It has seemed to me for a long time it might be better if building AGI were a government project," Sam Altman publicly mused last week... Altman speculated on possibility of the government "nationalizing" private AI companies into a public project, admitting more than once he's wondered what would happen next. "I obviously don't know," Altman said — but he added that "I have thought about it, of course" Altman's speculation hedged that "It doesn't seem super likely on the current trajectory. That said, I do think a close partnership between governments and the companies building this technology is super important."
Could powerful AI tools one day slip from the hands of private companies to be controlled by the U.S. government? Fortune magazine's AI editor points out that "many other breakthroughs with big strategic implications — from the Manhattan Project to the space race to early efforts to develop AI — were government-funded and largely government-directed." And Fortune added that last week the Defense Department threatened Anthropic with the Defense Production Act, which allows the president to designate "critical and strategic" goods for which businesses must accept the government's contracts. Fortune speculates this would've been "a sort of soft nationalization of Anthropic's production pipeline".
Altman acknowledged Saturday that he'd felt the threat of attempted nationalization "behind a lot of the questions" he'd received when answering questions on X.com... How exactly will this AI build-out be handled — and how should AI companies be working with the government? In a sprawling ask-me-anything session on X that included other members of OpenAI leadership, one Missouri-based developer broached an AGI-government scenario with OpenAI's Head of National Security Partnerships, Katherine Mulligan. If OpenAI built an AGI — something that even passed its own Turing test for AGI — would that be a case where its government contracts compelled them to grant access to the DoD?
"No," Mulligan answered. At our current moment in time, "We control which models we deploy."
(Score: 1, Disagree) by oldeschool on Wednesday March 11, @01:46AM (2 children)
the answer is always no -- the stock answer to any should the government question.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 11, @03:25AM
So you're in favor of letting the Post Office go to hell, leaving mail delivery up to FedEx and other companies? Who's going to deliver rural mail then?
Lots of things make sense to be done by the government, another is roads. Are you really ready to be paying tolls for every privately maintained road you use?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 11, @05:46PM
Why do you say that? Does that mean you are incapable of forming a transparent competent government? Shall we then just trudge onward to our ultimate demise?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by jb on Wednesday March 11, @07:48AM (1 child)
Since to date nobody is even vaguely close to implementing an AGI, the question is entirely moot.
This looks like yet more hype designed to con people into confusing "GenAI" (which isn't even any kind of AI, let alone AGI) with AGI.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 11, @11:52AM
> This looks like yet more hype designed to con people ...
In other words, keep the current "AI bubble" from popping, as it gets ever larger.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by datapharmer on Wednesday March 11, @10:23AM (2 children)
This is just starting the dialogue on the AI companies needing to bailout all their investors, because useful or not the money spent doesn’t justify the product and the ROI isn’t there. If they frame it as “too important for national security not to buy” then it sounds like the private companies doing the public a favor instead of what it actually is - a bailout!
(Score: 2) by looorg on Wednesday March 11, @11:40AM (1 child)
One wonders if that is the plan. Run it for as long as you can, grow as big so it is unsustainable and then when it eventually falls down you have become an integral part of everything and now the government have to come and rescue you with a massive bailout or nationalization.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Ox0000 on Wednesday March 11, @03:26PM
Looking at the current GenAI/LLM/... field, I've always found it peculiar. The more I think about it, the more I come to the conclusion that they are not in the business of AI. They're in the business of fundraising. They just happen to utilize AI to raise the funds. The point is not to build AI, the point is to raise as much money as possible from as many places as possible. After all, that's the only thing these people know how to do... For instance: Altman used to run YC, a startup accelerator. All they know is how to raise funds.
Getting a bailout from USG is of course the biggest goal of these fund raisers, the "ultimate" investment round... the acknowledgement that you are Too Big To Fail.
(Score: 1) by JamesWebb on Saturday March 14, @11:09PM
Its my project and mine alone. Sorry. Locked