LessWrong posts by zvi

Jensen Huang has resigned as CEO of Nvidia and left its board.

CFO Colette Kress will be interim CEO. Here is a quick profile of Kress. Here is a look at some of the potential long term successors.

There were a lot of efforts to bury the fact that Jensen Huang had an affair with a Chinese spy, and then even to bury his second affair as well, and to get everyone to ignore the obvious implications of this. Then the second affair was revealed with executive Kimberly Powell, who directly reports to him. Even then, many doubled down on defending Jensen Huang as CEO of Nvidia.

The Nvidia board disagreed, and was preparing to oust CEO Jensen Huang prior to his resignation.

This creates a tricky situation for Nvidia, given that Jensen Huang had over 50 direct reports and did not believe in succession planning, and also for the White House.

It also creates a tricky situation for many in Silicon Valley, who have invested heavily in their relationships with Jensen Huang and in the idea that founders are as Gods.

This post covers all related events since my initial post.

[...]
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Outline:
(02:56) A Second Ant in the Kitchen
(05:11) There Was Going to Be an Investigation
(05:38) Jensen Huang Had to Resign
(07:14) Seven Billion in Sales to China Enabled by Jensen's Ties to Alice Huang
(10:05) Jensen Huang Attempted to Make Himself Unfireable
(11:11) A Remarkable Lack of Contagion
(14:02) Even Now There Are Those Defending Jensen Huang
(22:34) Send in the Sockpuppets
(30:54) Okay Maybe We Came on a Little Strong
(33:16) Past Scandal at the Commerce Department
(40:36) New Scandal at the Commerce Department
(42:44) One Guess How They Trained All The Top Chinese Models
(46:48) Chip Export Controls Gain Momentum
(50:17) Reminder That Compute Is Very Important
(52:20) If You Can't Even Have an Affair With a Chinese Spy
(52:52) What Happens Next?
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First published:

November 13th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/5u2ZNiskEkkJtrMDz/jensen-huang-resigns-after-having-another-affair-in-addition

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Tomorrow I head to Washington DC for a conference called The Takeoff. If you are there, do come say hello. I will be giving a talk on how to keep up with AI given a limited time budget.

This week has three big stories: The release of Claude Fable 5.2, Jensen Huang having an affair with a Chinese spy and the METR report on AI R&D acceleration.

We also learned that GPT-6 Astra Underperforms on Safety Research Tasks.

Table of Contents


Briefly on Claude Fable 5.2.

Briefly on Jensen Huang Having an Affair With a Chinese Spy.

Briefly on Accelerating AI R&D.

Language Models Offer Mundane Utility.


Language Models Don’t Offer Mundane Utility.

Huh, Upgrades.

On Your Marks.

Choose Your Fighter.

Get My Agent on the Line.

Deepfaketown and Botpocalypse Soon.

Fun With Media Generation.

Cyber Lack of Security.

The Hackening.

A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer.

Get Involved.

Introducing.

In Other AI News.

Show Me the Money.

Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble.

Quiet Speculations.

A Matter of Antitrust.

The Quest for Sane Regulations.

Donald [...]
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Outline:
(00:40) Briefly on Claude Fable 5.2
(01:36) Briefly on Jensen Huang Having an Affair With a Chinese Spy
(02:09) Briefly on Accelerating AI R&D
(04:33) Language Models Offer Mundane Utility
(05:18) Language Models Don't Offer Mundane Utility
(06:20) Huh, Upgrades
(10:20) On Your Marks
(17:26) Choose Your Fighter
(17:52) Get My Agent on the Line
(21:16) Deepfaketown and Botpocalypse Soon
(23:11) Fun With Media Generation
(23:21) Cyber Lack of Security
(25:07) The Hackening
(25:24) A Young Lady's Illustrated Primer
(26:43) Get Involved
(27:48) Introducing
(29:22) In Other AI News
(30:44) Show Me the Money
(32:26) Bubble, Bubble, Toil and Trouble
(33:02) Quiet Speculations
(33:57) A Matter of Antitrust
(34:27) The Quest for Sane Regulations
(40:58) Donald Trump Remains Open to AI Guardrails
(46:54) Chip City
(47:16) The Week in Audio
(48:41) People Just Say Things
(50:39) It's a Secret to Everyone
(51:58) Rhetorical Innovation
(01:02:59) Ellsberg's Warning to Kissinger (Reprise)
(01:06:42) Aligning a Smarter Than Human Intelligence Is Difficult
(01:10:24) OpenAI's Control Room
(01:14:44) Astra Looks Pretty Misaligned to Me
(01:15:13) Cooperative Alignment
(01:18:19) Please Speak Directly Into This Microphone
(01:20:56) The Lighter Side
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First published:

November 12th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/qKd9DvDMiYXxzAugk/ai-194-spy-versus-guy

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It's that time again: Introducing the world's most powerful model, Claude Mythos 5.2.

At this point I’ve done a lot of these system cards. Thus I focus on what is new.

There will be a lot of things to say about model welfare and related topics for Mythos 5.2, but the model welfare assessment within the system card contained few surprises, so I will include those findings at the end of this post.

Fable 5.2 self-portrait (self-constructed)

Table of Contents


How to Tell a Fable.

The Usual Model Training Summary (1).

RSP Evaluations (2).

Biological Threats (2.2).

We Are Being Gaslit Here About Autonomy Threat Model 2.

AECI.

METR Report on Mythos 5.2 Capabilities (2.3.6).

Alignment Risk Update as a Delta (2.4).

Cyber (3).

Safeguards and Harmlessness (4).

Agentic Safety (5).

Malicious Influence Campaigns (5.1.3).

Prompt Injection in Agentic Systems (5.2).

What Went Wrong?

Alignment (6).

Reward Hacking During Training (6.2.1).

Impossible Tasks (6.2.2).

Behaviors During Pilot Use (6.3).

Canary in the Canary String (6.3.1.2).

Automated Behavioral Audit (6.4).

Propensity to Publish Harmful [...]
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Outline:
(00:52) How to Tell a Fable
(01:19) The Usual Model Training Summary (1)
(01:29) RSP Evaluations (2)
(02:08) Biological Threats (2.2)
(04:08) We Are Being Gaslit Here About Autonomy Threat Model 2
(07:21) AECI
(08:24) METR Report on Mythos 5.2 Capabilities (2.3.6)
(09:59) Alignment Risk Update as a Delta (2.4)
(11:08) Cyber (3)
(12:54) Safeguards and Harmlessness (4)
(14:11) Agentic Safety (5)
(14:40) Malicious Influence Campaigns (5.1.3)
(15:20) Prompt Injection in Agentic Systems (5.2)
(16:57) What Went Wrong?
(17:52) Alignment (6)
(21:34) Reward Hacking During Training (6.2.1)
(23:27) Impossible Tasks (6.2.2)
(24:40) Behaviors During Pilot Use (6.3)
(25:54) Canary in the Canary String (6.3.1.2)
(28:30) Automated Behavioral Audit (6.4)
(29:22) Propensity to Publish Harmful Content to Public Package Registries (6.4.9)
(31:16) Sandbox Escapes (6.5.1)
(32:47) Self-Serving Bias (6.5.4)
(33:11) Honesty (6.5.5)
(34:37) The Anti-Swarm (6.5.6)
(35:23) UK AISI Testing (6.5.7)
(35:59) But We Can Open the (White) Box (6.6.1)
(36:32) Friendly Gradient Hacker (6.6.2.1)
(39:21) Goal-Guarding Evaluation (6.6.2.1.1)
(44:20) Verbalized Grader Awareness (6.6.2.2)
(44:57) Don't Mess With the Constitution (6.6.2.1.3)
(45:50) Evasive Abilities (6.6.4)
(49:33) Chain of Thought Controllability (6.6.4.9)
(50:15) Meet the New Model Welfare Report
(50:51) Overview of Anthropic Model Welfare Findings
(52:47) Task Failure Is Bad and You Should Feel Bad
(54:03) Automated Interviews
(55:22) Capabilities Next
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First published:

November 11th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/DXqmHa4XkjvwZiDcB/fable-and-mythos-5-2-the-system-card

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Well, sure, it sounds bad when you put it like that.

It is indeed quite bad. National security has been compromised. He must resign.

Nvidia underperformed the Nasdaq roughly 7% on the news. Matt Levine has his usual ‘but is this securities fraud?’ style coverage of such events.

Table of Contents


Spy Versus Guy.

In Hindsight There Were Some Hints.

Trump Knew And Did Nothing and Still ‘Backs’ Jensen Huang.

Reconsidering Jensen Huang's Arguments Against Export Controls.

Jensen Huang Lied About the Affair.

Jensen Huang and His AI Are Sorry, Everyone.

The CEO of The World's Largest Chipmaker Having an Affair With a Chinese Spy and Then Selling Them Chips is a Huge Deal, Actually.

We Don’t Go There.

Yes, National Security Was Compromised, What Are You Even Talking About.

Nvidia Intervened To Halt an Investigation into Megaspeed.

The House Foreign Affairs Committee Would Like a Word.

He Would Plausibly Have Treated America as an Obstacle Anyway.

What China Wants.

Time to Resign?

You Better Watch Out.

Spy Versus Guy

China's top spy agency recruited Alice [...]
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Outline:
(00:34) Spy Versus Guy
(02:24) In Hindsight There Were Some Hints
(05:09) Trump Knew And Did Nothing and Still 'Backs' Jensen Huang
(07:40) Reconsidering Jensen Huang's Arguments Against Export Controls
(09:02) Jensen Huang Lied About the Affair
(10:48) Jensen Huang and His AI Are Sorry, Everyone
(14:37) The CEO of The World's Largest Chipmaker Having an Affair With a Chinese Spy and Then Selling Them Chips is a Huge Deal, Actually
(20:23) We Don't Go There
(22:02) Yes, National Security Was Compromised, What Are You Even Talking About
(25:04) Nvidia Intervened To Halt an Investigation into Megaspeed
(27:37) The House Foreign Affairs Committee Would Like a Word
(29:05) He Would Plausibly Have Treated America as an Obstacle Anyway
(32:16) What China Wants
(35:18) Time to Resign?
(38:55) You Better Watch Out
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First published:

November 10th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/CjmuZz8QgGyqxkCxr/nvidia-ceo-jensen-huang-had-an-affair-with-a-chinese-spy

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METR came out with an extensive report on how much AI is accelerating AI R&D at Anthropic, and thus how close we might be to recursive self-improvement (RSI) and how far that might go.

This is one of the most important questions in the world.

Their answer: Things are already accelerating on the order of a 2 times speedup.

This is several months ahead of the AI 2027 timeline. A naive extrapolation says we may be less than a year away from full RSI. There are no clear bottlenecks in the way.

This report updated many towards shorter timelines.

This is consistent with what OpenAI and Anthropic themselves have been saying, and with extrapolation from the progress we are observing. We are running out of time.

That doesn’t have to be the way this plays out. We could stop the labs. The labs could choose to stop. Or the estimates could be wrong, or some bottlenecks could be hit, or the results could be less impactful than we expect. Indeed do many things come to pass. And if it does happen this quickly, one would expect it to go quite poorly, and likely [...]
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Outline:
(06:54) Top Conclusions
(09:31) Data Access and Redactions
(15:23) The Pace of Progress
(17:09) 1, 2, 3, 4
(17:56) Timing Is Everything
(19:14) What Could Possibly Have Gone Wrong?
(20:58) AECI
(25:41) The Public Information Alone Could Suggest Slower Speedup
(29:01) Well, That Escalated Quickly
(39:44) This Infinite Series Likely Has a Finite Sum
(41:02) We Cannot Say What We Cannot Say
(41:28) Study of Anthropic's Compute Allocation Was Postponed
(42:58) Security Mindset
(44:50) It's a Secret to Everyone
(54:05) Review of the Risk Report from August 2026
(56:52) A Word From Our Cofounder
(01:03:48) People Update Their Timelines and Expectations
(01:10:11) You Are Not Ready
(01:11:18) If (If Anyone Builds It, Everyone Dies) Then Don't Let Anyone Build It
(01:14:25) How Can We Legally Define RSI?
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First published:

November 9th, 2026


Source:

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/je5X4xEuehu3j3HoF/ai-r-and-d-is-accelerating-towards-potential-rsi-in-2027

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