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My north star for the future of AI

theatlantic.com

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Re: My north star for the future of AI

#41

Post by BrenBarn »

PradeetPatel wrote: post #18
threeseed wrote: post #16

I wonder if she realises that almost everyone in SV has gone to university and most have attended at least one or two ethics classes during that time. Because ultimately people will be driven by the same thing that drove previous generations: money, power, fame, success, ego etc. And no amount of university lectures with enlightened scientists and their superior values will change that.

The main issue here is that the engineers have failed to communicate how picking the ethical options can create value for key stakeholders. Until that can be achieved, alternative options that generate more value will always be prioritised. Such is only the logical turn of events.

I'd say the main issue is that governments have failed to put in place guardrails that penalize those who pursue monetary value over all else.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#42

Post by hurryer »

__loam wrote: post #9
dirtyhippiefree wrote: post #3

“ Whatever academics like me thought artificial intelligence was, or what it might become, one thing is now undeniable: It is no longer ours to control.” I have no doubt Sam Altman thought he was in control until he was told to go…by humans… Machines think faster than humans. Simple math…

Machines don't think. They do what they're told, nothing more. "Simple man" as they say.

Chemistry doesn't think either, it just reacts according to the formulas.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#43

Post by pharmakom »

swatcoder wrote: post #35
PradeetPatel wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The main issue here is that the engineers have failed to communicate how picking the ethical options can create value for key stakeholders. Until that can be achieved, alternative options that generate more value will always be prioritised. Such is only the logical turn of events.

Yes, the irony is that corporations (and all other collectives) already represent AGI in that they can pass all the same tests and assume all the same roles as any human, when given the same kind of accomodations we give to these technological systems. And we've already let those AGI align themselves predominantly on "profit" In their worry about a new AGI that they may never actually discover, the apocolypts are bei…

Weird definition of intelligence.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#44

Post by swatcoder »

pharmakom wrote: post #43
swatcoder wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the irony is that corporations (and all other collectives) already represent AGI in that they can pass all the same tests and assume all the same roles as any human, when given the same kind of accomodations we give to these technological systems. And we've already let those AGI align themselves predominantly on "profit" In their worry about a new AGI that they may never actually discover, the apocolypts are bei…

Weird definition of intelligence.

That's part of the irony.

That's the definition being used in AI research. Does this system succeed on this test of {reasoning, theory of mind, abstract thinking, ... etc}? Can this system outperform most human workers?

And yes, corporations and other collectives can fully satisfy both criteria for most economically valuable tasks. If you make the same degree of input/output adaptations for them that you do for LLM's, they'll write you articulate letters all day, perform inhuman computations and reasoning tasks, develop and execute grand strategy, control all your robots, ace all your tests, and then write all your code for a tenth of what it would cost with your Bay Area tech bro.

From OpenAI's charter:

> OpenAI’s mission is to ensure that artificial general intelligence (AGI)—by which we mean highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work—benefits all of humanity.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#45

Post by wddkcs »

trees101 wrote: post #39
swatcoder wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the irony is that corporations (and all other collectives) already represent AGI in that they can pass all the same tests and assume all the same roles as any human, when given the same kind of accomodations we give to these technological systems. And we've already let those AGI align themselves predominantly on "profit" In their worry about a new AGI that they may never actually discover, the apocolypts are bei…

this is a perceptive comment. There's a lot of conversation around this, one term used is "Egregore" https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ2h7FYLTwg&t=8m30s https://youtu.be/FY4Fil_nB_c?t=4592

I wonder how long before we're hearing about egregores in common parlance. Corporations are already acknowledged as having freedom of speech in America, that's half way there.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#47

Post by 473944793 »

threeseed wrote: post #16

I wonder if she realises that almost everyone in SV has gone to university and most have attended at least one or two ethics classes during that time. Because ultimately people will be driven by the same thing that drove previous generations: money, power, fame, success, ego etc. And no amount of university lectures with enlightened scientists and their superior values will change that.

The thing I always find strange in these discussions is that they seem to frame people who chase "money, power, fame, success, ego etc." as not acting ethically.

It's interesting I think because all of the above have ethics in my experience. What they don't do is treat their ethics with the same sense of supremism as the vocal activists/advocates who frame everything unaligned with their view critically. And if you show even a little compromise that too gets treated as a lack of ethics in that people will at the very least view it as the money winning out over personal beliefs.

The idea that someone can be legitimately ethical without being an extremist about the matter is largely unacknowledged by the vocal ethicists. But in a way that also makes sense because from their view the silence is probably just more room to criticize in the conversation.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#48

Post by 25213521354 »

robwwilliams wrote: post #14

Beautifully written, heart-and-mind felt, but already reads like a belated plea to bring humanity to computer science, AI research, and big business. All when liberal art universities are losing their liberal arts. One cannot really disagree (I cannot anyway), but what pragmatic actions can one take—-especially after moving from Stanford to Google. Yes, Li has been in and fed the belly of the beast. Now what?

Are liberal arts universities really losing their liberal arts though? The emphasis and core material of a liberal arts education has shifted a bit. But considering how ubiquitous Critical Theory and its components have managed to become in everything from academia to public discourse to institutional policy-setting I don't think it's accurate at all to refer to the liberal arts as in decline. Maybe classical liberal arts but modernized liberal arts are at the heart of most politics right now.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#49

Post by __loam »

peddling-brink wrote: post #19
__loam wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Machines don't think. They do what they're told, nothing more. "Simple man" as they say.

Neither do we. We just do what our neurons tell us to do.

I'm getting pretty tired of the anti-human bullshit on this site.

Re: My north star for the future of AI

#50

Post by pharmakom »

swatcoder wrote: post #44
pharmakom wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird definition of intelligence.

That's part of the irony. That's the definition being used in AI research. Does this system succeed on this test of {reasoning, theory of mind, abstract thinking, ... etc}? Can this system outperform most human workers? And yes, corporations and other collectives can fully satisfy both criteria for most economically valuable tasks. If you make the same degree of input/output adaptations for them that you do for LLM's…

I think the general public understand AGI as a conscious mind that is also intelligent in the AI researcher sense, like what you might see in movie. Lots of hype comes from this terminology gap.
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