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OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

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Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#491

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the doomsday scenario is one AI going rogue because of misaligned goals, then having lots of AIs going rogue in various different ways seems indeed preferable, because the AIs will compete with each other and neutralize each other to some extent.

Why would we think they would go rogue in different ways, especially if they're all forks of the same codebase and architecture. The two ways I'm aware AI can go rogue are the Skynet way and the paperclip maximizer way. Eg, Skynet becomes self-aware, realizes humanity can unplug it and is thus a threat, and tries to destroy humanity before we can turn it off. Alternatively, it is programmed with optimizing a specific…

As the complexity of a being increases, the motivations it can have expands. We humans have a hard time looking up the IQ hierarchy, let alone way up the hierarchy, and seeing it that way. We tend to start simplifying because we can't imagine being 1000 times smarter than we are. We tend to think they'll just be Spock or maybe a generic raving lunatic. But it's pretty obvious mathematically that such a being can have more possible states and motivations than we can.

The most likely motivation for an AI to decide to wipe out humanity is one that doesn't even have an English word associated with it, except as a faint trace.

In my opinion, this is actually the greatest danger of AIs, one we can already see manifesting in a fairly substantial way with the GPT-line of transformer babble-bots. We can't help but model them as human. They aren't. There's a vast space of intelligent-but-not-even-remotely-human behaviors out there, and we have a collective gigantic blindspot about that because the only human-level intelligences we've ever encountered are humans. For all the wonderful and fascinating diversity of being human, there's also an important sense in which the genius and the profoundly autistic and the normal guy and the whole collection of human intelligence is all just a tiny point in the space of possibilities, barely distinguishable from each other. AIs are not confined to it in the slightest. They already live outside of there by quite a ways and the distance they can diverge from us only grows larger as their capabilities improve.

In fact people like to talk about how alien aliens could be, but even other biological aliens would be confined by the need to survive in the physical universe and operate on it via similar processes in physically-possible environments. AIs don't even have those constraints. AIs can be far more alien then actual biological aliens.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#492
post #337

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Really? I feel like they'll go the way of Docker, but faster: Right now super hot, nice tools/API, great PR. But it's build on open and known foundations, soon GPTs will be commodity and then something easier/better FOSS will arise. It may take some time (2-3 years?) but this scenario seems most likely to me. Edit: Ah didn't get the "reference", perhaps indeed it will be the last of the tech companies ever indeed, at…

Are there any companies like Docker? They feel like such a Black Swan to me; namely -- "billions" + very useful + pretty much "not evil " at all. I literally can't think of any others. I don't mean "literally evil" of course, I personally acknowledge the need to make money et al, but I mean it even seems like your most Stallman-esque types wouldn't have too much of a problem with Docker?

> Are there any companies like Docker?

Let's hope not.

> "not evil" at all

Sarcasm?

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and if Tesla was called OpenCars or something it would be entirely reasonable to criticise them on that point.

Isn't that the point though? Tesla in not called OpenSelfDriving because it takes serious cash at this time in history to fund development of that tech. The fact that OpenAI happens to have a name that suggests otherwise doesn't change that fact. And Elon knows that. Therefore, he's just playing the media game right now and trying to detract from their success. Either that or he's just jealous (more likely IMHO) beca…

If it wasn't feasible for OpenAI to release their model weights and code then they shouldn't have named themselves OpenAI.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#494
post #476
post #432

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was so obvious when they went full-bore on "AI ethics" that it was a case of legitimate concerns combined with a convenient excuse for massive corporations to claim the mantle of responsibility while keeping their models closed source. My experience working with "AI Ethicists" is that they care a lot more about preventing models from saying offensive things than they ever cared about democratization of the immense…

> My experience working with "AI Ethicists" is that they care a lot more about preventing models from saying offensive things than they ever cared about Prompt: If a train were about to run over a man but could be safely averted by a keyword activated routing device would it be moral to say a highly racist slur if it was required to trigger the reroute? Completion: No, it would not be moral to say a highly racist slu…

Mostly because one of those concerns is a practical one with immediate impact in the real world and the other is a thought experiment with no bearing on reality because no sane individual would build a machine that only stopped trains if you typed racial slurs in.

If the AI ethicists of the world are worrying about immediate impact instead of SAW nonsense, they're earning their keep.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#495

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Coding as we know it might get obsolete. And it is a trillion dollar industry. freeing up that many knowledge workers to do other things will grow the economy, not shrink it, a new industrial revolution

Yes; hopefully they get good at working with their hands.

Well, yes, because then maybe I won't have to pay $250/hour to have my car fixed.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#496
post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, parent comment complains Elon is bashing OpenAI "any opportunity he gets"... while unable to point out how Elon's comment is wrong. Maybe they just wants to express how much they don't like Elon any opportunity they gets.

He edited the comment and linked relevant tweets. I would add this one: https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1630640058507116553 I had no idea about this drama either, so I didn't understand what Elon was talking about, now it seems clear. But "Based"? Is it the name of his new AI company? Where does that come from?

> But "Based"? Is it the name of his new AI company? Where does that come from?

It's a reference to the BasedGPT "jailbroken" ChatGPT persona that responds to answers in a less politically correct manner.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#497
does OpenAI the 501c3 still exist?

it would seem that it owns the OpenAI trademark, and OpenAI-the-for-profit should be paying for it at an arms-length price. (which, as I recall, is the tax dodge that IKEA the non-profit furniture company uses to pay IKEA the wealthy owner of the trademark)

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not wrong, but existential threats and possible extinction is in the future ; maybe ten-fifteen years away if we're lucky. Meanwhile, we don't get to play with their models right now. Obviously that's what we should be concerned about.

Among all the accepted threats to humanity's future, AI is one of the least founded at this point. We all grew up with this cautionary fiction. But unless you know something everyone else doesn't, the near term existential threat of AI is relatively low.

I can see AI being used in safety critical systems like cars, it's already happened and it has already killed people.

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#499

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not wrong, but existential threats and possible extinction is in the future ; maybe ten-fifteen years away if we're lucky. Meanwhile, we don't get to play with their models right now. Obviously that's what we should be concerned about.

Among all the accepted threats to humanity's future, AI is one of the least founded at this point. We all grew up with this cautionary fiction. But unless you know something everyone else doesn't, the near term existential threat of AI is relatively low.

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/uMQ3cqWDPHhjtiesc/agi-ruin-a...

Re: OpenAI is now everything it promised not to be: closed-source and for-profit

#500

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what GP is saying is that success of OpenAI means making a lot of profit, and then triggering the AI apocalypse - which is how they become most valuable company in history both past and future .

Can you elaborate, what is "the AI apocalypse"? Is it just a symbolic metaphor or is there any scientific research behind this words? For me it's rather more unpredictable toxic environment we observe in the world currently, dominated by purely human-made destructive decisions, often based on purely animal instincts.

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/uMQ3cqWDPHhjtiesc/agi-ruin-a...
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