4 ms·

Of we ignore the risks and threats of AI for a second, this whole story is actually incredibly funny. So much childish stupidity on display on all sides is just

by hef19898 3y ago

Of we ignore the risks and threats of AI for a second, this whole story is actually incredibly funny. So much childish stupidity on display on all sides is just hilarious. Makes what the world would look like if, say, the Manhattan Project would have been managed the same way. Well, a younger me working at OpenAI would resign latest after my collegues stage a coup againstvthe board out of, in my view, a personality cult. Propably would have resigned after the third CEO was announced. Older me would wait for a new gig to be ligned up to resign, with beginning after CEO number 2 the latest. The cyckes get faster so. It took FTX a little bit longer from hottest start up to enter the trajectory of crash and burn, OpenAI did faster. I just hope this helps ro cool down the ML sold as AI hype a notch.

jacquesm 3y ago
The scary thing is that these incompetents are supposedly the ones to look out for the interests of humanity. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic. Not that I had any illusions about this being a fig leaf in the first place.
- stingraycharles 3y ago
  Perhaps they were put in that position precisely because of their incompetence, not despite of it.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    I wouldn't rule that out. Normally you'd expect a bit more wisdom rather than only smarts on a board. And some of those really shouldn't be there at all (conflicts of interest, lack of experience).
jibe 3y ago
Of we ignore the risks and threats of AI for a second [..] just hope this helps ro cool down the ML sold as AI hype If it is just ML sold as AI hype, are you really worried about the threat of AI?
- hef19898 3y ago
  It can be both, a hype and a danger. I don't worry much about AGI by now (I stopped insulting Alexa so, just to be sure). The danger of generative AI is that it disrupts all kinds of things: arts, writers, journalism, propaganda... That threat already exists, the tech being no longer being hyped might allow us to properly adress that problem.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    > I stopped insulting Alexa so, just to be sure Priceless. The modern version of Pascal's wager.
anonymouskimmer 3y ago
> Makes what the world would look like if, say, the Manhattan Project would have been managed the same way. It was not possible for a war-time government crash project to have been managed the same way. During WW2 the existential fear was an embodied threat currently happening. No one was even thinking about a potential for profits or even any additional products aside from an atomic bomb. And if anyone had ideas on how to pursue that bomb that seemed like a decent idea, they would have been funded to pursue them. And this is not even mentioning the fact that security was tight. I'm sure there were scientists who disagreed with how the Manhattan project was being managed. I'm also sure they kept working on it despite those disagreements.
- Apocryphon 3y ago
  That's what happened to the German program though https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program
  - anonymouskimmer 3y ago
    Well, yes, but they were the existential threat. Hey, maybe this means the AGIs will fight amongst themselves and thus give us the time to outwit them. :D
    - jowea 3y ago
      Actual scifi plot.
- hooande 3y ago
  For real. It's like, did you see Oppenheimer? There's a reason they put the military in charge of that.

jacquesm 3y ago

The scary thing is that these incompetents are supposedly the ones to look out for the interests of humanity. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic. Not that I had any illusions about this being a fig leaf in the first place.

stingraycharles 3y ago
Perhaps they were put in that position precisely because of their incompetence, not despite of it.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  I wouldn't rule that out. Normally you'd expect a bit more wisdom rather than only smarts on a board. And some of those really shouldn't be there at all (conflicts of interest, lack of experience).

jibe 3y ago

Of we ignore the risks and threats of AI for a second [..] just hope this helps ro cool down the ML sold as AI hype If it is just ML sold as AI hype, are you really worried about the threat of AI?

hef19898 3y ago
It can be both, a hype and a danger. I don't worry much about AGI by now (I stopped insulting Alexa so, just to be sure). The danger of generative AI is that it disrupts all kinds of things: arts, writers, journalism, propaganda... That threat already exists, the tech being no longer being hyped might allow us to properly adress that problem.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  > I stopped insulting Alexa so, just to be sure Priceless. The modern version of Pascal's wager.

anonymouskimmer 3y ago

> Makes what the world would look like if, say, the Manhattan Project would have been managed the same way. It was not possible for a war-time government crash project to have been managed the same way. During WW2 the existential fear was an embodied threat currently happening. No one was even thinking about a potential for profits or even any additional products aside from an atomic bomb. And if anyone had ideas on how to pursue that bomb that seemed like a decent idea, they would have been funded to pursue them. And this is not even mentioning the fact that security was tight. I'm sure there were scientists who disagreed with how the Manhattan project was being managed. I'm also sure they kept working on it despite those disagreements.

Apocryphon 3y ago
That's what happened to the German program though https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_nuclear_weapons_program
- anonymouskimmer 3y ago
  Well, yes, but they were the existential threat. Hey, maybe this means the AGIs will fight amongst themselves and thus give us the time to outwit them. :D
  - jowea 3y ago
    Actual scifi plot.
hooande 3y ago
For real. It's like, did you see Oppenheimer? There's a reason they put the military in charge of that.