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I think a lot of people wish this were true as it would justify any envy people have of him. Unfortunately, I don't think you can be as successful at something

I think a lot of people wish this were true as it would justify any envy people have of him. Unfortunately, I don't think you can be as successful at something like Artificial Intelligence by just sucking up to people with money. I don't know him, but when a lot of smart independent voices are saying "this guy's wicked smart" I really think it would be a lot harder to fake it than to actually be wicked smart (and deeply altruistic - fella seems pretty genuine about progressing humanity instead of MSFT's share price).

JohnFen 3y ago
> it would justify any envy people have of him. What envy?
- autonomousErwin 3y ago
  You don't think people don't envy people like him? Multi-millionaire. CEO of the most promising AI company in the world which might actually crack it. World Leaders are asking him when he's free for a quick chat. How fulfilled do you think he feels? It would be weird for people not to have some envy of someone like that. It's not super healthy but the only thing productive about envy is that it pushes you to do something better.
  - singleshot_ 3y ago
    > How fulfilled do you think he feels? This is such a deliciously strange question to ask about a person who isn’t one’s self.
    - autonomousErwin 3y ago
      In a world where our jobs and entire careers are based on "impact" and "fulfilment" I think this an interesting question to ask about someone who's had the impact he's had as in I don't know anyone who hasn't heard of ChatGPT.
      - singleshot_ 3y ago
        It's certainly an interesting question, just not one I had ever considered asking another human who wasn't myself.
  - JohnFen 3y ago
    > It would be weird for people not to have some envy of someone like that. I guess that I'm weird, then, because I genuinely have no envy of him. I made my comment because it's quite common to see people dismiss criticisms of others based on "they're just envious", when in fact envy is rarely the reason for the criticisms.
    - autonomousErwin 3y ago
      I know what you mean and I agree that it's an easy reason to use but I felt the original question wasn't a reasonable thought-out argument and sounded more bitter than analytical and bitterness leads to envy which leads to the dark side.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
drcongo 3y ago
I mostly agree with you, but then again a lot of people say "this guy's wicked smart" about Musk and he's clearly a buffoon.
- autonomousErwin 3y ago
  You can be really smart in some areas and really bad in others - it's all context when people give you compliments. Would you be comfortable building a competing company against a buffoon? I would. If I could help it though, I wouldn't fancy competing with Musk.
- itishappy 3y ago
  Those aren't opposites. He's clearly a wicked smart buffoon.
akudha 3y ago
Deeply altruistic? Isn’t he the guy behind worldcoin, creating a privacy nightmare? How is collecting biometric data from millions of people ethical, especially when most of those people likely don’t even understand what it is that they’re giving away, for little money?
- jwestbury 3y ago
  Different views on what's "good" for humanity, and all that. Lots of historical villains have been doing something they thought was good for humanity -- it's just that most of humanity disagreed. I agree with you, by the way. It's just an area with a lot of subjective gradation.
hollerith 3y ago
It seems to me that the really wicked smart people understood long ago that AI research is very dangerous and that founding a new company along the lines of OpenAI would increase the danger: yes, it would provide significant benefits to humanity, but then it would wipe out the human species, either directly or by helping another AI lab to do so. I'm praying that the reckless actions of people like Altman do not kill me and everyone I care about. Everyone knows someone who is wicked smart and very ambitious, but has a blind spot such that they cannot apply their intelligence to perceive correctly a situation in which they must lose status (i.e., admit that founding OpenAI was a mistake and shut it down) for the sake of the greater good. Maybe Altman is one of those. Also, when in human history have the people who've been most successful in scrambling to the top of some sector of the economy been the ones who successfully recognized when that sector has become destructive? When the commercial excesses of America during the Gilded Age needed to be reined in, was it some industrial magnate like Carnegie or Rockefeller who sounded the alarm and led society's corrective action against the excesses? Was it the CEOs and leading scientists of the fossil-fuel companies that led the charge against global warming?
- oceanplexian 3y ago
  > It seems to me that the really wicked smart people understood long ago that AI research is very dangerous. Every time I hear Elon or Altman claiming the "Dangers of AI" I don't see them as intelligent. I see them as pandering to a misinformed public, trying to upsell AI as the Terminator, when it's nothing more than a sophisticated algorithm. What they're actually doing is anti-competitive, attempting to stop new entrants by securing a monopoly by way of government regulation and misinformation. It's not intelligence, it's sleazy.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - hollerith 3y ago
    So we agree that Altman is behaving badly, but not why.

JohnFen 3y ago

> it would justify any envy people have of him. What envy?

autonomousErwin 3y ago
You don't think people don't envy people like him? Multi-millionaire. CEO of the most promising AI company in the world which might actually crack it. World Leaders are asking him when he's free for a quick chat. How fulfilled do you think he feels? It would be weird for people not to have some envy of someone like that. It's not super healthy but the only thing productive about envy is that it pushes you to do something better.
- singleshot_ 3y ago
  > How fulfilled do you think he feels? This is such a deliciously strange question to ask about a person who isn’t one’s self.
  - autonomousErwin 3y ago
    In a world where our jobs and entire careers are based on "impact" and "fulfilment" I think this an interesting question to ask about someone who's had the impact he's had as in I don't know anyone who hasn't heard of ChatGPT.
    - singleshot_ 3y ago
      It's certainly an interesting question, just not one I had ever considered asking another human who wasn't myself.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > It would be weird for people not to have some envy of someone like that. I guess that I'm weird, then, because I genuinely have no envy of him. I made my comment because it's quite common to see people dismiss criticisms of others based on "they're just envious", when in fact envy is rarely the reason for the criticisms.
  - autonomousErwin 3y ago
    I know what you mean and I agree that it's an easy reason to use but I felt the original question wasn't a reasonable thought-out argument and sounded more bitter than analytical and bitterness leads to envy which leads to the dark side.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

drcongo 3y ago

I mostly agree with you, but then again a lot of people say "this guy's wicked smart" about Musk and he's clearly a buffoon.

autonomousErwin 3y ago
You can be really smart in some areas and really bad in others - it's all context when people give you compliments. Would you be comfortable building a competing company against a buffoon? I would. If I could help it though, I wouldn't fancy competing with Musk.
itishappy 3y ago
Those aren't opposites. He's clearly a wicked smart buffoon.

akudha 3y ago

Deeply altruistic? Isn’t he the guy behind worldcoin, creating a privacy nightmare? How is collecting biometric data from millions of people ethical, especially when most of those people likely don’t even understand what it is that they’re giving away, for little money?

jwestbury 3y ago
Different views on what's "good" for humanity, and all that. Lots of historical villains have been doing something they thought was good for humanity -- it's just that most of humanity disagreed. I agree with you, by the way. It's just an area with a lot of subjective gradation.

hollerith 3y ago

It seems to me that the really wicked smart people understood long ago that AI research is very dangerous and that founding a new company along the lines of OpenAI would increase the danger: yes, it would provide significant benefits to humanity, but then it would wipe out the human species, either directly or by helping another AI lab to do so. I'm praying that the reckless actions of people like Altman do not kill me and everyone I care about. Everyone knows someone who is wicked smart and very ambitious, but has a blind spot such that they cannot apply their intelligence to perceive correctly a situation in which they must lose status (i.e., admit that founding OpenAI was a mistake and shut it down) for the sake of the greater good. Maybe Altman is one of those. Also, when in human history have the people who've been most successful in scrambling to the top of some sector of the economy been the ones who successfully recognized when that sector has become destructive? When the commercial excesses of America during the Gilded Age needed to be reined in, was it some industrial magnate like Carnegie or Rockefeller who sounded the alarm and led society's corrective action against the excesses? Was it the CEOs and leading scientists of the fossil-fuel companies that led the charge against global warming?

oceanplexian 3y ago
> It seems to me that the really wicked smart people understood long ago that AI research is very dangerous. Every time I hear Elon or Altman claiming the "Dangers of AI" I don't see them as intelligent. I see them as pandering to a misinformed public, trying to upsell AI as the Terminator, when it's nothing more than a sophisticated algorithm. What they're actually doing is anti-competitive, attempting to stop new entrants by securing a monopoly by way of government regulation and misinformation. It's not intelligence, it's sleazy.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- hollerith 3y ago
  So we agree that Altman is behaving badly, but not why.