Safety isn’t binary, it’s degrees of risk assessment, mitigation and acceptance. Infinite safety is never progressing. But never progressing means failing the charity mission. And AI isn’t just being created at OpenAI, for them to succeed at the charity mission they need to stay ahead of risky competitors with a safer AI.
The charity can’t afford its GPU costs without the LLC, and the LLC can’t lead the industry if it’s behind all the competitors. To be relevant the safety side needs compute, and they need to be ahead of the curve, and they also need real world data from the LLC. If the charity nukes the LLC, it takes itself with it and fails its mission. They’re so intertwined they need compromise in the board. And they let that board dwindle to small entrenched factions, which sounded more like the Hatfield’s and the mcCoys. With such a fragile structure they needed mature adults with functional conflict resolution.
So -- if appropriate -- he could make changes.
Or he could not change, and she publishes anyway.
> No, Sam wanted to be the first recipient of Helen's expression.
If I get copy approval to what you write, that is by definition a restriction to your freedom of expression. How is this up for debate?
Agreed. It seems remarkable that she dealt with her conflict of interest so thoroughly that she published an article that was mildly critical of the organization. I do not think her duty was to let Sam Altman seize power by firing her from the board on a flimsy pretext, though.
I'd say the OpenAI employees are the ones with the conflict of interest, since they stand to get rich if the company does well, independent of whether the charter is being upheld.
> I'd say the OpenAI employees are the ones with the conflict of interest, since they stand to get rich if the company does well, independent of whether the charter is being upheld.
Those pesky employees again. Too bad we still need them. But after AGI is a fact we don't and then it'll be a brave new world.
Where are you drawing this conclusion from? Nothing in the text suggests that was his intent - certainly his actions thereafter suggest that he was in fact more concerned with the potential harm to the for-profit company.
>In the email, Mr. Altman said that he had reprimanded Ms. Toner for the paper and that it was dangerous to the company, particularly at a time, he added, when the Federal Trade Commission was investigating OpenAI over the data used to build its technology.
Otherwise I'm not sure what changes would be "appropriate" for him to direct.
A board member should care about their organization more than their interpretation of the charter. If a Mozilla board member publicly criticized Firefox for violating their charter of a free and open internet because they're receiving money from Google, while also praising Brave for not doing so, I guarantee that they'd also be ousted.
Isn't the whole reason we have non-profit boards and charters is so that they can make just this kind of call?
(I'm not saying that this is what is happening here -- just responding to your particular claim.)
Yes. From the board. That's why we typically don't see boards air their dirty laundry out in the open even when in retrospect, they obviously had a problem with leadership.
It's not a contradiction to criticize someone for saying too much sometimes and saying too little another time. The board should be open to insiders and cautious with external communications.
As a CEO I'd want your concerns brought to me so they could be addressed. But if they were addressed, that is one less paper that could be published by Ms. Toner. As a member of the openai board, seeing the problem solved is more important to openai than her publishing career.
"Second, because the board is still the board of a Nonprofit, each director must perform their fiduciary duties in furtherance of its mission—safe AGI that is broadly beneficial. While the for-profit subsidiary is permitted to make and distribute profit, it is subject to this mission. The Nonprofit’s pzrincipal beneficiary is humanity, not OpenAI investors."
I see. I don't know whether she did discuss any issues with Sam before hand, but it really does not sound like she had any obligation to do so (this isn't your typical for-profit board so her duty wasn't to OpenAI as a company but to what OpenAI is ultimately trying to do).
The optics dont look good though if a board member is complaining publicly.
If Sam would let it go what would happen? Nothing. Criticism and comparisions already exist and will exist. Having it coming from board member at least gives counter argument that they're well aware of potential problems and there is opportunity to address gaps if they are confirmed.
If regulators find argument in the paper reasonable and that's going to have impact - what's wrong with that? It just means argument was true and should be addressed.
They don't need to worry about commercial side because money is being pured more than enough.
The nature of safety research is critical by definition. You can't expect to have research constrained to talk only in positive terms.
Both sides should have worried less and carry on.
That's the pro safety solution.
If she believes that the most advanced current effort is heading in the wrong direction, then slowing it down is helpful. "Most advanced" isn't the same as "safest".
> and potentially let a different effort take the lead
Sure but her job isn't to worry about other efforts, it's to worry about whether OpenAI (the non-profit) is developing AGI that is safe (and not whether OpenAI LLC, the for-profit company, makes any money).
Then it was 1/6 about the voting.
But voting is totally different thing than speaking about concerns and then getting actually them into the list, which will we voted further if they decide to do something about it.
In theory that is 1/6 * 1/6 power if you are alone with it for the decision to happen.
How? Being a board member is not enough. There were aready likely two against her in this case, while the rest is unknown.
Fall 2021
Holden Karnofsky resigns from the Board, citing a potential conflict because his wife, Daniela Amodei, is helping start Anthropic, a major OpenAI competitor, with her brother Dario Amodei. (They all live(d) together.) The exact date of Holden’s resignation is unknown; there was no contemporaneous press release.
Between October and November 2021, Holden was quietly removed from the list of Board Directors on the OpenAI website, and Helen was added (Discussion Source [1]).
0. https://loeber.substack.com/p/a-timeline-of-the-openai-board
1. https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/fmDFytmxwX9qBgcaX/...
Isn’t she an academic? Getting people to pay attention to her is at least half her job.
how could this possibly be accomplished when trying to sell the product itself. Investors pouring Billions into it are in it for profit... they're not going to let you just stop, or help a competitor for free.
>...
>We commit to use any influence we obtain over AGI’s deployment to ensure it is used for the benefit of all, and to avoid enabling uses of AI or AGI that harm humanity or unduly concentrate power.
>Our primary fiduciary duty is to humanity.
>...
>We are concerned about late-stage AGI development becoming a competitive race without time for adequate safety precautions. Therefore, if a value-aligned, safety-conscious project comes close to building AGI before we do, we commit to stop competing with and start assisting this project. We will work out specifics in case-by-case agreements, but a typical triggering condition might be “a better-than-even chance of success in the next two years.”
https://openai.com/charter
Seems to me like Helen is doing a better job of upholding the charter than Sam is.