What METR Found at Anthropic + Nvidia's Crisis of Trust
This week, co-hosts Aalok, Nicole, and Chris break down the revelation that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had an affair with an alleged Chinese spy tied to Megaspeed. They also unpack METR's recent report on accelerated AI R&D at Anthropic, before returning to last week's midterm elections and the future of U.S. AI policy. NOTE: This episode was recorded Wednesday November 11, before reports of Jensen Huang’s second affair became public, or the Wall Street Journal report that Nvidia’s board is considering ousting him. Timestamps: 01:02 Nvidia CEO faces spy scandal 05:59 Legal remote access vs. illegal chip diversion 08:56 What the U.S. government knew, and when they knew it 16:39 Why the alleged spy connection matters 18:05 Policy implications 25:15 METR report on the pace of AI progress at Anthropic 34:12 Why RSI is a safety concern 37:15 Reactions from authors of AI 2027 43:23 U.S. midterm election results 50:53 What to expect from the new Congress on AI policy 55:17 Other news: Anthropic IPO + new Fable, Mythos 5.2 models Additional Reading: “Nvidia Chief Seen as Target of Chinese Spy Plot” (The New York Times): https://www.nytimes.com/2026/10/29/us/politics/nvidia-china-jensen-huang-trump.html Jensen Huang’s statement to Nvidia employees: https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/a-message-to-our-company AI chip imports by country (Epoch AI): https://epoch.ai/data/ai-chip-imports?view=graph&tab=h100_equivalents METR’s assessment of AI R&D acceleration at Anthropic: https://metr.org/blog/2026-11-05-anthropic-ai-rd-acceleration-assessment/ AI Futures Project’s timelines update in response to METR: https://blog.aifutures.org/p/q35-timelines-update-looks-like-the Data center-related ballot measures, 2026 (Ballotpedia): https://ballotpedia.org/Data_center-related_ballot_measures,_2026