[chasd00]

>Statements to the effect that AI will be controlled for safety are pretentious.

and "safety" is such a loaded term these days. What exactly do they mean by safety? Prevention of launching ICBMs or prevention of not using the gender neutral pronoun "they"?

[JW_00000]

The Executive Order [1] is clearly more focused on the former. Some of the things they mention (I haven't read it all):

* creating chemical/biological/nuclear weapons

* biohazards

* outputs that could threaten to critical infrastructure (e.g. energy infrastructure)

* threats to national security

* cyberattacks, e.g. automatic discovery of vulnerabilities/exploits

* software that would "influence real or virtual events" (I'm guessing they mean elections?)

* social engineering

* generating fake news / propaganda

* generating child porn or deep fakes

Note that it's not banning these, but asking US government departments as well as private companies, AI experts, academia, for their inputs on what regulations could/should be. In that sense, this Mozilla letter is a response to the EO.

Also, there's no mention of the use of certain pronouns, nor of an AI-caused apocalypse (not even a mention of paperclips!).

[1] https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-action...

[chasd00]

i was being a bit extreme so thanks for the clarifications. Something about this topic brings out a lot of emotion from me.

[mrangle]

I think they mean to borrow from the fear of the former in order to apply it to the latter in practice, when using the term in the abstract. At least when speaking to the public.

But not to worry. For better or worse, in short time these concerns will seem like they were a foolish delusion. If not because of their questionable morality, then because they were so wildly unrealistic in application.

That's not to say that AI safety won't be a topic for decades to come or longer, simply because it confers political and harassment power. Even if ineffective in terms of AI in practice.