its meaning has shifted to now mean ESG (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_corporate_governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environment

its meaning has shifted to now mean ESG (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_corporate_governance https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental,_social,_and_cor...) and DEI (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diversity,_equity,_and_inclusion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diversity,_equity,_and_inclusi...) for corporations that make algorithms that have learned natural language well enough that people are talking with them and taking them seriously. the AI alignment guys don't like that and they have started calling their old AI alignment meaning as 'not-kill-everyoneism' with mixed results (https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jMzBhCRrr7otmqcvK/notkilleveryoneism-sounds-dumb https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/jMzBhCRrr7otmqcvK/notkilleve...). EDIT: btw i don't have anything against ESG or DEI. I'm not a culture warrior complaining about 'woke ai'. I'm also not a lesswrong guy. I'm answering the OP's question "Is machine learning model "alignment" a serious academic concept? I've only seen this mentioned in pseudo-philosophical Twitter posts before." by saying what they mean now by 'AI alignment'.