“AI speeds up 3rd party safety researchers by ~1.6x (via self-reports)” by Angel Martinez, Dewi Gould, nicole x, Alejandro Aristizabal

LessWrong (30+ Karma) · Oct 27, 2026 · 15m

TL;DR: Labs are accelerating due to automated AI research and development. As an upper bound, in March 2026, Anthropic researchers self-reported producing 4 times more output with AI tools than without them.

We lack public evidence on how this may differentially impact safety versus capabilities. As a first measurement of automated safety-specific research uplift, we surveyed 52 third-party AI safety professionals from 20+ orgs and found a median reported speedup of 1.58 x.

We think it is important to develop standardized methods for tracking safety-specific uplift, as these will facilitate a…