Quick Note on This Week’s AI News
There’s been a lot of coverage in the news and people talking about AI safety this week following Jacob Coxon’s resignation post.
One theme I’ve seen is people arguing about whether the “fear campaigns” (posts like his, and publications from others including labs and leaders in the space) are genuine or not.
While I have my own opinions on this, what I keep thinking is that it doesn’t matter. We’re actively building something we can’t explain and potentially can’t stop.1
We’re arguing about the motives of people warning us instead of asking whether we can actually understand what is being built and what potential negative impact it can have.
At the same time, I think it’s a good thing just for this discourse to become more widespread in any way. This is the first time it feels like more people are becoming concerned or starting to realize the concerns. It’s so important right now for more people to understand the risks of much more capable AI, and the rate at which those capabilities are being developed compared to the rate of progress in alignment.
- “Stop” meaning yes, if it were to “escape”, but maybe even more about the race between labs and countries.