<\/p>\n Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers quickly shut it down, reminding Musk\u2019s attorney, Steven Molo, to stay focused on the issue at trial, delivering a withering rebuttal:<\/p>\n Article continues below <\/p>\n You may like<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s ironic your client, despite these risks, is creating a company that is in the exact space,\u201d Rogers said. \u201cThere are some people who do not want to put the future of humanity in Mr Musk\u2019s hands. But we\u2019re not going to get into that business.\u201d<\/p>\n The Musk vs Altman feud<\/p>\n The Musk vs OpenAI trial is the latest chapter in a feud between rival CEOs Musk and Altman that has been building for years. Much of it has played out through public comments and online jabs, but it has now escalated into a month-long federal court case in California.<\/p>\n At the heart of Musk\u2019s claim is the allegation that OpenAI \u2014 the company he co-founded in 2015 \u2014 drifted away from its original non-profit mission. He argues that Altman betrayed public trust by turning the organization into a profit-driven company.<\/p>\n Musk has also named OpenAI president Greg Brockman and Microsoft<\/a> as part of the case, claiming they played a role in the company\u2019s shift toward commercialization \u2014 allegations Microsoft denies.<\/p>\n The judge is right, of course. This case isn\u2019t about whether AI should exist. It\u2019s about the future direction of OpenAI. A Musk victory could trigger a major shake-up at the company and potentially even lead to Altman\u2019s removal as CEO.<\/p>\n But the fact that extinction came up at all points to the real story here \u2014 whether AI could pose an existential threat to humanity.<\/p>\n An old debate<\/p>\n The technology being debated in abstract terms is already here, embedded in tools like ChatGPT and rapidly spreading into everyday life. The people at the center of the case are the same figures shaping the future of AI itself, and moments like this week\u2019s courtroom exchange point to unresolved issues beyond a corporate battle.<\/p>\n What to read next<\/p>\n Even as AI becomes more embedded in everyday products, there is still no consensus among its creators about how risky it really is<\/a>. Some frame it as a transformative tool that will improve productivity, creativity, and access to information. Others continue to warn, sometimes in uncompromising terms, about long-term dangers that are harder to define, let alone regulate.<\/p>\n The same companies racing to roll out smarter, faster AI tools are also, at times, the ones raising concerns about where that race could lead<\/a>. That tension is not new \u2014 but it is rarely expressed this directly, and almost never in a legal setting like this.<\/p>\n The trial is expected to run for several weeks, with billions of dollars and the future structure of OpenAI on the line. But it also captures the central contradiction of the AI era right now: the people building the technology are still debating how dangerous it might be \u2014 even as they continue to build it at speed.<\/p>\n \n Follow TechRadar on Google News<\/a> and add us as a preferred source<\/a> to get our expert news, reviews, and opinion in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button!<\/p>\n The best business laptops for all budgets<\/p>\n Our top picks, based on real-world testing and comparisons<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Elon Musk and Sam Altman\u2019s trial veered into AI extinction debate The judge shut down claims AI could…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":562090,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[554,733,4308,86,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-562089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-technology","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=562089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/562089\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/562090"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=562089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=562089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=562089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Google](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/diM9tpwF2Lz85R8q85CT78.jpg\")
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