A portray featured within the movie “The Matrix Resurrections.” A piano enjoying computer-generated music based mostly on the actions of a bacterial colony. A small military of Spam cans with mechanical fingers, all collaboratively pecking at keys to sort a narrative composed by synthetic intelligence.
At instances humorous, at instances chilling, reveals on the Misalignment Museum’s grand opening earned curious glances Friday night as passersby peered via the massive home windows of the artwork set up at 201 Guerrero St close to 14th Road.
The museum, which will likely be open via Might 1, goals to deepen public understanding of the doubtless sweeping penalties of supercharged AI. Following a 12 months marked by leaps ahead in AI’s capabilities, attendees – in addition to the museum’s director/curator, Audrey Kim –expressed a mix of pleasure for brand spanking new applied sciences and fears that humanity could also be unprepared for what comes subsequent.
Tech worker Neal Grantham stated he’s “enthusiastic about the place we’re proper now” and that he is had enjoyable interacting with the favored textual content generator ChatGPT, which was launched in November.
“I am OK proper now,” he stated. “Ask me in 5 years.”
In contrast, Tatiana, one other tech firm worker who declined to provide her final title, stated she has “a little bit of a nihilist perspective” on know-how. She worries that sufficiently superior AI can have devastating implications for the world as we all know it.
“I simply assume that in the end our species is simply the incubator for the following intelligence, which is AI,” she stated with a partly joking smile.
Kim, who works for the artwork manufacturing group Eurytheus, curated the present in 4 months utilizing funding from an nameless donor. She imagines a post-apocalyptic world wherein AI seizes management of many of the globe in a bid to achieve extra computational assets. After slaughtering virtually everybody alive, the AI realizes the error of its method and creates the Misalignment Museum as a memorial to civilization.
“Sorry for killing most of humanity,” reads a caption that’s seen from the road.
Kim, who acquired excited about AI security whereas engaged on self-driving automobiles at Cruise, is not positive whether or not such a horrific chain of occasions might actually occur. However with the explosion of computer-made artwork and literature this previous 12 months because of ChatGPT and the image-creating DALL-E – to not point out Microsoft Bing’s sometimes-confrontational chatbot that launched final month – she believes conversations about AI’s potential are extra essential than ever.
“I feel there’s something to have a look at that’s tangible, which might enhance understanding and data,” Kim stated.
The longer term is just not set
Audrey Kim, curator, museum director
Among the many museum’s most putting reveals is “Paperclip Embrace,” a sculpture composed of roughly 15,000 paperclips depicting two individuals embracing. It is a reference to “the paperclip maximizer,” a thought experiment wherein programmers instruct AI to provide as many paperclips as attainable.
With no sense of morality, the AI within the thought experiment creates paper clips in any respect prices. As a result of people might doubtlessly destroy the AI, negating its capability to make paperclips – and since human beings are losing atoms that may very well be was paperclips – the AI decides to kill all people.
For Kim, this thought experiment illustrates the significance of warning and cautious planning as know-how advances.
“I feel it is extremely unlikely that AI will extract my atoms to show me into paper clips,” she stated, laughing. “Nonetheless, I do assume that there are a variety of harmful outcomes that would occur with this know-how.”
Kim is very fearful concerning the dangerous prospects of synthetic normal intelligence (AGI), which refers to an AI that may perceive or be taught any process {that a} human being can. She worries that the shortage of a “management valve” on such intelligence might actually destabilize civilization and even destroy humanity.
Therefore the title of the Misalignment Museum: a “misaligned” AGI can be one with an underdeveloped data and acceptance of ethics.
The caption hanging above the doorway to the museum’s decrease flooring reads, “Abandon all hope, ye who enter right here,” a reference to the inscription on the gates of hell in Dante Alighieri’s Inferno. Kim does not assume individuals ought to abandon all hope. However she does assume individuals ought to take know-how’s prospects critically.
Kim sees these prospects as scary, but in addition doubtlessly constructive. “Like, the longer term is just not set,” she stated.
Kim hopes that the Misalignment Museum will encourage individuals within the tech business to assume extra fastidiously concerning the implications of their work, realizing the impression it might have on society and future generations.
The exhibit is not only for techies, although. Kim hopes that it’s going to encourage guests from all walks of life to understand the function that know-how is already enjoying of their lives and be extra considerate about points like digital privateness.
“I would like individuals to be extra conscious and never simply go quietly into this good evening,” she stated.
A successfullaunch
Hillary Clark, considered one of two artists answerable for the paperclip sculpture, is on board. She sees art-generating software program as a strong instrument that artists are simply now starting to discover.
“Now we have this chance proper now to create a brand new dialogue about what tech is,” she stated.
Customer Paul McKellar, who has a grasp’s diploma in Pc Engineering, agreed. He’s referred to AI as “the know-how of our time,” however stated it is tough for individuals to wrap their heads round it when so lots of its most excessive implications would require an enormous soar in its talents.
“I feel it is affordable to be fearful. I feel it is exhausting to be fearful, as a result of it’s totally distant,” he stated.
Whatever the background, guests laughed and regarded with curiosity at most of the museum’s quirkier installations. These embrace a kneeler at which guests can communicate to an AI that responds with the “voice of God,” in addition to a pair of roving Roomba vacuum cleaners outfitted with brooms.
Kim stated she was shocked by how a lot help the Misalignment Museum has already acquired. 100 tickets for the grand opening offered out inside two days, and the enterprise agency Factorial Funds contributed $250,000 to the museum Friday.
She hopes to lift $2.5 million for the exhibit by Might 1, which might enable the museum to get a bigger, everlasting location.
Kim stated Saturday afternoon she is just not positive what precisely is drawing so many individuals in, however the museum appears to be “resonating” with individuals within the Bay.
“One thing is happening,” she stated. “It is like, ‘Alright. We’re gonna all determine this out collectively.’”
The museum is open to the general public Thursdays and Fridays 4-7 pm and Saturday 2-5 pm
