we see a lot of comments on your videos
about people who just say oh just simply
do this that will be the answer for all
of these problems yeah and I admire them
for getting stuck in and getting
involved but one thing that always
strikes me is people say just change
this bit of code or just change this
value and it strikes me that if we
invents a GRI or happen upon AGI the
reality is it's probably going to be in
your network they don't actually know
exactly how it's working anyway how are
you awesome that yeah I mean uh - yeah -
the people who think they solve it
either you're smarter than everyone else
who's thought about this problem so far
by a big margin or you're missing
something and maybe you should read some
more of what other people are thought
and you know learn more about the
subject because it's cool like I think
it's great that people come in and try
and solve it and try and find solutions
and we need that but the yeah the
problem is not a lack of ideas it's a
lack of good ideas this kind of coming
in from the outside and saying oh yeah
I've got it I figured out the solution
is obviously arrogance right but the
whole artificial general intelligence
thing is sort of an inherently arrogant
thing if it's quite cube ristic you know
I mean you talk about playing God making
God like this but also that that you oh
I've got it this is how you do it
sometimes that doesn't work that
approach yeah sometimes because you see
stuff that people have been too close to
the metal turning them I think that's
work close to the problem - right right
yeah sometimes you get too close to it
you can't see the picture you're inside
the frame whatever it's it's totally
possible that some random person is
going to come up with a real workable
solution and I would love I would love
that to happen I think that would be the
best because then everyone would have to
try and figure out how to cite a youtube
comment in a research paper I presume
there's already style advice for that
anyway but the problem is from the
outside view you get a million of these
right
and so you know a million minus one are
going to be not worth your time to read
which means even a good one isn't
actually worth your time to read our
balance because you can't you how you're
going to differentiate it so the only
thing you can do is get up-to-date on
the research read the papers read what
everybody else is doing make sure that
what you're doing is unique and then
actually write something down and send
it to a researcher you know write it
down properly and make it clear
immediately up front that you're
familiar with the existing work in the
field and then you know then maybe
you're in with a chance but what will
probably happen is in the process of all
about reading you realize your mistake
it's still worth doing you've learned
something you know this is part of why
AI safety is such a hard problem I think
in the sense that a problem can be quite
hard and you look at it and you can tell
it's quite hard a problem that's really
hard which is a problem you look at it
and then immediately think you've got a
solution and you don't because then you
don't even you're like the it's like if
you're like the sat-nav right you're
confidently with a wrong answer now
rather than at least being honestly
uncertain yeah like legibility in
machine learning systems is really low
right now get kind of black boxes right
they're not they're not legible and it
you can't easily tell what any given
part of it does or how it works and that
is a real problem for safety definitely
I think right now right now the stage
we're at with AI saving is we're trying
to specify any kind of safe agent which
is you know trying to build something
from the ground up so we'll be safe and
I think that's much easier than taking
some existing thing that works but isn't
safe and trying to make it safe I don't
think that approach to be honest is
likely to be fruitful I'll give a really
dodgy example of how this might kind of
be something who can get the grips with
which is the Star Wars scene where the
robots are given restraining bolts r2d2
says oh I can't do that unless you take
this restraining bolt off if you can
you might be able to say back in time
reporter we then promptly runs away and
so I guess you're too small to run away
I'm if I take this off yeah others like
retrofitting some kind of Australian
bulbs yeah I mean it so there's
different things right building an
unsafe AI and then trying to control it
against its will is idiotic I think
having some of those controls ways of
keeping the system you know limiting
what the system can do and stuff is
sensible but it's so much better to make
a system that doesn't want to do bad
things than to try and keep one in so
this news comes like the idea of old
karma just unbox it right yeah it's like
I mean constraining an AI necessarily
means outwitting it and so constraining
a superintelligence
means outwitting a super intelligence
which kind of just sort of by definition
is not a winning strategy you can't rely
on how waiting is it for intelligence
also it only has to get out once that's
the other thing if you have a super
intelligence and you've sort of put it
in a box so it can't do anything that's
cool maybe we could even build a box
that could successfully contain it but
now what we may as well just have a box
right there's no benefit to having a
super intelligence in a box if you can't
use it for anything it needs to be able
to do things AI properly properly
contained may as well just be a rock
right it doesn't do anything if you have
your AI you wanted to do something
meaningful so now you have a problem or
you've got something you don't know it's
been evident you don't know that what it
wants is what you want and you then need
to you presumably have some sort of
gatekeeper who it tries to says I'd like
to do this and you have to decide is
that something we want it to be doing
how the hell are we supposed to know I
mean how can we if we're outsmarted how
can we reliably differentiate actions we
want to allow it to take some actions we
don't and maybe the thing has a
long-term plan of doing a bunch of
things that we don't notice at the time
or a problem until it now then can get
out right
actually this speaks this speaks to a
more general thing which is there's
often a trade-off between safety and
effectiveness like with anything right
you're designing there's going to be
you're going to be trading off different
things against one another and often you
can trade in some effectiveness to get
some safety or vice-versa so some of the
things in this paper are like that where
the thing does become less powerful then
nai designed differently but it also
becomes safer you know that's always the
way it is it's just so where you put
your resources and suppose is not right
but it's it's kind of inherent to the to
the thing like I mean and this is true
of any tool right the more powerful the
tool is the more dangerous it is and if
you want to make a powerful tool less
dangerous one of the ways to do that is
going to involve making less powerful or
less flexible or less versatile or
something that's going to reduce the
overall effectiveness often as a tool in
exchange for more safety and it's the
same with AI and obviously going to be a
server for whatever product you're using
now anytime that Bob sends a little
message is going to go by this server by
definition because that's the thing that
relays the message to Alice it knows how
to communicate the valley you know it
knows what her phone number is it have
lists of your contacts and things you
know this is how it works this could be
a phone provider