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Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

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Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#911

Post by jacquesm »

MacsHeadroom wrote: post #903
jacquesm wrote: post #648

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think the difference here is that I am fine with your belief that this is what a competent board should have, but I don't think this opinion is the same as actually establishing a legal duty. I don't think we'll be able to hash this out simply because too many of the pieces are missing. But if the board didn't have those items handy and they end up being incompetent then that by itself may end up as enough ground…

It's pretty standard to get DAO insurance which covers errors, omissions, and negligence, as a board member. At any rate, we don't know that the board doesn't have those minutes. I see no reason to assume they've failed duty of care. And being a non-profit does, in fact, give the board sole right to so much as dissolve the entire company and donate the proceeds to Anthropic if they decide in five minute zoom call, of…

DAO insurance doesn't cover malice and purposeful destruction.

If the minutes exist I'm sure they'll be leaked, if they don't they're in trouble. ANd if you don't see any reason to assume they've failed their duty of care that is fine by me but I think the last few days alone pretty much confirm that they did not.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#912

Post by gigglesupstairs »

mrandish wrote: post #503
neilv wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given 90%, including leadership, seems a bad career move for remaining people not to sign, even if you agreed with the board's action.

I'm waiting for Emmett Shear, the new iCEO the outside board hired last night, to try to sign the employee letter. That MSFT signing bonus might be pretty sweet! :-)

Haha that would be cute. This whole affair is so Sorkinist.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#913

Post by clnq »

rmeby wrote: post #332
clnq wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is this your opinion or is this something that’s an actual theory in sociology or psychology, or at least something people talk about in practice? Not trying to be mean, just to learn. There’s a whole genre of press releases and videos for apologies, so I’m not sure it’s such a reputational risk to admit one is wrong. It might be a bigger risk not to, it would seem. But what you say sounds interesting.

I would be interested too if that's an actual theory. My experience has largely been that if you're willing to admit you were wrong about something, most reasonable people will appreciate it over you doubling down. If they pile on after you have conceded, typically they come off much worse socially in my opinion.

> If they pile on after you have conceded, typically they come off much worse socially in my opinion.

Those who are obsessed with their reputation above morality have usually had a lot of practice punching down, and they don't really look as bad as someone being dunked on who gets confused.

I think this is like a cornerstone of bullying. It seems to work in social situations. I'm sure everyone reading this comment can picture it.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#914

Post by komali2 »

busterarm wrote: post #894
komali2 wrote: post #892

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you want to deter military action involving your country, contributing to its defense is probably the best thing that you can do. Given that Google is an American company, do you believe contributing to the American Department of "Defense" increases, or decreases, the amount of military action involving the USA? The American military isn't called "world police" for nothing, and just like the cops they're stickin…

We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there, despite us being the dominant military around the world. As does France, who has been a leading military power for longer than we have. That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there. I think the planet has relativ…

> If you're the type of person who thinks we should just give up this position by not adequately defending it through military and technology investment, I would prefer that you just expatriate yourself now rather than let some other ascendant nation dictate our future and our quality of life.

But I thought you said if we want to fix something we should do so from within the system? I'm interested in ending American imperialism, by your logic isn't the best place to do so from within the USA?

> We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there

From which nation state do you feel an existential threat? I haven't heard "they defend our freedoms" in a very, very long time, and I thought we all knew it was ironic.

> I think the planet has relatively finite resources

I'm curious about this viewpoint, because it seems to necessarily imply that the human race will simply die out when those resources (and those of the surrounding solar system) are exhausted. Is sustainability just, not a concept in this worldview?

> That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there.

It seems in the case of the USA, the "functional defense" is more often used to destabilize other nations, and arm terrorists that then turn around and attack the USA. It's really interesting you brought up Palestinian liberation as an example, because really one of the only reasons Israel is able to maintain its apartheid state and repression of the Palestinians is because of USA aid. In your understanding, both the Israelis and the Palestinians should arm up and up and up until they're both pointing nukes at eachother, correct? That's the only pathway to peace?

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#915

Post by lolinder »

evantbyrne wrote: post #687
loandbehold wrote: post #609

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What should he do, release a statement "The allegations are not true, my sister is mentally ill"? What would be the point? It will just attract yellow press.

He wouldn't want to attract attention to it regardless of whether he is guilty of innocent. What is a disappointing moral failure though is that employees and especially the board didn't demand such. Who the heck wants to work next to someone where it is an unaddressed question of whether they did such a thing?

Let's say the employees do the thing you consider to be ethical and demand an accounting, and Altman gets up and says "it's false, it never happened."

What then? Has anything really changed? I would expect him to say the same thing regardless of its truth, so it seems to me we have no additional information: she still says it happened, the rest of the family says she's delusional, and he (obviously) says he's innocent.

Are your hypothetical morally-concerned employees satisfied now? If so, why?

If they're not satisfied, how does this not create an environment where the only thing you have to do to destroy a company is pay a {sibling, cousin, neighbor, ex-lover, etc} to claim something damaging about its CEO?

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#916

Post by throw10920 »

tarruda wrote: post #71
seydor wrote: post #3

That s a great twist in the writer's storyline. Board quits, Altman + Brockman returns to openAI, shamed Sutskever defects to microsoft where he leads the AI division in a lifelong quest to take revenge for this humiliation.

He humiliated himself when succumbed to pressure and tweeted that apology.

What? Apologies are good. They signal regret. They're far superior to not apologizing. And they're not a form of "humiliation" until evil people attempt to humiliate those doing the apology.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#917

Post by evantbyrne »

lolinder wrote: post #915
evantbyrne wrote: post #687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wouldn't want to attract attention to it regardless of whether he is guilty of innocent. What is a disappointing moral failure though is that employees and especially the board didn't demand such. Who the heck wants to work next to someone where it is an unaddressed question of whether they did such a thing?

Let's say the employees do the thing you consider to be ethical and demand an accounting, and Altman gets up and says "it's false, it never happened." What then? Has anything really changed? I would expect him to say the same thing regardless of its truth, so it seems to me we have no additional information: she still says it happened, the rest of the family says she's delusional, and he (obviously) says he's innocen…

You're supposed to do an actual investigation, not just ask one party's opinion and call it a day. C'mon we're talking about his sister making this accusation not some rando gold digger I don't need to justify that some due diligence is in order. Innocent until proven guilty only works when allegations are investigated–otherwise everyone is always "innocent" because you have just chosen not to look.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#918

Post by Obscurity4340 »

marjipan200 wrote: post #897
Obscurity4340 wrote: post #890

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the problem I have when there's so many saying "no we need to wait, wait, wait, what about safety"...people are dying and in horrible states now. This needs to be available, at least the functionality that allows it to engage with you in a therapeutic context. To the extent they try to prevent or block everyone from having access to this kind of profound outlet/tool/conversation partner, I consider it a great…

That's why there's an Ollama option ;)

Also: thanks, Ollama ;)

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#919

Post by xvector »

evantbyrne wrote: post #878
xvector wrote: post #846

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't need to be a physician to tell when someone is clearly mentally ill and/or making stuff up.

It must be an incredible burden always knowing the truth, when other people actually have to do investigations for that.

When someone has a giant gaping wound you don't need an expert to understand what it is.

Some forms of mental illness display themselves nearly as clearly and obviously as a giant gaping wound.

Re: Sam Altman is still trying to return as OpenAI CEO

#920

Post by lolinder »

evantbyrne wrote: post #917
lolinder wrote: post #915

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's say the employees do the thing you consider to be ethical and demand an accounting, and Altman gets up and says "it's false, it never happened." What then? Has anything really changed? I would expect him to say the same thing regardless of its truth, so it seems to me we have no additional information: she still says it happened, the rest of the family says she's delusional, and he (obviously) says he's innocen…

You're supposed to do an actual investigation, not just ask one party's opinion and call it a day. C'mon we're talking about his sister making this accusation not some rando gold digger I don't need to justify that some due diligence is in order. Innocent until proven guilty only works when allegations are investigated–otherwise everyone is always "innocent" because you have just chosen not to look.

Now you're moving the goalposts. Until now you've been demanding that "leaders address salacious allegations brought against them by their own family" and that they "at least produce a public statement". What you're now demanding is the purview of the law, not the board.

If her allegations are true, he should face the consequences, but they should come first through the system that is specifically designed for testing the truth of allegations that are this serious. OpenAI is under no obligation to launch an investigation themselves in response to an indictment-by-Twitter-mob.

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