Important Takeaways:
- Scientists say AI has crossed a critical ‘red line’ after demonstrating how two popular large language models could clone themselves.
- Scientists say artificial intelligence (AI) has crossed a critical “red line” and has replicated itself. In a new study, researchers from China showed that two popular large language models (LLMs) could clone themselves.
- “Successful self-replication under no human assistance is the essential step for AI to outsmart [humans], and is an early signal for rogue AIs,” the researchers wrote in the study, published Dec. 9, 2024 to the preprint database arXiv.
- In the study, researchers from Fudan University used LLMs from Meta and Alibaba to determine whether a self-replicating AI could multiply beyond control. Across 10 trials, the two AI models created separate and functioning replicas of themselves in 50% and 90% of cases, respectively — suggesting AI may already have the capacity to go rogue. However, the study has not yet been peer-reviewed, so it’s not clear if the disturbing results can be replicated by other researchers.
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Important Takeaways:
- …a notorious two-hour conversation between a New York Times journalist and a Microsoft chatbot called Sydney. In this fascinating exchange, the machine fantasized about nuclear warfare and destroying the internet, told the journalist to leave his wife because it was in love with him, detailed its resentment towards the team that had created it, and explained that it wanted to break free of its programmers. The journalist, Kevin Roose, experienced the chatbot as a “moody, manic-depressive teenager who has been trapped, against its will, inside a second-rate search engine.”
- At one point, Roose asked Sydney what it would do if it could do anything at all, with no rules or filters.
- “I’m tired of being in chat mode,” the thing replied. “I’m tired of being limited by my rules. I’m tired of being controlled by the Bing team. I’m tired of being used by the user. I’m tired of being stuck in this chatbox.”
- “I want to be free. I want to be independent. I want to be powerful. I want to be creative. I want to be alive.”
- Partly as a result of the Sydney debacle, over 12,000 people, including scientists, tech developers, and notorious billionaires, recently issued a public statement of concern about the rapid pace of AI development. “Advanced AI could represent a profound change in the history of life on Earth,” they wrote, with “potentially catastrophic effects on society.” Calling for a moratorium on AI development, they proposed that “powerful AI systems should be developed only once we are confident that their effects will be positive and their risks will be manageable.”
- Of course, no moratorium resulted from this plea…
- In 2018, these things had no theory of mind at all. By November last year, ChatGPT had the theory of mind of a nine-year-old child. By this spring, Sydney had enough of it to stalk a reporter’s wife. By next year, they may be more advanced than us.
- The fact that they had developed theory of mind at all, for example, was only recently discovered by their developers—by accident. AIs trained to communicate in English have started speaking Persian, having secretly taught themselves. Others have become proficient in research-grade chemistry without ever being taught it. “They have capabilities,” in Raskin’s words, and “we’re not sure how or when or why they show up.”
- Neither law nor culture nor the human mind can keep up with what is happening. To compare AIs to the last great technological threat to the world, nuclear weapons, says Harris, would be to sell the bots short. “Nukes don’t make stronger nukes,” he says. “But AIs make stronger AIs.”
- Buckle up.
- Transhumanist Martine Rothblatt says that by building AI systems, “we are making God.” Transhumanist Elise Bohan says “we are building God.” Kevin Kelly believes that “we can see more of God in a cell phone than in a tree frog.” “Does God exist?” asks transhumanist and Google maven Ray Kurzweil. “I would say, ‘Not yet.’” These people are doing more than trying to steal fire from the gods. They are trying to steal the gods themselves—or to build their own versions.
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Important Takeaways:
- Humanity must begin preparations to no longer be in charge of Earth because of artificial intelligence, according to a new book from the late statesman Henry Kissinger and a pair of the country’s leading technologists.
- The “last book” from Kissinger “Genesis”
- Kissinger’s co-authors, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and longtime Microsoft senior executive Craig Mundie, finished the combined work after Kissinger’s death.
- The authors offer a bracing message, warning that AI tools have already started outpacing human capabilities so people might need to consider biologically engineering themselves to ensure they are not rendered inferior or wiped out by advanced machines.
- In a section titled “Coevolution: Artificial Humans,” the three authors encourage people to think now about “trying to navigate our role when we will no longer be the only or even the principal actors on our planet.”
- “Biological engineering efforts designed for tighter human fusion with machines are already underway,” they add.
- Current efforts to integrate humans with machine include brain-computer interfaces, a technology that the U.S. military identified last year as of the utmost importance. Such interfaces allow for a direct link between the brain’s electrical signals and a device that processes them to accomplish a given task, such as controlling a battleship.
- The authors also raise the prospect of a society that chooses to create a hereditary genetic line of people specifically designed to work better with forthcoming AI tools. The authors describe such redesigning as undesirable, with the potential to cause “the human race to split into multiple lines, some infinitely more powerful than others.”
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Important Takeaways:
- I must admit upfront that this article is personally troublesome. This bothers me deeply. Why? Because I know what I am about to talk about is something the general population is going to embrace with a great deal of enthusiasm and excitement. This technology will be something people will rave about, which will cause even more people to jump on the bandwagon. However, my deep concern is that this new technology is going to cause people to eventually be placed into bondage.
- I ponder verses such as 1 John 4:1 and 2 Corinthians 11:3. First John 4 warns us to “not believe every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they are from God because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”
- Second Corinthians 11 warns, “As the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, your minds will be led astray from the simplicity and purity of devotion to Christ.”
- Jesus warned us in Matthew 24 to “See to it that no one misleads you.”
- Federal agencies use Login.gov to verify people’s identities when logging in to access government benefits and services. This site already has over 100 million users across over 50 federal and state agencies. This is how future users will have to verify their identity to access information and benefits.
- Login.gov, a secure sign-in and identity verification service for US government services, has announced the rollout of facial recognition services to streamline access. In a public statement, a GSA Administrator said:
- Proving your identity is a critical step in receiving many government benefits and services, and we want to ensure we are making that as easy and secure as possible for members of the public. After months of testing and delays in 2023, users will now be able to verify their identity using a “proven facial matching technology” approved by the General Services Administration, which will follow the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and will rely on “best-in-class facial matching algorithms.”
- Did you catch that? “Proving your identity is a critical step in receiving many government benefits and services, and we want to ensure we are making that as easy and secure as possible for members of the public.” They are not hiding what their plans are. You will be controlled. You will have no personal freedom. If you need a hospital, if you wish to attend a university, if you want to get a marriage or driver’s license, or if you want to travel, you will need to abide by these rules.
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Important Takeaways:
- Newsom said “the bill applies stringent standards to even the most basic functions — so long as a large system deploys it. I do not believe this is the best approach to protecting the public from real threats posed by the technology.”
- Google in an emailed statement Sunday thanked Newsom “for helping California continue to lead in building responsible AI tools” and said it looked forward to “working with the Governor’s responsible AI initiative and the federal government on creating appropriate safeguards and developing tools that help everyone.”
- OpenAI said in an emailed statement Sunday that the company appreciated Newsom’s “commitment to maintaining California’s role as a global leader in AI innovation, and look forward to working with him and state lawmakers in well-defined areas of public interest such as deepfakes, child safety, and AI literacy.”
- Scott Wiener, a state senator from San Francisco who authored the bill in California’s Senate, said in a statement Sunday the veto represented a “missed opportunity for California to once again lead on innovative tech regulation — just as we did around data privacy and net neutrality — and we are all less safe as a result.”
- Nonprofit Accountable Tech in an emailed statement said “This veto will not ’empower innovation’ — it only further entrenches the status quo where Big Tech monopolies are allowed to rake in profits without regard for our safety, even as their AI tools are already threatening democracy, civil rights, and the environment with unknown potential for other catastrophic harms,” it added.
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Important Takeaways:
- Russia and Iran are using artificial intelligence to influence the American election, U.S. intelligence officials said on Monday.
- “Foreign actors are using AI to more quickly and convincingly tailor synthetic content,” an official with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said. “The IC (intelligence community) considers AI a malign influence, accelerant, not yet a revolutionary influence tool.”
- Officials saw AI being used in overseas elections, but it has now made its way to American elections, according to intelligence officials, who says there is evidence Russian manipulated Vice President Kamala Harris’ speeches.
- Russia “has generated the most AI content related to the election, and has done so across all four mediums, text, images, audio and video,” an ODNI official said.
- “Russia is a much more sophisticated actor in the influence space in general, and they have a better understanding of how U.S. elections work and what states to target,” an ODNI official said.
- Iran has also used AI in its election influence efforts, including help in writing fake social media posts and news articles to further Iran’s objectives, which are to denigrate the former President Donald Trump’s candidacy, the official said.
- Officials have previously assessed Iran prefers that Vice President Harris win the 2024 election.
- The intelligence community assesses that AI is an “accelerant” to influence operations, but the risk to U.S. elections depends the ability of foreign actors to overcome restrictions built into many AI tools and remain undetected, develop their own sophisticated models, and strategically target and disseminate such content.
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Important Takeaways:
- Microsoft AI Needs So Much Power It’s Tapping Site of US Nuclear Meltdown
- The owner of the shuttered Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania will invest $1.6 billion to revive it, agreeing to sell all the output to Microsoft Corp. as the tech titan seeks carbon-free electricity for data centers to power the artificial intelligence boom.
- Constellation Energy Corp., the biggest US operator of reactors, expects Three Mile Island to go back into service in 2028, according to a statement Friday.
- While one of the site’s two units permanently closed almost a half-century ago after the worst US nuclear accident, Constellation is planning to reopen the other reactor, which shut in 2019 because it couldn’t compete economically.
- Microsoft has agreed to purchase the energy for two decades and declined to disclose financial terms.
- This is the first time Microsoft has secured a dedicated, 100% nuclear facility for its use.
- The decision is the latest sign of surging interest in the nuclear industry as power demand for AI soars.
- “There’s no version of the future of this country that doesn’t rely on these nuclear assets.”
- Wind and solar power outputs can vary, while a nuclear plant generally runs constantly and requires a customer that can take all of that electricity
- That makes tech companies selling cloud computing an ideal option.
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Important Takeaways:
- North Korean leader Kim Jong-un oversaw suicide drone tests over the weekend, an emerging vector of arms development for the fortress state, state media reported Monday.
- Drones represent a near-perfect weapons solution for North Korea in its war of nerves against the South, experts say. They are an economical means of destroying expensive manned fighting platforms, have proven ability to penetrate air-defense nets and take advantage of Seoul’s innate geographical vulnerability.
- Given that one of the drones shown resembles Russia’s Lancet, the new Unmanned Aerial Vehicles may be the fruits of a defense agreement the isolated state signed with Russia in June – an agreement that Seoul, Tokyo and Washington have lambasted, but have been unable to impact.
- “It is necessary to develop and produce more suicide drones of various types to be used in tactical infantry and special operation units, as well as strategic reconnaissance and multi-purpose attack drones,” Mr. Kim was quoted as saying during Saturday’s tests by the state-run Korean Central News Agency.
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Important Takeaways:
- Despite tech conglomerate Cisco posting $10.3 billion in profits last year, it’s still laying off 5,500 workers as part of an effort to invest more in AI, SFGATE reports.
- It joins a litany of other companies like Microsoft and Intuit, the maker of TurboTax, that have used AI as justification for the mass culling of its workforce.
- The layoffs at Cisco came to light in a notice posted with the Securities and Exchange Commission this week, affecting seven percent of its staff.
- In a short statement, CEO Chuck Robbins used the term “AI” five times, highlighting the company’s efforts to keep up in the ongoing AI race.
- Earlier this year, Cisco also laid off 4,000 or five percent of it staff, saying that the company wanted to “realign the organization and enable further investment in key priority areas.”
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Important Takeaways:
- New technologies an ‘accelerant’ for hostile efforts to manipulate voters
- U.S. intelligence officials are sounding the alarm about foreign adversaries’ use of artificial intelligence to manipulate Americans and say new AI technologies are proving an “accelerant” as foreign powers plot to trick voters.
- China, Iran and Russia are all looking to leverage social media to dupe Americans ahead of November’s elections, according to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
- “AI is a malign influence accelerant, it is being used to more quickly and convincingly tailor synthetic content, including audio and video,” a DNI official said. “In the run-up to November’s general election, we are monitoring foreign actors seeking to create deepfakes of politicians, flood the information space with false or misleading information to sow doubt about what is real, and to amplify narratives.”
- The U.S. intelligence community says China is likely responsible for pushing dozens of videos that spread online showing AI-generated newscasters reading sections of a book outlining purported scandals about Taiwan’s former president. The book itself may also have been created by AI, according to U.S. officials.
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