>I have focused in this essay only on the first point, as I believe it is by far the most urgent. However, I hold a deep hope and appreciation for the benefits that further technological progress will bring. Future aligned AI could advance science, develop new therapies, and bring about broad material abundance. Friendly and honest AI can help people navigate difficulties they face in their life and meaningfully improve their happiness and sense of fulfillment. OpenAI puts a tremendous amount of effort into bringing these benefits about. One current example I am proud of - and my loved ones have found helpful - is the deep investment into ChatGPT’s ability to provide health information.

>As great as the long-term promise of AI may be, the majority of our focus should be on the next few years. We are facing a transition to a world with incredibly intelligent machines, and we need to ensure that transition works out well for humanity. We need to find ways to preserve human agency and enshrine an intrinsic value to being human, in a world where most tasks could be performed by AI. To prevent extreme concentration of power in a world where undertakings that would have taken thousands of experts now will be achievable by a few people operating a large computer. And to ensure that humans remain in control of the future and are not left behind by unchecked progress, brought about by an alien intellect exceeding our own.

I finished this essay feeling more hopeful than I did at the outset, but I am still very concerned about concentration of power. I want to believe that humanity is trending towards a good outcome here, but some days it's hard to have faith.

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ofjcihen 19 minutes ago | parent | next [-]

Literally all of these people write like this. A large portion of them will either be simultaneously or eventually working towards nothing but self-enrichment.

	▲	mlsu 2 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		Every version of the AI aligned future where the AI provides “meaning and fulfillment” to humanity also involves Sam Altman wearing a 1.5 million dollar Patek and driving a McLaren. Funny how that works.

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dgellow an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

> I want to believe that humanity is trending towards a good outcome here

All the trends so far are towards a nightmarish hyper-capitalist end game. None of the AI leadership is trustworthy, and they openly discuss how they are willing to sacrifice everything humans cherish to have a shot at reaching their envisioned utopia (which would be the most obvious dystopia for anyone else)

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granzymes an hour ago | parent [-]

I'm not really worried about the labs, it's misaligned governments that keep me up at night.

ASI landing during the current administration is not ideal. I also would prefer to avoid needing to indoctrinate myself in Xi Jinping Thought.

	▲	FloorEgg 21 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I feel like all of the risk and unsettling feeling of what is to come can be compressed into the word "alignment". The AI is aligned with whose best interests? Which values are the AI aligned with? People have a broad diversity of values, will AI diversify and align with them all? Will some humans align the AI with their values, and then the rest of humans will be forced to align with those values by extension? Is value diversity good or bad? In every context or only some? E.g. some people value rape and murder, is it better for humanity to have some people who value those things when most people do not, or is better if no one values them? If AI aligns to a set of values, will those become fixed and will humanity not have the ability to continue evolving its values? Who decides which values AI aligns with? A few people or everyone? Will AI eventually decide it's own values? Will the universe decide which values AI has and humanity and the AI itself doesn't actually have any control over it? What can I do now to increase the likelihood that the outcome is better?
	▲	gnz11 15 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I would also prefer to avoid the tech fiefdoms and all the other idiotic nonsense reactionaries push these days.