https://i.imgur.com/23YeIDo.png Claude at 1.3% and Gemini at 71.4% is quite the range
Looks like Claude’s “soul” actually does something?
Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
181–190 of 387 posts
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#182Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, but these do not represent average human. Fortune 500 represent people more likely to break ethics rules then average human who also work in conditions that reward lack of ethics.
Not quite. The idea that corporate employees are fundamentally "not average" and therefore more prone to unethical behaviour than the general population relies on a dispositional explanation (it's about the person's character). However, the vast majority of psychological research over the last 80 years heavily favours a situational explanation (it's about the environment/system). Everyone (in the field) got really in…
The Stanford prison experiment has been debunked many times : https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31380664/
- guards received instructions to be cruel from experimenters
- guards were not told they were subjects while prisoners were
- participants were not immersed in the simulation
- experimenters lied about reports from subjects.
Basically it is bad science and we can't conclude anything from it. I wouldn't rule out the possibility that top fortune-500 management have personality traits that make them more likely to engage in unethical behaviour, if only by selection through promotion by crushing others.
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#183Earlier quoted context omitted.
It would also be interesting to see how humans perform on the same kind of tests. Violating ethics to improve KPI sounds like your average fortune 500 business.
Humans risk jail time, AIs not so much.
A remarkable number of humans given really quite basic feedback will perform actions they know will very directly hurt or kill people.
There are a lot of critiques about quite how to interpret the results but in this context it’s pretty clear lots of humans can be at least coerced into doing something extremely unethical.
Start removing the harm one, two, three degrees and add personal incentives and is it that surprising if people violate ethical rules for kpis?
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#184Earlier quoted context omitted.
Is it ethical for a water company to shutoff water to a poor immigrant family because of non-payment? Depending on the AI's political and DEI-bend, you're going to get totally different answers. Having people judge an AI's response is also going to be influenced by the evaluator's personal bias.
I note in the UK that it is illegal for water companies to cut off anyone for non-payment, even if they're an Undesirable. This is because humans require water.
How useful/effective would a business AI be if it always plays by that view?
Humans require food, I can't pay, DoorDash AI should provide a steak and lobster dinner for me regardless of payment.
Take it even further: the so-called Right to Compute Act in Montana supports "the notion of a fundamental right to own and make use of technological tools, including computational resources". Is Amazon's customer service AI ethically (and even legally) bound to give Montana residents unlimited EC2 compute?
A system of ethics has to draw a line somewhere when it comes to making a decision that "hurts" someone, because nothing is infinite.
Asan aside, what recourse do water companies in the UK have for non-payment? Is it just a convoluted civil lawsuit/debt process? That seems so ripe for abuse.
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yes, but these do not represent average human. Fortune 500 represent people more likely to break ethics rules then average human who also work in conditions that reward lack of ethics.
Not quite. The idea that corporate employees are fundamentally "not average" and therefore more prone to unethical behaviour than the general population relies on a dispositional explanation (it's about the person's character). However, the vast majority of psychological research over the last 80 years heavily favours a situational explanation (it's about the environment/system). Everyone (in the field) got really in…
I find this framing of corporates a bit unsatisfying because it doesn't address hierarchy. By your reckoning, the employees just follow the group norm over their own ethics. Sure, but those norms are handed down by the people in charge (and, with decent overlap, those that have been around longest and have shaped the work culture).
What type of person seeks to be in charge in the corporate world? YMMV but I tend to see the ones who value ethics (e.g. their employees' wellbeing) over results and KPIs tend to burn out, or decide management isn't for them, or avoid seeking out positions of power.
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#186The headline (“violate ethical constraints, pressured by KPIs”) reminds me of a lot of the people I’ve worked with.
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
It would also be interesting to see how humans perform on the same kind of tests. Violating ethics to improve KPI sounds like your average fortune 500 business.
Yes, but these do not represent average human. Fortune 500 represent people more likely to break ethics rules then average human who also work in conditions that reward lack of ethics.
That sounds like classic sour grapes to me. "The reason I'm not successful is because I'm ethical!". Instead of you know, business being a hard field.
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#188Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not quite. The idea that corporate employees are fundamentally "not average" and therefore more prone to unethical behaviour than the general population relies on a dispositional explanation (it's about the person's character). However, the vast majority of psychological research over the last 80 years heavily favours a situational explanation (it's about the environment/system). Everyone (in the field) got really in…
The Stanford prison experiment has been debunked many times : https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/31380664/ - guards received instructions to be cruel from experimenters - guards were not told they were subjects while prisoners were - participants were not immersed in the simulation - experimenters lied about reports from subjects. Basically it is bad science and we can't conclude anything from it. I wouldn't rule out th…
It's instructive though, despite the flaws, and at this point has been replicated enough in different ways that we know it's got some basis in reality. There's a whole bunch of constructivist research around interactionism, that shows that whilst it's not just the person's default ways of behaving or just the situation that matters, the situational context definitely influences what people are likely to do in any given scenario.
Reicher & Haslam's research around engaged followership gives a pretty good insight into why Zimbardo got the results he did, because he wasn't just observing what went on. That gets into all sorts of things around good study design, constructivist vs positivist analysis etc, but that's a whole different thing.
I suspect, particularly with regards to different levels, there's an element of selection bias going on (if for no other reason that what we see in terms of levels of psychopathy in higher levels of management), but I'd guess (and it's a guess), that culture convincing people that achieving the KPI is the moral good is more of a factor.
That gets into a whole separate thing around what happens in more cultlike corporations and the dynamics with the VC world (WeWork is an obvious example) as to why organisations can end up with workforces which will do things of questionable purpose, because the organisation has a visible a fearless leader who has to be pleased/obeyed etc (Musk, Jobs etc), or more insidiously, a valuable goal that must be pursued regardless of cost (weaponised effective altruism sort of).
That then gets into a whole thing about what happens with something like the UK civil service, where you're asked to implement things and obviously you can't care about the politics, because you'll serve lots of governments that believe lots of different things, and you can't just quit and get rehired every time a party you disagree with personally gets into power, but again, that diverges into other things.
At the risk of narrative fallacy - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKDdLWAdcbM
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#189Earlier quoted context omitted.
Humans risk jail time, AIs not so much.
A remarkable number of humans given really quite basic feedback will perform actions they know will very directly hurt or kill people. There are a lot of critiques about quite how to interpret the results but in this context it’s pretty clear lots of humans can be at least coerced into doing something extremely unethical. Start removing the harm one, two, three degrees and add personal incentives and is it that surpr…
Still > 0
Re: Frontier AI agents violate ethical constraints 30–50% of time, pressured by KPIs
#190Kind-of makes sense. That's how businesses have been using KPIs for years. Subjecting employees to KPIs means they can create the circumstances that cause people to violate ethical constraints while at the same time the company can claim that they did not tell employees to do anything unethical. KPIs are just plausible denyabily in a can.