A trending youtube video w/ 500k views in a day brings up Dario Amodei’s Machines of Loving Grace (Timestamp for the quote): [Note: I had Claude help format, but personally verified the text’s faithfulness]
I am an AI optimist. I think our world will be better because of AI. One of the best expressions of that I’ve seen is this blog post by Dario Amodei, who is the CEO of Anthropic, one of the biggest AI companies. I would really recommend reading this—it’s one of the more interesting articles and arguments I have read. He’s basically saying AI is going to have an incredibly positive impact, but he’s also a realist and is like “AI is going to really potentially fuck up our world”
He’s notable and more trustworthy because his company Anthropic has put WAY more effort into safety, way way more effort into making sure there are really high standards for safety and that there isn’t going to be danger what these AIs are doing. So I really really like Dario and I’ve listened to a lot of what he’s said. Whereas with some other AI leaders like Sam Altman who runs OpenAI, you don’t know what the fuck he’s thinking. I really like [Dario] - he also has an interesting background in biological work and biotech, so he’s not just some tech-bro; he’s a bio-tech-bro. But his background is very interesting.
But he’s very realistic. There is a lot of bad shit that is going to happen with AI. I’m not denying that at all. It’s about how we maximize the positive while reducing the negatives. I really want AI to solve all of our diseases. I would really like AI to fix cancer—I think that will happen in our lifetimes. To me, I’d rather we fight towards that future rather than say ‘there will be problems, let’s abandon the whole thing.’
Other notes: This is youtuber/Streamer DougDoug (2.8M subscribers), with this video posted on his other channel DougDougDoug (“DougDoug content that’s too rotten for the main channel”) who often streams/posts coding/AI integrated content.
The full video is also an entertaining summary of case law on AI generated art/text copyright.
making sure there are really high standards for safety and that there isn’t going to be danger what these AIs are doing
Ah yes, a great description of Anthropic’s safety actions. I don’t think anyone serious at Anthropic believes that they “made sure there isn’t going to be danger from these AIs are doing”. Indeed, many (most?) of their safety people assign double-digits probabilities to catastrophic outcomes from advanced AI system.
I do think this was a predictable quite bad consequence of Dario’s essay (as well as his other essays which heavily downplay or completely omit any discussion of risks). My guess is it will majorly contribute to reckless racing while giving people a false impression of how good we are doing on actually making things safe.
Anthropic has put WAY more effort into safety, way way more effort into making sure there are really high standards for safety and that there isn’t going to be danger what these AIs are doing
implies it’s just the amount of effort is larger than other companies (which I agree with), and not the Youtuber believing they’ve solved alignment or are doing enough, see:
but he’s also a realist and is like “AI is going to really potentially fuck up our world”
and
But he’s very realistic. There is a lot of bad shit that is going to happen with AI. I’m not denying that at all.
So I’m not confident that it’s “giving people a false impression of how good we are doing on actually making things safe.” in this case.
I do know DougDoug has recommended Anthropic’s Alignment Faking paper to another youtuber, which is more of a “stating a problem” paper than saying they’ve solved it.
A trending youtube video w/ 500k views in a day brings up Dario Amodei’s Machines of Loving Grace (Timestamp for the quote):
[Note: I had Claude help format, but personally verified the text’s faithfulness]
Other notes: This is youtuber/Streamer DougDoug (2.8M subscribers), with this video posted on his other channel DougDougDoug (“DougDoug content that’s too rotten for the main channel”) who often streams/posts coding/AI integrated content.
The full video is also an entertaining summary of case law on AI generated art/text copyright.
Ah yes, a great description of Anthropic’s safety actions. I don’t think anyone serious at Anthropic believes that they “made sure there isn’t going to be danger from these AIs are doing”. Indeed, many (most?) of their safety people assign double-digits probabilities to catastrophic outcomes from advanced AI system.
I do think this was a predictable quite bad consequence of Dario’s essay (as well as his other essays which heavily downplay or completely omit any discussion of risks). My guess is it will majorly contribute to reckless racing while giving people a false impression of how good we are doing on actually making things safe.
I think the fuller context,
implies it’s just the amount of effort is larger than other companies (which I agree with), and not the Youtuber believing they’ve solved alignment or are doing enough, see:
and
So I’m not confident that it’s “giving people a false impression of how good we are doing on actually making things safe.” in this case.
I do know DougDoug has recommended Anthropic’s Alignment Faking paper to another youtuber, which is more of a “stating a problem” paper than saying they’ve solved it.