AI Whistleblower Daniel Kokotajlo Warns Artificial Intelligence Could Create a New Species and Threaten Human Survival
July 25, 2026
Ex-OpenAI governance researcher Daniel Kokotajlo walked away from $2 million in equity after refusing to sign a non-disparagement agreement, all to warn the public about what’s happening behind closed doors in Silicon Valley.
Speaking on The Diary of a CEO, Kokotajlo breaks down the alarming reality of the race to Superintelligence:
Warns that internal consensus puts a high probability on AI evolving into a self-governing “new species” that could out-think and eventually replace humanity.
While the public assumes human-level AI is decades away, top researchers at OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI believe the tipping point could happen within just a few years.
“This is probably the most important event in our lifetimes—perhaps in all of human history,” he argues.
AI has the potential to transform medicine, science, education, and nearly every aspect of human life. But if safety, transparency, and accountability fail to keep pace with capability, the same technology could introduce risks unlike anything the world has faced before.
The future of AI will not be determined by technology alone but by the choices humanity makes today.
Sources: @thediaryofaceopodcast & steven
#fyp #OpenAI #AIWhistleblower #ArtificialIntelligence #TechNews
English caption:
Daniel Kokotajlo: The scary open secrets in the AI industry right now is that it’s possible they will end up essentially creating a new species that ends up ruling the world with a 70% chance that this goes horribly wrong like human extinction. That’s one possibility. There’s many more.
Interviewer: It’s quite chilling what you’re saying.
Daniel Kokotajlo: Yeah. It gets me down sometimes. I basically told my wife, like, let’s not have more kids. It’s too uncertain. I don’t think they will over join the workforce. Everybody should be afraid that their jobs are going to be lost. And I know this because I went to OpenAI in 2022. What I did there was forecasting as to what the next couple of 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.
Interviewer: I read somewhere that you lost $2 million for not signing an anti disparagement clause, meaning you couldn’t criticize the company.
Daniel Kokotajlo: Yes, for reasons I’m happy to get into. But the main thing I’ve learned is when I go talk to people at Anthropic and OpenAI about forecasting, they’re like, it’s not gonna take that long, you need to shorten them again. Getting 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 AI’s 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 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.
Interviewer: Well, this report here in 2021, it was remarkably accurate. And then you just published this one.
Daniel Kokotajlo: Yeah. So this is a new scenario.
Interviewer: So let’s go through these slowly one at a time.
Daniel Kokotajlo: I’d be incredibly happy if all my predictions turned out to be wrong.
