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OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

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Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#251

Post by marcyb5st »

sva_ wrote: post #22

Since OpenAI didn't release the parameter count of GPT-4, I've been wondering/doubting if it is really much bigger than GPT-3. The release of GPT-3.5 has shown that they've found ways of drastically cutting down compute costs (an order of magnitude) while maintaining or even improving the quality of the model's outputs. Perhaps the reason that they didn't release the specifics of GPT-4 might be in part due to them wa…

I am not sure how much bigger, but definitely much bigger IMHO. Otherwise you wouldn't be capped at 25 requests every 3h. That number is small enough that makes me think the inference costs/hardware needed are much bigger than 3.5.

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#252

Post by BeefWellington »

lionkor wrote: post #150
ugh123 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>performance on standardized tests? That doesn't necessarily seem like the best metric for what the LLM tries to be. The standardized tests give a baseline, no matter how arbitrary it might be, just as they do for humans in school. Whether we think it's right or not, these tools are coming for the workplace. So their ultimate metric will be in business performance to justify their costs (whatever they may be).

GPT 3.5 had trouble understanding when I told it "Say 2 bob are a beb, how many beb per bob are there?" and it wrote a goddamn essay about shoes. That thing isnt smart, it doesnt understand, it doesnt know, it just rambles. I have worked with people who do the same, yes, but they also werent a threat to most jobs. I said it before, and I will say it again: If ChatGPT 3,4,5,... can take your job, maybe youre not reall…

> I said it before, and I will say it again: If ChatGPT 3,4,5,... can take your job, maybe youre not really providing that much value.

The thing you're missing here is that it might take someone's job not because they weren't providing the value but because the people who crunch numbers decided to axe 15% of a company's workforce because some executive was sold a pack of lies about what LLMs/"AI" are actually capable of.

It's fine if that happens to one company who then finds out the hard way. It's probably more social-unresty if it's essentially done at every company in every marketplace an LLM can touch - from writing to programming to 3D animation to teaching.

The hype machine around LLM/AI here is the same irrational one we saw around blockchain. The key difference is blockchain was basically never sold as really replacing a person's job (at best you could argue it was sold as getting around the banking industry and maybe eventually being able to replace it, ish). The primary sales pitch of these LLMs is essentially "do more with less".

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#253

Post by inquist »

VerminOctopus1 wrote: post #237
nunodonato wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

dude why are you copy and pasting my comments from other threads?

Did they actually plagiarize a comment you’ve made previously?

I searched and didn’t find any identical prior comment

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#254

Post by gwd »

Alifatisk wrote: post #243
gwd wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly reck…

> I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly re…

From their technical report [1]:

> 2.12 Acceleration

> OpenAI has been concerned with how development and deployment of state-of-the-art systems like GPT-4 could affect the broader AI research and development ecosystem.23 One concern of particular importance to OpenAI is the risk of racing dynamics leading to a decline in safety standards, the diffusion of bad norms, and accelerated AI timelines, each of which heighten societal risks associated with AI. We refer to these here as acceleration risk.”24 This was one of the reasons we spent eight months on safety research, risk assessment, and iteration prior to launching GPT-4. In order to specifically better understand acceleration risk from the deployment of GPT-4, we recruited expert forecasters25 to predict how tweaking various features of the GPT-4 deployment (e.g., timing, communication strategy, and method of commercialization) might affect (concrete indicators of) acceleration risk. Forecasters predicted several things would reduce acceleration, including delaying deployment of GPT-4 by a further six months and taking a quieter communications strategy around the GPT-4 deployment (as compared to the GPT-3 deployment). We also learned from recent deployments that the effectiveness of quiet communications strategy in mitigating acceleration risk can be limited, in particular when novel accessible capabilities are concerned.

> We also conducted an evaluation to measure GPT-4’s impact on international stability and to identify the structural factors that intensify AI acceleration. We found that GPT-4’s international impact is most likely to materialize through an increase in demand for competitor products in other countries. Our analysis identified a lengthy list of structural factors that can be accelerants, including government innovation policies, informal state alliances, tacit knowledge transfer between scientists, and existing formal export control agreements.

> Our approach to forecasting acceleration is still experimental and we are working on researching and developing more reliable acceleration estimates.

[1] https://cdn.openai.com/papers/gpt-4.pdf

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#255

Post by paulluuk »

emptysongglass wrote: post #232
gwd wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly reck…

No one discusses the elephant in the room: who elected these elites to decide what was and wasn't ethical and responsible? Nobody. So who ends up making the ethical decisions? A group of highly privileged SV types insulated from the very real problems, concerns, and perspectives of the ordinary person. This is just more of what humans have been doing over millennia: taking power then telling everyone else it was too…

I'm not sure this is entirely fair. Nobody elected the people who inspect nuclear powerplants either, but I still assume that they're doing a good job in protecting humanity. Even if they are possibly "highly priviledged".

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#256

Post by lalos »

gwd wrote: post #197
danpalmer wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And those suggestions would be very in-line with the original purpose of OpenAI. A purpose they are now actively hindering in the name of profit.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly reck…

> Here's one example: GPT-4 was actually done back in August of last year. If their goal was to maximize profit, the obvious thing to do would be to release API access to it as soon as possible.

They did that, that's how Reid Hoffman got early access to write his book, that's how Microsoft got access to start working on Bing/ChatGPT4 for a cool $10 billion and that's how countless of other got early access. Got the money, got the marketing and got the synchronized deployment of multiple use cases by a selected crew of companies and they get to say the corpspeak of 'we care, we didn't release on August!'. This is taken from the Apple iOS SDK book, you make the API changes and release privately to have the announcement and a parade of implementations by third party to prove that it is viable.

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#258

Post by robertlagrant »

anonymousDan wrote: post #214
gwd wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. From everything I've heard and seen, the actual researchers at OpenAI are trying to take seriously the risk that a super-intelligent AI might destroy the human race. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money…

What a bunch of BS. The only reason they are keeping it private is for commercial gain .

I don't really understand this - it's like trying to explain a colleague's behaviour by saying they're doing something so they get their salary.

Of course they need to have commercial gain in mind. But you need to be more specific.

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#259

Post by BurningFrog »

emptysongglass wrote: post #232
gwd wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly reck…

No one discusses the elephant in the room: who elected these elites to decide what was and wasn't ethical and responsible? Nobody. So who ends up making the ethical decisions? A group of highly privileged SV types insulated from the very real problems, concerns, and perspectives of the ordinary person. This is just more of what humans have been doing over millennia: taking power then telling everyone else it was too…

An AI bent on taking over the world would write posts like this.

Re: OpenAI’s policies hinder reproducible research on language models

#260

Post by scotty79 »

emptysongglass wrote: post #232
gwd wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think what most of the people here are missing is how big, how paranoid, and how influential the "AI alignment" movement is. To you it looks like they're being overly careful and paranoid, perhaps as an excuse to set up a monopoly silo to extract money. But a lot of the people the OpenAI researchers work closely with -- people deep in the "AI alignment" community -- are telling them that they're being wantonly reck…

No one discusses the elephant in the room: who elected these elites to decide what was and wasn't ethical and responsible? Nobody. So who ends up making the ethical decisions? A group of highly privileged SV types insulated from the very real problems, concerns, and perspectives of the ordinary person. This is just more of what humans have been doing over millennia: taking power then telling everyone else it was too…

> No one discusses the elephant in the room: who elected these elites to decide what was and wasn't ethical and responsible? Nobody.

I'm a fan of SF. I remember nice quote from Beggers in Spain or maybe one of two subsequent books.

It was something in the spirit of; "Who should control the new technology?" is the wrong question. The correct question is "Who can?".

I think nobody ever truly gets to vote on their technological future or elect it.

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