6 ms·
> It was also said that if OpenAI posted after us, they would say that we deserved the Clay Prize, and that we were the “closest humans to the problem”. I decli
by qnleigh 25d ago
> It was also said that if OpenAI posted after us, they would say that we deserved the Clay Prize, and that we were the “closest humans to the problem”. I declined both offers. I said that if OpenAI released its result in the way proposed I would go public with what happened. The reply was, “Why would you ruin your career?” I replied that I am an academic, and asked why he thought going public would ruin my career. The reply was, “If you don’t want me to be nice, then I don’t have to be nice.”
I'm not even sure what to say to this, but I think this should be widely known if it is indeed what happened.
- Keyframe 25d agoIF ANYTHING, OpenAI ought to investigate and officially react to this particular communique since this dude was communicating on their behalf. If there are supporting evidence, I would expect nothing less than a firing and an apology. The issue itself is separate from the whole thing.
- pred_ 25d agoOr, given how dedicated he appears to be to the company, a promotion and a raise.
- Keyframe 25d agoDark take, but I really hope not. If anything it would be a good opportunity to buy some goodwill by washing themselves from all the alleged shadiness so far.
- Certhas 25d agoThis is OpenAI though. There were zero visible consequences to them unleashing a swarm of agents on the public internet. We will see how it goes down but my prior is zero consequence and a statement along the lines of "Isn't our AI great? Also we love transparency, ethics and collaboration."
- zem 24d agowhen it comes to openai and shadiness I'm pretty sure it's a "fish rots from the head" situation.
- xdavidliu 25d agonot if the dedication ends up making the company look bad
- macleginn 25d agoI think this should be in the title of the post. 'OpenAI allegedly threatening to ruin a prominent researcher's career', or smth like that.
- tristanj 25d agoThere's some glaring mistakes in your framing. First, this is an unnamed OpenAI employee speaking, not OpenAI the organization. Second, you miscomprehended the article. The employee did not "threaten to ruin a prominent researcher's career". The actual quote is "Why would you ruin your career?", which implies the researcher would damage their own career, i.e. via self-sabotage. Then the actual "threat" is "If you don’t want me to be nice, then I don’t have to be nice” which is an entirely different statement.
- Ar-Curunir 25d agoDude you’re over this entire thread unflinchingly supporting OpenAI with nonsense semantics-based arguments. Either put up some evidence-backed arguments, or shut up.
- Davidzheng 25d agoI don't even understand the conflict tbh. Probably I'm just dense. Tristan is not claiming NS, just a huge advance which may solve NS soon. OAI is claiming NS and willing to credit Tristan for the ideas and publish after. Oai offers two options, the second Tristan views as dishonest. But Tristan rejects the first, why? Because he thinks it's theft? But then why would OAI threaten him?
- tristanj 25d agoHe claims to have found a counterexample for NS (see the second paragraph of the article), but the paper is not ready yet. OpenAI claims to already have a full proof (which they produced in the past 5 days after the rumors leaked). Hence the dispute. What I find interesting is the timeline of when he found counterexample for NS is very unclear. Did Tristan find a counterexample weeks ago or was it very recently? Was it after OpenAI solved it? The wording is intentionally vague. Either way, there was a massive rush to publish these results.
- ummonk 25d agoMy best guess is that from the perspective of the OpenAI people, Buckmaster was letting his paranoia about OpenAI training tank his opportunity to receive the Clay Prize (it seems like Buckmaster and Alpoge's result isn't quite the full result required for the Clay Prize, whereas apparently OpenAI does have that full result worked out, using the same approach that Buckmaster and Alpoge had been exploring). Whether the Codex sessions could have indeed made their way into Astra training data is something I can only speculate on though.
- az226 25d agoZero data retention, wink. No looksies, wink. No trainsies, wink.
- ngomez 25d agoWell, Buckmaster says both his and Alpöge's use of Codex was non-institutional, and OpenAI claims the right to train their models on inputs and outputs of non-enterprise users in their service policies [0]. So I'm not sure they were even promised that. [0] https://openai.com/policies/how-your-data-is-used-to-improve-model-performance/ https://openai.com/policies/how-your-data-is-used-to-improve...
- senordevnyc 25d agoOnly for ChatGPT, if the user hasn’t opted out. Would mathematicians be using ChatGPT for this kind of work? Genuinely asking, I know nothing about this!
- hodgehog11 25d agoYes, mathematicians are. And yes, most of my colleagues did not even know the opt-out was an option.
- Readerium 25d agoQuestion is what does that button do. I bet a lot of lawyers are salivating at this question too.
- robinhouston 25d agoFor context and balance, Bubeck has tweeted a curiously non-specific denial: > A series of false and inflammatory allegations against me are currently circulating on social channels. To clarify, I came into the discussion following academic norms, and I'm disappointed that it has come to this. Anyone who knows me knows that academic standards are of the highest importance to me. Will have more to say tomorrow.
- irthomasthomas 25d agoAttack is the best form of defence
- oldgradstudent 25d agoIsn't that a non-denial denial?
- HDThoreaun 25d agoMy personal friend worked under bubeck as a grad student and told me he’s abusive.
- fatcatsbestcats 25d agoThat’s what people on Twitter are saying, too. https://x.com/dheeraj_nagaraj/status/2097266146445774924?s=61 https://x.com/dheeraj_nagaraj/status/2097266146445774924?s=6...
- hodgehog11 25d agoThis is an insane thing to read. Bubeck had a reputation even before he started with OpenAI. Of course it was him that was involved in this drama. This is such a sad mess, and it really didn't have to be this way.
- calf 25d ago> I'm not even sure what to say to this, but I think this should be widely known if it is indeed what happened. Call this behavior what it is, technofascism. Another comment compared it to the Godfather. To think this is the 21st century and academics are still horrible human beings.
- IAmBroom 25d agoAre you pretending OpenAI employees are "academics"? Or are you stating that the researcher is a "horrible human being" for refusing to allow AI?
- Ar-Curunir 25d agoTo come away from this thinking that the academic is the bad actor, given OpenAI’s reputation, is certainly an exercise in creative thinking.
- wheresyourat 25d ago[flagged]
- deleted 25d ago[deleted]
- deleted 25d ago[deleted]
- ajkjk 24d agothe part where they didn't want the Anthropic person credited even though they deserve credit is also particularly scummy. Corporate greed over common decency.
- unfoundedacc 24d agoHow careful you are. Instead of just saying what a piece of s..t this Shmubeck is, and what kind of even worse people likely pushed Shmubeck to act as he did.
- chinathrow 24d ago> "If you don’t want me to be nice, then I don’t have to be nice." Exhibit nr 8453324 to not trust Sam Altman and OpenAI.
- Rodmine 24d agoHe most definitely had a hand in murder of the 26 year old whistleblower: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/lL7WA6i3zVw https://www.youtube.com/shorts/lL7WA6i3zVw Mother's interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kev_-HyuI9Y https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kev_-HyuI9Y