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Now this is alarming: "According a recent AI Working Group internal email obtained by FedScoop, the AI tool is expected to be used for many day to day tasks an

Now this is alarming: "According a recent AI Working Group internal email obtained by FedScoop, the AI tool is expected to be used for many day to day tasks and key responsibilities within congressional offices such as: generating constituent response drafts and press documents; summarizing large amounts of text in speeches; drafting policy papers or even bills; creating new logos or graphical element for branded office resources and more." While generating press documents, summarizing speeches, and creating logos seem all reasonable innocent tasks, "drafting policy papers or even bills" is not exactly something that should be outsourced to a garbage-generating machine...

meltyness 4y ago
An easily-verifiable garbage-generation resource!
- jruohonen 4y ago
  Against which would you verify when the goal of policy documents and bills is to create something new (and even the references to old things are unavailable, inaccurate, or even invented)? Another thing is that the Congress (like any governmental body in any country) presumably has huge databases of digitalized documents that could be used to train a custom LLM better suited for these tasks.
  - meltyness 4y ago
    That it meets an intent. "Take 3 hours of floor arguments and committee testimony, and identify compromises."
Pilottwave 4y ago
Calling cutting edge-models consumer facing models like ChatGPT-4 garbage generating machines is very intellectually dishonest. These models are fully capable of drafting these kinds of texts, esp. when qualified staff is guiding the model.
- PartiallyTyped 4y ago
  Guiding and finalizing / correcting.
- MaxMatti 4y ago
  As long as they actually look at it which I don't expect them to, especially after revision 15 of a multi-page document.
- dmreedy 4y ago
  They may not generate garbage per se, but they do generate bullshit. Or if you want to put it more positively, they are consummate improvisers. The amount of guidance they require cannot be understated, since while they demonstrate phenomenal capacity for production of language, and understanding of language, they do not yet demonstrate much in the way of capacity for control or alignment. A technology can be both wildly powerful, mindblowingly cool, and deeply imperfect. I don't believe it's intellectually dishonest to emphasize the latter when it comes to impact against the human beings on the other end of the barrel. Especially when the technology starts to break out of the communities that already understand it (and its limitations).
  - spenczar5 4y ago
    > They may not generate garbage per se, but they do generate bullshit. Or if you want to put it more positively, they are consummate improvisers. The amount of guidance they require cannot be understated, since while they demonstrate phenomenal capacity for production of language, and understanding of language, they do not yet demonstrate much in the way of capacity for control or alignment. I truly can’t tell whether you are describing the US Congress or LLMs.
    - dmreedy 4y ago
      I can't deny that the similarities are strong enough that it weakens some of the philosophical underpinnings of the argument. But I am also wondering these days whether we are all just LLMs at the core of it.
- 4y ago
badcppdev 4y ago
Just what you need. A AI hallucinating some reply to a constituent and then that eventually becoming official or somehow becoming law.
- sidewndr46 4y ago
  What happens when a Congress member uses Chat GPT to draft a public statement and it accidentally includes their resignation? Will we suddenly find that AI is a danger to society and must be regulated?
  - akiselev 4y ago
    Nothing happens, except everyone on the Hill will ridicule the politician and his staff. To resign Congress members have to actually send a letter to the governor of the state they represent. Most unilateral actions in government require some sort of formal document addressed to the relevant authority.
sesteel 4y ago
When I see statements like "garbage-generating machine", I immediately think that the person making such a statement may not be aware of the capabilities of GPT-4.
- ionwake 4y ago
  Conversely , I disagree and think garbage generating machine is funny and on point in this serious context. Just for the record I love chatgpt but don’t tell me it also doesn’t produce garbage as per OP.
  - throwawayadvsec 4y ago
    yeah just like most humans produce garbage all the time I wouldn't call a tool that is more capable and knowledgeable than the average human to be a garbage generating machine
    - smeagull 4y ago
      I wouldn't either. But I would still call GPT-4 a garbage generating machine.
      - throwawayadvsec 4y ago
        I'm actually arguing that GPT-4 is more knowledgeable and capable than the average human, and I insist on the word average.
        ionwake 4y ago
        So are we - literally who are you arguing with? Read my comment slowly I’m not saying it only produces garbage.
- smeagull 4y ago
  Funny, I see that I think they've been in the trenches and had to beat the thing into submission to get useful output from it and realised the true impossibility of the task.
christkv 4y ago
can probably be used to explore massive bills as well.
- gs17 4y ago
  Many of those are so massive they even exceed the 32K token limit of GPT-4.
  - welshwelsh 4y ago
    That's true but it doesn't need to process the whole bill in one prompt. For example you could split a 200K token bill into 10 parts that are 20K each, and ask GPT-4 to create a 2K token summary of each part. Then combine those summaries to create another 20k prompt, and ask it to summarize that.
roenxi 4y ago
The entire process whereby laws are drafted and enforced is alarming. Lobbyists and people who disagree with your way of life have substantial influence. I believe that for some of the largest expenditures of my lifetime the US Congress voted literally without people having read the final text bills they were voting on [0]. The language is interpreted by a large group of unreliable judges and juries. Corruption hangs in the air, and people who talk rationally are thin in the conversation. Lord of the Flies looms large in everyone's minds. Using AI in the drafting process is hardly something to get worked up about in amongst that mess. ChatGPT has a nice clear style and will probably help make these laws more accessible. ChatGPT can read a 4,000 page bill in 3 days. It'll probably be a net win once the dust settles if it makes it harder to ram stuff through without debate. And it'll be a nice neutral way of arguing about what is in a bill - people might be able to agree on which AI is reasonable and what it thinks the summary should be. That'd be a win the size of the moon in terms of better pressure to write good legislation. [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64069764 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64069764
- throwawayadvsec 4y ago
  "ChatGPT can read a 4,000 page bill in 3 days."? in 3 minutes?
  - cardboardbach 4y ago
    Of course, but the statement was likely a jab at an organic congressperson's inability to read a bill in even three days, before going ahead and signing it anyway.
  - saulpw 4y ago
    Actually it takes about 10-30 seconds (one request) for GPT4 to summarize 2000 words (a page or two). And there is a limit of 25 requests every 3 hours for GPT4, and no API access. So this might even take significantly longer than 3 days.
    - flangola7 4y ago
throwawayadvsec 4y ago
I literally have more trust in GPT-3(or even Llamma 7b) than in Republicans
kmlx 4y ago
agree 1. the warning is right there when you open up chatgpt: > This is a free research preview. Our goal is to get external feedback in order to improve our systems and make them safer. While we have safeguards in place, the system may occasionally generate incorrect or misleading information and produce offensive or biased content. It is not intended to give advice. 2. i know lots of companies that have banned the use of chatgpt for a plethora of reasons. but government is allowed to use it?
cush 4y ago
At least ChatGPT is faster than our current garbage-generating machine
- dmreedy 4y ago
  To quote Mitch Ratcliffe, 'A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention with the possible exceptions of handguns and Tequila.'
ellisv 4y ago
> generating constituent response drafts and press documents; Not too worried about that one since most responses are already automated > summarizing large amounts of text in speeches; Again, this seems fine. > drafting policy papers or even bills; Not terribly thrilled about this one but I don’t expect it to be able to draft actual legislation — my experience has been that ChatGPT doesn’t know actual legislation well and wouldn’t know how to modify current laws. > creating new logos or graphical element for branded office resources and more Fine with this one. Only one of these is potentially problematic to me but there are also ways for them to use it to make better laws.
- berkeleyjunk 4y ago
  >> summarizing large amounts of text in speeches; > Again, this seems fine. Not sure about that. Imagine all the misunderstandings of the speeches already and add on ChatGPT making up something or wrongly summarizing something.
counttheforks 4y ago
I can't wait for no organization to be contactable anymore. Give it a year or two and every form of communication will be handled by a ChatGPT bot.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
antibasilisk 4y ago
And that my friends is how we handed control of government to machines
BeFlatXIII 4y ago
Considering what human congressmen pass, the AI will likely do a better job.
idopmstuff 4y ago
I don't think it's reasonable to assume they're just going to let GPT write bills with no supervision, especially given that the first sentence specifically says they're experimenting with it. It's really, really good that they're doing this - this is an incredibly important technology, and the best way for politicians to understand it is to actually use it in their day to day work. Have it write the first draft of bills and see what kind of weird stuff it puts in there - that's how you actually understand the hallucination issue.
cyanydeez 4y ago
Just wait till they get lobbiests versions. GIGO will be streamlined. Fear not though, this will give them more time to ignore popular mandates.

meltyness 4y ago

An easily-verifiable garbage-generation resource!

jruohonen 4y ago
Against which would you verify when the goal of policy documents and bills is to create something new (and even the references to old things are unavailable, inaccurate, or even invented)? Another thing is that the Congress (like any governmental body in any country) presumably has huge databases of digitalized documents that could be used to train a custom LLM better suited for these tasks.
- meltyness 4y ago
  That it meets an intent. "Take 3 hours of floor arguments and committee testimony, and identify compromises."

Pilottwave 4y ago

Calling cutting edge-models consumer facing models like ChatGPT-4 garbage generating machines is very intellectually dishonest. These models are fully capable of drafting these kinds of texts, esp. when qualified staff is guiding the model.

PartiallyTyped 4y ago
Guiding and finalizing / correcting.
MaxMatti 4y ago
As long as they actually look at it which I don't expect them to, especially after revision 15 of a multi-page document.
dmreedy 4y ago
They may not generate garbage per se, but they do generate bullshit. Or if you want to put it more positively, they are consummate improvisers. The amount of guidance they require cannot be understated, since while they demonstrate phenomenal capacity for production of language, and understanding of language, they do not yet demonstrate much in the way of capacity for control or alignment. A technology can be both wildly powerful, mindblowingly cool, and deeply imperfect. I don't believe it's intellectually dishonest to emphasize the latter when it comes to impact against the human beings on the other end of the barrel. Especially when the technology starts to break out of the communities that already understand it (and its limitations).
- spenczar5 4y ago
  > They may not generate garbage per se, but they do generate bullshit. Or if you want to put it more positively, they are consummate improvisers. The amount of guidance they require cannot be understated, since while they demonstrate phenomenal capacity for production of language, and understanding of language, they do not yet demonstrate much in the way of capacity for control or alignment. I truly can’t tell whether you are describing the US Congress or LLMs.
  - dmreedy 4y ago
    I can't deny that the similarities are strong enough that it weakens some of the philosophical underpinnings of the argument. But I am also wondering these days whether we are all just LLMs at the core of it.
4y ago

badcppdev 4y ago

Just what you need. A AI hallucinating some reply to a constituent and then that eventually becoming official or somehow becoming law.

sidewndr46 4y ago
What happens when a Congress member uses Chat GPT to draft a public statement and it accidentally includes their resignation? Will we suddenly find that AI is a danger to society and must be regulated?
- akiselev 4y ago
  Nothing happens, except everyone on the Hill will ridicule the politician and his staff. To resign Congress members have to actually send a letter to the governor of the state they represent. Most unilateral actions in government require some sort of formal document addressed to the relevant authority.

sesteel 4y ago

When I see statements like "garbage-generating machine", I immediately think that the person making such a statement may not be aware of the capabilities of GPT-4.

ionwake 4y ago
Conversely , I disagree and think garbage generating machine is funny and on point in this serious context. Just for the record I love chatgpt but don’t tell me it also doesn’t produce garbage as per OP.
- throwawayadvsec 4y ago
  yeah just like most humans produce garbage all the time I wouldn't call a tool that is more capable and knowledgeable than the average human to be a garbage generating machine
  - smeagull 4y ago
    I wouldn't either. But I would still call GPT-4 a garbage generating machine.
    - throwawayadvsec 4y ago
      I'm actually arguing that GPT-4 is more knowledgeable and capable than the average human, and I insist on the word average.
      - ionwake 4y ago
        So are we - literally who are you arguing with? Read my comment slowly I’m not saying it only produces garbage.
smeagull 4y ago
Funny, I see that I think they've been in the trenches and had to beat the thing into submission to get useful output from it and realised the true impossibility of the task.

christkv 4y ago

can probably be used to explore massive bills as well.

gs17 4y ago
Many of those are so massive they even exceed the 32K token limit of GPT-4.
- welshwelsh 4y ago
  That's true but it doesn't need to process the whole bill in one prompt. For example you could split a 200K token bill into 10 parts that are 20K each, and ask GPT-4 to create a 2K token summary of each part. Then combine those summaries to create another 20k prompt, and ask it to summarize that.

roenxi 4y ago

The entire process whereby laws are drafted and enforced is alarming. Lobbyists and people who disagree with your way of life have substantial influence. I believe that for some of the largest expenditures of my lifetime the US Congress voted literally without people having read the final text bills they were voting on [0]. The language is interpreted by a large group of unreliable judges and juries. Corruption hangs in the air, and people who talk rationally are thin in the conversation. Lord of the Flies looms large in everyone's minds. Using AI in the drafting process is hardly something to get worked up about in amongst that mess. ChatGPT has a nice clear style and will probably help make these laws more accessible. ChatGPT can read a 4,000 page bill in 3 days. It'll probably be a net win once the dust settles if it makes it harder to ram stuff through without debate. And it'll be a nice neutral way of arguing about what is in a bill - people might be able to agree on which AI is reasonable and what it thinks the summary should be. That'd be a win the size of the moon in terms of better pressure to write good legislation. [0] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64069764 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-64069764

throwawayadvsec 4y ago
"ChatGPT can read a 4,000 page bill in 3 days."? in 3 minutes?
- cardboardbach 4y ago
  Of course, but the statement was likely a jab at an organic congressperson's inability to read a bill in even three days, before going ahead and signing it anyway.
- saulpw 4y ago
  Actually it takes about 10-30 seconds (one request) for GPT4 to summarize 2000 words (a page or two). And there is a limit of 25 requests every 3 hours for GPT4, and no API access. So this might even take significantly longer than 3 days.
  - flangola7 4y ago

throwawayadvsec 4y ago

I literally have more trust in GPT-3(or even Llamma 7b) than in Republicans

kmlx 4y ago

agree 1. the warning is right there when you open up chatgpt: > This is a free research preview. Our goal is to get external feedback in order to improve our systems and make them safer. While we have safeguards in place, the system may occasionally generate incorrect or misleading information and produce offensive or biased content. It is not intended to give advice. 2. i know lots of companies that have banned the use of chatgpt for a plethora of reasons. but government is allowed to use it?

cush 4y ago

At least ChatGPT is faster than our current garbage-generating machine

dmreedy 4y ago
To quote Mitch Ratcliffe, 'A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any other invention with the possible exceptions of handguns and Tequila.'

ellisv 4y ago

> generating constituent response drafts and press documents; Not too worried about that one since most responses are already automated > summarizing large amounts of text in speeches; Again, this seems fine. > drafting policy papers or even bills; Not terribly thrilled about this one but I don’t expect it to be able to draft actual legislation — my experience has been that ChatGPT doesn’t know actual legislation well and wouldn’t know how to modify current laws. > creating new logos or graphical element for branded office resources and more Fine with this one. Only one of these is potentially problematic to me but there are also ways for them to use it to make better laws.

berkeleyjunk 4y ago
>> summarizing large amounts of text in speeches; > Again, this seems fine. Not sure about that. Imagine all the misunderstandings of the speeches already and add on ChatGPT making up something or wrongly summarizing something.

counttheforks 4y ago

I can't wait for no organization to be contactable anymore. Give it a year or two and every form of communication will be handled by a ChatGPT bot.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

antibasilisk 4y ago

And that my friends is how we handed control of government to machines

BeFlatXIII 4y ago

Considering what human congressmen pass, the AI will likely do a better job.

idopmstuff 4y ago

I don't think it's reasonable to assume they're just going to let GPT write bills with no supervision, especially given that the first sentence specifically says they're experimenting with it. It's really, really good that they're doing this - this is an incredibly important technology, and the best way for politicians to understand it is to actually use it in their day to day work. Have it write the first draft of bills and see what kind of weird stuff it puts in there - that's how you actually understand the hallucination issue.

cyanydeez 4y ago

Just wait till they get lobbiests versions. GIGO will be streamlined. Fear not though, this will give them more time to ignore popular mandates.