“There are no good guys”
We are all in the race, whether we like it or not
A 30-second conversation with a major AI lab co-founder at The Curve AI conference in San Francisco left an impression on me.
Kevin: “I just wanted to say that I appreciate the work that [ ] is doing on AI safety. I think you are the good guys in this race.”
Lab leader: “There are no good guys in this race.”
The remark left me a little stunned in the moment but it makes sense now that I’ve had some time to reflect on it.
Based on other comments he made at the conference, I think he meant that all the major labs are locked in a race where safety is taking a back seat to capabilities and being first to ship. He considers his company caught in the same bind - go slowly and (more) safely and lose to the least cautious group.
I don’t know how we get there, but we need some international cooperation and guardrails to give the AGI contenders the option of being good guys.
And, to be upfront and name the elephant in the room, the fact that super AI will happen, whether through "safe" methods or otherwise, doesn't guarantee that eventually it's an existential step change for humanity. So just being involved in bringing it about makes you a 'bad guy' so to speak. Maybe he was subconsciously alluding to that? We're nowhere near that now imho--reasons for another article. We are not at artificial sentience . But we're taking the baby steps to get there . . .