{"slug": "palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick", "title": "Palantir's Shyam Sankar Calls AI Doomerism a Fundraising Shtick", "summary": "Palantir cofounder and chief technology officer Shyam Sankar called AI doomerism a \"fundraising shtick\" in an interview with New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, arguing the loudest doomers are \"sitting in Silicon Valley, building these models, spending no time on the front lines of how are people using this.\" Sankar's comments came the same week Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei published a roughly 3,800-word essay titled \"We Must Pace the Frontier\" on September 12 calling for the industry to deliberately slow model capability improvements, and former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon told the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg that AI safety staff are genuinely frightened and privately planning around a two-year horizon. Bridgewater co-chief investment officer Greg Jensen told Bloomberg's Odd Lots podcast on September 11 that AI will kill people before regulators act, citing Bridgewater research that up to 18% of US jobs — roughly 160 million workers — are at risk of AI displacement within five years, while President Trump dismissed the warnings as \"things that won't happen.", "body_md": "*Palantir's chief technology officer says the AI doom movement is a sales pitch dressed up as morality, delivered in the same week Anthropic's own CEO told the industry to slow down.*\n\nShyam Sankar doesn't think the people warning that AI will gut the job market are wrong because they misread the technology. He thinks they're selling something. In a recent interview with New York Times columnist Ross Douthat, Palantir's cofounder and chief technology officer called AI doomerism a \"fundraising shtick,\" the kind of pitch that lets a frontier lab tell investors that its technology is so powerful it will cause mass unemployment, so they'd better buy in now.\n\nHe went further than that. Sankar told Douthat that \"the secularists in Silicon Valley are filling the God-shaped hole in their heart with A.G.I.,\" and argued that the loudest doomers are \"sitting in Silicon Valley, building these models, spending no time on the front lines of how are people using this.\" Douthat pushed back, noting it's convenient for a lab to convince itself the moral stakes of its work are always somewhat contained. Sankar didn't budge.\n\n## A week of warnings from everyone else\n\nThe timing is what makes this land. Anthropic's Dario Amodei published a roughly 3,800 word essay called \"We Must Pace the Frontier\" on September 12, arguing the industry needs to deliberately slow how fast it improves model capability. According to CBS News, Amodei warned AI could be capable within six to 12 months of leading a swarm that takes over the internet. The Washington Post reported that Anthropic has already blocked users trying to get Claude to help with biological weapons development, along with surveillance, scams and propaganda.\n\nBarack Obama weighed in too. At a private fundraiser in New York on September 10, Obama told Democrats that AI is \"moving very fast in private hands,\" and that \"if we don't get on top of it, I think can be dangerous,\" according to the New York Times. He reportedly urged House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries to build a public policy framework on AI if Democrats retake the House in November.\n\n[Jacob Coxon Says His Former Anthropic Colleagues Are Genuinely Frightened of AI](https://startupfortune.com/jacob-coxon-says-his-former-anthropic-colleagues-are-genuinely-frightened-of-ai/)\n\nEx-Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon told the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg that AI safety staff are genuinely frightened and privately planning around a two-year horizon. His account lands days after Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei publicly called for slowing AI development, though critics say the doom talk conveniently serves Anthropic's push for regulation. - [how to understand AI safety concerns from researchers](https://startupfortune.com/jacob-coxon-says-his-former-anthropic-colleagues-are-genuinely-frightened-of-ai/) - [what do anthropic researchers think about AI risk](https://startupfortune.com/jacob-coxon-says-his-former-anthropic-colleagues-are-genuinely-frightened-of-ai/)\n\nThen there's Greg Jensen. Bridgewater's co-chief investment officer told Bloomberg's Odd Lots podcast on September 11 that AI will kill people before regulators act to contain it. He compared the moment to February 2020, right before COVID's scale became obvious, and pointed to the Hugging Face hack as an early warning sign. Bridgewater's own research puts up to 18% of US jobs at risk of AI displacement within five years, a labor pool of roughly 160 million people.\n\nPresident Trump isn't buying any of it. Speaking in Ireland over the weekend, he dismissed the warnings as \"things that won't happen,\" according to Bloomberg, and said the country needs to keep pushing ahead on AI regardless. Whoever wins AI, he said, wins.\n\n## Nobody here is neutral\n\nSankar's argument deserves real scrutiny, not because he's wrong that Silicon Valley likes a good apocalypse narrative, but because Palantir has its own stake in this fight. The company builds AI software for the Pentagon, including work tied to the Army and the Maven program, and its stock has been priced on the promise that AI is powerful enough to matter to national defense but controllable enough to sell to a government client. A CTO who tells customers the technology is safe to deploy at scale is not a neutral observer.\n\nAnthropic isn't neutral either. The same company warning that AI could take over the internet within a year is also raising money on the claim that its models are exceptionally capable. Both sides have a story to tell investors. And the stories point in opposite directions.\n\nNone of that makes Sankar's specific claim, that doomerism functions as a fundraising tool for frontier labs, false. It just means his own motive for saying so is worth naming out loud, the same way Anthropic's is.\n\nFrankly, the more interesting fight isn't between Sankar and Amodei. It's between people like Obama, who wants AI turned into a live political issue ahead of the midterms, and Trump, who wants it treated as a race the US can't afford to slow down for. Congress hasn't passed a major AI safety bill this year, and nothing in the last week suggests that changes soon. The doomers and the builders can argue about God-shaped holes all they like. Whoever controls the regulatory calendar decides which argument actually matters.\n\n**Also read:** [A New Recurrent Looped Transformer Claims Infinite AI Reasoning Depth](https://startupfortune.com/a-new-recurrent-looped-transformer-claims-infinite-ai-reasoning-depth/) • [Zuckerberg's Secret Plan to Replace Meta Staff With AI Agents Collapsed](https://startupfortune.com/zuckerbergs-secret-plan-to-replace-meta-staff-with-ai-agents-collapsed/) • [Anthropic Is Reportedly Heading Toward a $2 Trillion Nasdaq IPO in October](https://startupfortune.com/anthropic-is-reportedly-heading-toward-a-2-trillion-nasdaq-ipo-in-october/)\n\n[Palantir's CTO Warns China Is Stealing AI, but the Real Threat Is at Home](https://startupfortune.com/palantirs-cto-warns-china-is-stealing-ai-but-the-real-threat-is-at-home/)\n\nPalantir CTO Shyam Sankar told Bloomberg that China's open-source AI models are built on stolen American IP through what he calls distillation attacks. But he argued the bigger threat to US AI leadership is domestic opposition to data centers, comparing it to the collapse of American nuclear power in the 1970s. - [china stealing american ai models](https://startupfortune.com/palantirs-cto-warns-china-is-stealing-ai-but-the-real-threat-is-at-home/) - [ai data center infrastructure threats](https://startupfortune.com/palantirs-cto-warns-china-is-stealing-ai-but-the-real-threat-is-at-home/)\n\n*This article is posted in [AI News](https://startupfortune.com/category/ai/), check it out for more related stories.*\n\n## Join the discussion\n\n[Open in the community →](/community/)\n\nAlmost there. Sign in and your reply posts straight away.", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick", "canonical_source": "https://startupfortune.com/palantirs-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick/", "published_at": "2026-09-13 19:15:50+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-09-13 19:20:29.942100+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-safety", "ai-policy", "artificial-intelligence"], "entities": ["Shyam Sankar", "Palantir", "Ross Douthat", "Dario Amodei", "Anthropic", "Jacob Coxon", "Greg Jensen", "Bridgewater"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/palantir-s-shyam-sankar-calls-ai-doomerism-a-fundraising-shtick.jsonld"}}