Hanlon's razor aside, maybe that was the intention.
> You also informed the leadership team that allowing the company to be destroyed “would be consistent with the mission.”
This is a ten year old who set off their first fire cracker turning to their parents's iphone and saying 'I have become death, destroyer of worlds', because they don't really understand how any of this works but they've somehow ended up in control of it and are now terrified of doing their jobs.
But as far as I can tell, circumstances are still scant.
In retrospect it's a mistaken position, because it's pretty obvious now that if OpenAI disintegrates it will be as an exodus to Microsoft, which will undoubtedly be a worse steward, but I think it's an ethically consistent position to hold, in a naive sort of way. That's part of why I believe they actually said something like this.
it totally sounds like they outsourced company management to ChatGPT..
/s (mostly...)
Ok, well, maybe it is. but a magic 8-ball would have been better than this.
I think it is typical ChatGPT pattern:
- ChatGPT, you made mistake in your steps
- I am sorry, let me fix it and give you another answer.
Sometimes I think that really ambitious people have this blind spot about not seeing how accepting roles that are toxic can end up destroying your reputation. My favorite example is all the Trump White House staffers - regardless of what one thinks of Trump, he's made it abundantly clear that loyalty is a one way street, and I can't think of a single person that came out of the White House without a worse (or totally destroyed) reputation. But still people lined up, thinking "No way, I'll be the one to beat the odds!"
he was poorly informed by the board
Or
He agrees that they are off the rails with respect to safety.
See the Atlantic article, if you havn't read. Lots of context.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38341399
The new guy believes that there is a 5-50 percent chance of full AI Armageddon. I get the impression that the two women on the board may agree. The quora guy I don't have enough background on. Ilya obviously got extremely worried and communication with Altman and Brockman broke down. Now since repaired during negotiations it would appear.
The new ceo more or less stated that he took the role as a (paraphrase) 'responsibility for mankind'. That says a lot about that whole 5-50 percent risk number imo.
There is a 100% chance that something kills all of us if we aren't mindful of it. I don't see a lack of mindfulness, I see an abundance of fear, and progress being offered up as a sacrifice to the idol of status-quo.
You fire the CEO and completely destroy a 90b company because of these two reasons?
No wonder everyone wants out. I would think I was going crazy if I sat in a meeting and heard these two reason.