OpenAI, the company behind the AI chatbot ChatGPT, has announced ten equal grants worth $1 million to experiment with democratic processes that determine how AI software should be governed to address bias and other factors. The company aims to fund recipients that present compelling frameworks for answering questions on whether AI ought to criticize public figures and what it should consider as the median individual in the world.
Critics of AI systems, such as ChatGPT, point out that these systems have inherent biases due to the inputs used to shape their views. The users have found examples of racist or sexist outputs from the AI software. Concerns are growing that AI working alongside search engines like Alphabet’s Google and Microsoft’s Bing may produce incorrect information convincingly.
AI Regulation
OpenAI, which is backed by $10 billion from Microsoft, has been leading the call for the regulation of AI. However, it recently threatened to pull out of the European Union over proposed rules. According to Sam Altman, OpenAI’s chief executive, the current draft of the EU AI Act would be over-regulating. He also stated that they have heard that it is going to get pulled back, and they are still talking about it.
The startup’s grants would not fund that much AI research. Salaries for AI engineers and others in the red-hot sector easily top $100,000 and can exceed $300,000. OpenAI said in a blog post that AI systems “should benefit all of humanity and be shaped to be as inclusive as possible.” The company is launching this grant program to take a first step in this direction.
The San Francisco-based startup said the results of the funding could shape its views on AI governance, but no recommendations would be binding. Altman has been a leading figure calling for the regulation of AI while simultaneously rolling out new updates to ChatGPT and image-generator DALL-E. He appeared before a U.S. Senate subcommittee this month, saying “if this technology goes wrong, it can go quite wrong.”
Microsoft also recently endorsed comprehensive regulation of AI even as it has vowed to insert the technology into its products, racing with OpenAI, Google, and startups to offer AI to consumers and businesses.
AI’s Potential and Concerns
Nearly every sector has an interest in AI’s potential to improve efficiency and cut labor costs, along with concerns that AI could spread misinformation or factual inaccuracies, what industry insiders call “hallucinations.” AI is already behind several widely believed spoofs. One recent phony viral image of an explosion near the Pentagon briefly affected the stock market.
Despite calls for greater regulation, Congress has failed to pass new legislation to meaningfully curtail Big Tech. OpenAI’s grants aim to fund recipients that present compelling frameworks to determine how AI software should be governed to address bias and other factors. The company believes that the results of the funding could shape its views on AI governance, but no recommendations would be binding.
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