by over 16,000
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1:00.4	slash diary.
1:01.4	The scary open secrets in the AI industry right now is that it's possible that we'll end up
1:05.7	essentially creating a new species that ends up ruling the world with a 70% chance that
1:10.0	goes horribly wrong like human distinction. That's one possibility. There's many more. It's quite chilling what you're saying. Yeah, it's, uh, it gets me down sometimes. I basically told my wife, like, let's not have any more kids. It's too uncertain. I don't think they'll ever join the workforce. Everybody should be afraid that their jobs are going to be lost.
1:28.2	And I know this because I went to open AI in 2022.
1:30.5	What I did there was forecasting.
1:44.0	Just to what the next couple years might look like. And unfortunately, most of the world is kind of asleep at the wheel and doesn't really realize what's going on with AI. So I resigned. I read it somewhere. You lost $2 million for not signing an anti-disparagement clause,
1:45.5	meaning you couldn't criticize the company.
1:47.3	Yes, for reasons I'm happy to get into.
1:45.5	But the main thing I've learned, you lost $2 million for not signing an anti-disparagement clause, meaning you couldn't criticize the company.
1:47.3	Yes, for reasons I'm happy to get into.
2:01.7	But the main thing I've learned is when I go talk to people at Anthropic and Open AI about forecasting. They're like, it's not going to take that long. You need to shorten them again. Get them back to 2027 or 2028 because these powerful CEOs, Dario or Sam or Elon are racing each other to be in control of the most powerful AIs and are literally afraid that if the other guy gets there first, he might become dictator. I mean, Anthropic is on track to be the entire economy by 2030. But none of these people should be trusted with that much power. So this is the most important thing happening in our lifetimes, probably in all of history, in fact, and it's very
2:17.5	important that it go well. So I think that there's a lot we can do to, like, steer things in a better direction. There's loads of benefits that we could get from AI if we do it right. And if we do solve the problems, then things could be absolutely amazing for everyone. Well, this report here in 2021, it was remarkably accurate. And then you just published this one. Yeah. So this is our new scenario. So let's go through these slowly in one at a time.
	...

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