The AI Safety Community Is Unfortunately Doing More Harm Than Good

Gavin MorrisonOct 2, 2026

I think the AI safety community is doing more harm than good right now. Public warnings that frame human extinction as a coin flip may not persuade people to support better safeguards. They risk pushing the broader public toward fear and backlash against the entire AI industry. Palisade Research’s interviews with current and former frontier-lab employees come at a moment when AI safety is already reaching a much wider audience. I’m worried that this kind of messaging will make people more likely to demand a ban on AI, rather than engage seriously with alignment or responsible development. I believe today’s models are powerful, and future systems will be more so. We need safeguards and stronger release policies. But we should be careful about how we make that case, and whether our public messaging is helping people understand the risks—or simply driving them away from the conversation.