Elon Musk, Others Fund $1B Non-Profit To Advance AI Research, Ethics (openai.com)

As reported by The Wall Street Journal, The Verge, and many others (including this widely run Reuters story), a heavily backed non-profit group called OpenAI on Friday introduced itself and its utopian-sounding goals of open sourcing a great deal of AI research and, as The Verge puts it, "to stop AI from ruining the world." Elon Musk and Peter Thiel are two of the backers, along with Y-combinator president Sam Altman and other Silicon Valley luminaries, so the group starts out with a war chest big enough to support a wide range of research -- a billion dollars. According to the Wall Street Journal, The idea for OpenAI crystallized last summer as a result of ongoing discussions between Mr. Musk and Mr. Altman over the future of AI. Mr. Musk has warned in the past that the future of the Earth is at risk if AI develops in the wrong ways. Tesla, one of the companies he leads, is adding autonomous capabilities to its cars that require AI technology such as image recognition. ... OpenAI intends to collaborate with the academic and for-profit worlds, but it also wants to give researchers the freedom to pursue lines of enquiry without pressure to achieve an immediate pay-off. “Our focus is not only doing the right thing for today, but also doing the right thing for 50 years from now,” Mr. Brockman said.

Comments

Apparently...

[burtosis]

Elon must love terrifying himself with all his talk of AI lately.

Re:Apparently...

[Anonymous Coward]

Elon is a toolshed that goes out of his way to speak on topics to which he has no education. AI is so far away from the Hollywood doomsday picture he's painting that it's absurd to even worry about it.

Hold On Tight!

[JimSadler]

Computers, 3D printing and AI are all super, major developments. Any major development in human history has carried a certain amount of chaos, pain and suffering along with it. AI is going to cause a total shift in the nature of human affairs and existence. But in theory, we have an advantage. We can see it coming and we can buffer the negative consequences if we choose to do so. Obviously human employment will become quite rare in the near future. People without jobs must be well supported by governments. They must have all that is needed to get by plus more so that they can consume products produced by industry. Taxes can only come from people who can afford to pay them and that translates into the wealthy and businesses paying the tax load for the rest of us. I know the knee-jerk reaction that some people will have when i mention this. And just maybe that is the area that we need to spend money on. We need to make people aware that a huge change is upon them and that there is no choice but to eliminate many long-held beliefs in order to have a smoother transition into the new era. Imagine the chaos that went on when we went from the horse to the car. That was nothing compared to what Ai has in store for us.

Probably not the best use of $1B

[mykepredko]

I guess Musk got an AI demo that scared the bejeezus out of him because I always think about an article I read about the genesis of SpaceX where he sat down for a couple of days with a spreadsheet working at figuring out if there was a business opportunity with a reusable launcher.

That kind of data centric, analytical approach doesn't seem to be taken here - it seems to be more knee-jerk worry than anything else.

Better uses for the $1B? Let's see:
- Practical electric propulsion for airliners.
- Large scale power storage and distribution systems for EV, wind and tidal (all renewable) energy sources.
- Lunar mining, refining and smelting to help create a sustainable industry off earth.
- An electric delivery van.
- Accelerating the Dragon II development.

All would provide returns which would help mankind, would disrupt entrenched industries and provide a (somewhat risky) ROI for other investors to join in.

AI...

[matbury]

AI is no match for human stupidity.

Where is he getting the government funding?

[reemul]

Elon Musk is a brilliant man, but he won't hand you a hanky without finding some way to get a government grant or subsidy out of it. Every one of his businesses gets at least some money shaken out of the taxpayers somewhere in the process. So where is he getting the federal or state money for this venture? I can't believe that he has broken with his long practice of finding a way for the government to pay him to do what he was going to do anyway, that would be a bigger story than the AI thing.