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Introducing OpenAI

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Re: Introducing OpenAI

#231

Post by eli_gottlieb »

djokkataja wrote: post #189
vonnik wrote: post #150

> Musk: I think the best defense against the misuse of AI is to empower as many people as possible to have AI. If everyone has AI powers, then there’s not any one person or a small set of individuals who can have AI superpower. In a sense, we have no other defense. AI is just math and code, and I know of no way to distinguish good linear algebra from evil linear algebra. The barriers to putting that math and code tog…

> But if I adopt Elon's caution toward the technology, then I'm not sure if I agree with his reasoning. If he believes in the potential harm of AI, then supporting its widespread use doesn't seem logical. If you take the quote above, and substitute the word "guns" for "AI", you basically have the NRA, and the NRA is not making the world a safer place. They aren't interchangeable concepts, though: guns can only be use…

>Figuring out how to make neural networks work at human-comparable levels for tasks like machine vision was the hardest part IMO. Once you have that, if you break down how the brain would have to work (or could work) to perform various functions and limit yourself to using neural networks as building blocks, it's not that difficult to come up with a synthetic architecture that performs all of the same functions, provided you steer clear of magical thinking

Actually, you need a number of things other than neural networks, but... nevermind, everyone here is clearly fixated on pro-Musk-Bostrom-bloc vs anti rather than on the science.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#232

Post by [deleted] »

jmatthews wrote: post #127
orthoganol wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In terms of artificial general intelligence, the kind of stuff that gets associated with 'the singularity' etc. - I agree - there is seemingly nothing at all out there that appears to even be on a trajectory, I mean even theoretically, to coming close. But sure, for more narrow specializations, disrupting certain industries, there is a lot that could be advanced on a short time scale. I don't think the big breakthrou…

That's the thing. It's not necessarily about an evolution. If I "accidentally" make a break though right now. The AI could evolve into a super intelligence before dinner time. Simply stated, an AI that writes AI.(Forget the halting problem for a moment) How many iterations can it create in 3 hours?

[deleted]

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#233

Post by eli_gottlieb »

skndr wrote: post #181
argonaut wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Improvements in AI aren't linear, though This is a point everyone makes, but it hasn't been proven anywhere. Progress in AI as a field has always been a cycle of hype and cool-down. Edit (reply to below). Talk about self-bootstrapping AIs, etc. is just speculation.

Sure, though you can't extrapolate future technological improvements from past performance (that's what makes investing in tech difficult). Just as one discovery enables many, human-level AI that can do its own AI research could superlinearly bootstrap its intelligence. AI safety addresses the risk of bootstrapped superintelligence indifferent to humans.

>Just as one discovery enables many, human-level AI that can do its own AI research could superlinearly bootstrap its intelligence.

Of course, that assumes the return-on-investment curve for "bootstrapping its own intelligence" is linear or superlinear. If it's logarithmic or something other than "intelligence" (which is a word loaded with magical thinking if there ever was one!) is the limiting factor on reasoning, no go.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#234

Post by Fricken »

argonaut wrote: post #228
Fricken wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With a powerful enough computer the learning curve of a simulated baby could hypothetically be condensed to minutes, or seconds. Which would appear to us in normal time to be an intelligence explosion.

The simulated baby would extremely tax to the limit the entire resources of whatever supercomputer trained it. People have to run deep learning programs on multiple GPUs right now, and performance is constrained by memory bandwidth, which does not follow Moore's law.

It's a hypothetical, not expected to happen in conventional supercomputers with the current state of machine learning.

Imagine a massively parallel optical computer with the same transistor density as the human brain, the size of an olympic swimming pool running at the speed of light, and networked with 1000s of other similar computers around the world.

Foomp, superintelligence, you won't even be able to pinpoint the source.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#235

Post by p1esk »

efng wrote: post #223
p1esk wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed his point. People are the problem, not computers. Computers can help people hurt other people, just like guns help people hurt other people. But instead the hype is about the possibility of computers hurting people, on their own. Which, at least at this point, is about as alarming as the possibility that a gun will go off on its own.

And I think that you and the great-grandparent missed the point: It's not people, it's sentience that is dangerous. Since the dawn of time that meant man or gods. Soon that list will need to include computers.

Until that "soon" arrives, there's a far greater chance that people will wipe out humanity. We have more suicidal terrorists today than ever in history.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#236

Post by jfoutz »

mindcrime wrote: post #168
vonnik wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're focused on weapons of mass destruction, I prefer a world of nuclear nonproliferation to the opposite. There are relatively few nations that possess nuclear weapons, and we have very few instances of them using those weapons against anyone else. To argue against myself, I'd say that the difference between weapons and AI is that AI is more general. It's not just a killing machine. In fact, I hope that killing…

If we're focused on weapons of mass destruction, I prefer a world of nuclear nonproliferation to the opposite So do I generally speaking, but with a caveat... I think that having multiple (eg, more than 1 or 2) nuclear powers is likely a Good Thing (given that the tech exists at all). The whole MAD principle seems very likely to be one reason the world has yet to descend into nuclear war. The main reason I prefer nuc…

I actually prefer japan's approach. They know exactly how to build nukes. They don't have any on hand. If they're backed into a corner, they'll produce as many as they feel they need.

Unfortunately during the cold war, neither side could really rely on the other to just chill out for a couple of days. So now we can deliver hundreds (thousands?) anywhere in the world in about 45 minutes.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#237

Post by zxcvvcxz »

pratnala wrote: post #206
zxcvvcxz wrote: post #196

Man I dunno about some of this media hype surrounding the topic of AI. I understand how powerful ML/AI algorithms are for general pattern matching (with a big enough computer, gradient descent can learn a lot of things...), but this whole skynet/doomsday fear thing seems ridiculous. I guess the risk is embedding into systems that manage missiles or something. But you don't need sophisticated algorithms for that to be…

I like how your comment goes from no issues to alarmist.

"Stream of consciousness writing" or whatever it's called =)

I don't consider the two viewpoints expressed to be contraditory.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#238

Post by argonaut »

Fricken wrote: post #234
argonaut wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The simulated baby would extremely tax to the limit the entire resources of whatever supercomputer trained it. People have to run deep learning programs on multiple GPUs right now, and performance is constrained by memory bandwidth, which does not follow Moore's law.

It's a hypothetical, not expected to happen in conventional supercomputers with the current state of machine learning. Imagine a massively parallel optical computer with the same transistor density as the human brain, the size of an olympic swimming pool running at the speed of light, and networked with 1000s of other similar computers around the world. Foomp, superintelligence, you won't even be able to pinpoint the…

Sure, but you would get the baby situation I posited years before what you're envisioning. You're skipping a bunch of steps. My hypotheticals (if they ever do happen) would occur way before your hypotheticals. Progress does not go in "Foomp" steps.

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#239

Post by pkinsky »

ryanx435 wrote: post #117
minimaxir wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While a great short story and should be required reading for sci-fi fans, there's a big difference between the singularity and omnipotence.

no there isn't, if you include time. lets say that a general AI is developed and brought online (the singularity occurs). Lets also say that it has access to the internet so it can communicate and learn, and lets also say that it has unlimited amount of storage space (every harddrive in every device connected to the internet). at first the AI will know nothing, it will be like a toddler. than, as it continues to lear…

Or maybe the AI would fracture into warring components after every network partition. Maybe it would be unable to maintain cohesion over large areas due to the delay imposed by the speed of electrical communications.

Why should one hypothetical be assumed true and not the other?

Re: Introducing OpenAI

#240

Post by colordrops »

tim333 wrote: post #176
colordrops wrote: post #171

This reminds me a bit of all the hype around space elevators several years ago. People were talking about it like it was an inevitable achievement in the near future, nearly oblivious to the huge challenges and unsolved problems necessary to make it happen. I haven't seen anything but very rudimentary single-domain problems solved that point to incremental improvement, so I'm wondering if these billionaire investors…

AI has been progressing in a fairly predictable way as computers get faster and gradually ticking off milestones like beating us and chess and driving cars with less crashes. There are only a finite number of such skill areas to tick off.

Finite maybe, but there are still innumerable skills to "tick off". And different problems are of differing difficulty to solve. We also do not even know what the problems are, considering that we don't have a full understanding of consciousness and how it arises. How are we so sure that we can solve a problem quickly if we don't even know what the problem is?
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