Anthropic believe they are building a god with RSI, not a tool. That was never their goal
Not Anthropic specifically, but there's this thing that I recently read:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/11/09/opinion/ai-anthropic-doom...:
> A.I. company leaders often talk about how their work might lead to human extinction soon. This is astonishing. Even if you wanted to destroy humanity, you wouldn’t say so. If, however, you wanted to save the human species, wouldn’t you stop developing this technology?
> There is an explanation for why some tech leaders, so seemingly worried about an extinction-level event, are plunging ahead with A.I. development: Mankind’s survival, while important to many of them, is less critical than building something they believe to be not only conscious but godlike. A substantial portion of the A.I. community, in celebrating this belief, is quick to support any action or statement that reinforces the idea that the technology is like a deity. They might call for regulation, but only in specific ways — perhaps by deploying more A.I. to control A.I. — that adore the technology’s powers. It is that adoration that is nonnegotiable.
It's by the guy who apparently invented VR and was apparently mentored by Marvin Minsky. So he likely has the kind of access that gives his opinions credibility.
I think it's unlikely that an AI enthusiasts would literally claim "they are building a god," but such an attitude (or something very similar) is implied by their statements and attitudes, e.g.
1. Talk/hope of building something that so exceeds human capability, it's beyond human comprehension and control.
2. Taking existential risks for humanity (by their own statements) to try to get there, against all reason.
3. etc.
I guess they think AI will become smarter than people but I'm not sure that's a god. I've always thought of gods as the dictionary "a supreme being, creator, or a supernatural entity" rather than a souped up chess computer.
That's a marketing page. It sounds like their view is more like "we're building a god, but only we can be trusted to make a good god instead of a devil."
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/11/05/technology/dario-amodei-a...:
> These schools of thought fused for Dr. Amodei into an unyielding conviction that A.I. could be so dangerous that only he and like-minded technologists could be entrusted with building it. That catalyzed his stated efforts to create A.I. before people without concerns about the safety of humanity did, and spurred a desire to control the technology, his friends and colleagues said.
> I guess they think AI will become smarter than people but I'm not sure that's a god. I've always thought of gods as the dictionary "a supreme being, creator, or a supernatural entity" rather than a souped up chess computer.
We'll seeing God as "a supreme being, creator" is only a particular conception of god. IIRC, polytheists often gods as just powerful supernatural entities that are owed deference (because otherwise they might cause you trouble).
> or a supernatural entity" rather than a souped up chess computer
Obviously a AI machine god would fail a "being supernatural" test, but I'm sure the thinking goes that a super-intelligent AI would be so powerful, it's natural-ness wouldn't matter
If you're looking at history for an answer, the end result is somewhere between total destruction and something approaching world domination.
So, not that informative, really.
Anthropic desribes itself as a "public benefit corporation" in its IPO. The irony. Or is it sarcasm?
A god isn't your subordinate. You cannot "program" your wishes into it, like a genie/jinn. They (or their investors) want to make themselves into gods. Over you.