{"id":8862,"date":"2023-11-25T22:50:48","date_gmt":"2023-11-25T22:50:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/elon-musk-warns-something-scared-openai-chief-scientist-ilya-sutskever-as-ceo-sam-altmans-return-fails-to-answer-key-questions\/"},"modified":"2023-11-25T22:50:48","modified_gmt":"2023-11-25T22:50:48","slug":"elon-musk-warns-something-scared-openai-chief-scientist-ilya-sutskever-as-ceo-sam-altmans-return-fails-to-answer-key-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/topat10.com\/?p=8862","title":{"rendered":"Elon Musk warns \u2018something scared\u2019 OpenAI chief scientist Ilya Sutskever as CEO Sam Altman\u2019s return fails to answer key questions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Elon Musk played a big role<\/a> in persuading Ilya Sutskever<\/a> to join OpenAI as chief scientist in 2015. Now the Tesla<\/a> CEO wants to know what he saw there that scared him so much.<\/p>\n

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Sutskever, whom Musk recently described as<\/a> a \u201cgood human\u201d with a \u201cgood heart\u201d\u2014and the \u201clinchpin for OpenAI being successful\u201d\u2014served on the OpenAI board that fired CEO Sam Altman two Fridays ago; indeed, Sutskever informed Altman of his dismissal. Since then, however, the board has been revamped<\/a> and Altman reinstated<\/a>, with investors led by Microsoft<\/a> pushing for the changes.<\/p>\n

Sutskever himself backtracked on Monday<\/a>, writing on X<\/a>, \u201cI deeply regret my participation in the board\u2019s actions. I never intended to harm OpenAI.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

But Musk and other tech elites\u2014including ones who mocked the board for firing Altman\u2014are still curious about what Sutskever saw.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Late on Thursday, venture capitalist Marc Andreessen, who has ridiculed \u201cdoomers\u201d<\/a> who fear AI\u2019s threat to humanity, posted<\/a> to X, \u201cSeriously though \u2014 what did Ilya see?\u201d Musk replied<\/a> a few hours later, \u201cYeah! Something scared Ilya enough to want to fire Sam. What was it?\u201d<\/p>\n

That remains a mystery. The board gave only vague reasons for firing Atlman. Not much has been revealed since.<\/p>\n

\u2018Such drastic action\u2019<\/h2>\n

OpenAI\u2019s mission is to develop artificial general intelligence (AGI) and ensure it \u201cbenefits all of humanity.\u201d AGI refers to a system that can match humans when faced with an unfamiliar task.\u00a0<\/p>\n

OpenAI\u2019s unusual corporate structure put a nonprofit board higher than the capped-profit company, allowing the board to fire the CEO if, for instance, it felt the commercialization of potentially dangerous AI capabilities was moving at an unsafe speed.<\/p>\n

Early on Thursday, Reuters reported<\/a> that several OpenAI researchers had warned the board in a letter of a new AI that could threaten humanity. OpenAI, after being contacted by Reuters, then wrote an internal email acknowledging a project called Q* (pronounced Q-Star), which some staffers felt might be a breakthrough in the company\u2019s AGI quest. Q* reportedly can ace basic mathematical tests, suggesting an ability to reason, as opposed ChatGPT\u2019s more predictive behavior.<\/p>\n

Musk has longed warned of the potential dangers to humanity from artificial intelligence, though he also sees its upsides and now offers<\/a> a ChatGPT rival called Grok through his startup xAI. He cofounded OpenAI in 2015 and helped lure key talent including Sutskever, but he left a few years later on a sour note. He later complained that<\/a> the onetime nonprofit\u2014which he had hoped would serve as a counterweight to Google\u2019s AI dominance\u2014had instead become a \u201cclosed source, maximum-profit company effectively controlled by Microsoft.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last weekend, he weighed in on<\/a> the OpenAI board\u2019s decision to fire Altman, writing: \u201cGiven the risk and power of advanced AI, the public should be informed of why the board felt they had to take such drastic action.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

When an X user suggested there might be a \u201cbombshell variable\u201d unknown to the public, Musk replied, \u201cExactly.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sutskever, after his backtracking on Monday, responded to the return of Altman by writing<\/a> on Wednesday, \u201cThere exists no sentence in any language that conveys how happy I am.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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