Speaking with Tucker Carlson on Fox News Channel’s “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” Elon Musk declared the need for a “TruthGPT” to be an alternative to OpenAI’s ChatGPT, as that AI can’t tell the truth because it has been trained to be politically correct. Speaking about that need, he said (emphasis ours):
“It was, I put a trace amount of effort into recruiting Aliah. And he changed his mind a few times, I ultimately decided to go with OpenAI. But if he had not gone with opening, I would not have succeeded. I really put a lot of effort into creating this, this organization to serve as a counterweight to Google. And then I kind of took my eye off the ball, I guess, and they are now closed source.
“And they obviously for profit, and they’re closely allied with Microsoft, you know, in effect, Microsoft has a very strong say, if not directly controls open AI at this point. So you really have an OpenAI Microsoft situation. And then at Google DeepMind, the other two sort of heavyweights in this arena.
“So it seems like the world needs a third option. Yes. So I think I will create a third option, although starting very late in the game, of course. Can it be done? I don’t know. I think it’s we’ll see. It’s definitely starting late. But I will, I will, I will try to create a third option. And that third option, hopefully, does more more good than harm. Like the intention with opening, I was obviously do good.
“But it’s not clear whether it’s actually doing good or whether it’s I can’t tell at this point. Except that I’m worried about the fact that it’s being it’s being trained to be politically correct, which is simply another way of, of being untruthful, saying untruthful things. Yes, so that’s not a bad time…
“So yeah, I’m gonna start something which you called TruthGPT, or a maximum truth seeking AI that tries to understand the nature of the universe. And I think this, this might be the best path to safety in the sense that an AI that cares about understanding the universe is unlikely to annihilate humans because we are an interesting part of the universe. Hopefully, they would think that, I think because, yeah, like, we like humans, humanity could decide to hunt down all the chimpanzees and kill them, but we don’t.”
Elon Musk talks about making “TruthGPT” as an alternative to OpenAI, because it’s being “trained to be politically correct”
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) April 18, 2023
Elon also pushed back against what Open AI is up to in a tweet. That came in response to a tweet saying, “Elon Musk says that A.I. is ‘one of the biggest risks’ to civilization and needs to be regulated. He co-founded OpenAI.” Elon, in response, said, “OpenAI was created as an open source (which is why I named it “Open” AI), non-profit company to serve as a counterweight to Google, but now it has become a closed source, maximum-profit company effectively controlled by Microsoft. Not what I intended at all.”
OpenAI was created as an open source (which is why I named it “Open” AI), non-profit company to serve as a counterweight to Google, but now it has become a closed source, maximum-profit company effectively controlled by Microsoft.
Not what I intended at all.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 17, 2023
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video
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