Thread

1. chrsw · 1790867483 · focus · HN ↗

   Imagine if a car company like Ford or Toyota came out and said their new cars are kind of out of control and they needed special indemnities and protection from liabilities if they want to keep selling cars.

   1. giancarlostoro · 1790867640 · focus · HN ↗

      I mean... there is Boeing, which is arguably more horrifying.

      With AI it seems to be internal testing produces wild results, which is unsurprising to me, all of these models can be jailbroken, and as long as that's the case, they're all likely to be exploited maliciously.

      1. dgellow · 1790868703 · focus · HN ↗

         Not just internal, Anthropic’s S-1 literally covers the risk of ending humanity. They are telling their investors a public company could eradicate humanity. Give us money, the risk you have to evaluate in your financial framework is that we could eliminate humankind.

         I’m repeating it because that has to be internalized: the largest IPO ever will be for a company that casually consider they might kill us all and their own employees too. Including their children.

         1. TeMPOraL · 1790882331 · focus · HN ↗

            Yes. That's what x-risk literally means. Still doesn't sink in with people despite 20+ years of it being a topic, and 2+ years of it being a hot one.
   2. ultrarunner · 1790867782 · focus · HN ↗

      Replace this with Tesla, Waymo, etc and it's not far fetched. It might take a while, but liability is going to need a new legal doctrine to describe why it's not their fault that their car & their code killed someone.

      1. Espressosaurus · 1790869427 · focus · HN ↗

         Waymo at least seems to take a reasonable duty of care. Tesla clearly doesn't.
   3. linuxftw · 1790868881 · focus · HN ↗

      Yeah, imagine if pharmaceutical companies did it! Wait...
   4. Gormo · 1790870163 · focus · HN ↗

      Imagine further that there's actually nothing unusually wrong with the cars at all, but the manufacturers are deliberately playing up perceptions of risk in order to encourage regulatory intervention that they know they can influence and/or work around, but which competing solutions can't.
   5. buellerbueller · 1790875769 · focus · HN ↗

      Pharma already has this kind of protection.
   6. TheCoelacanth · 1790883068 · focus · HN ↗

      They pretty much did. Cars get an insane amount of special legal treatment. It's basically legal to kill people with a car as long as you aren't drunk or grossly negligent.

      I will be shocked if I live to see a year where AI kills more people than cars do legally.

      1. lelanthran · 1790883595 · focus · HN ↗

         > It's basically legal to kill people with a car as long as you aren't drunk or grossly negligent.

         It's the same even without cars; if you kill someone by accidentally bumping into someone, or running them down with a bicycle, you aren't going to get charged with murder as long as you aren't grossly negligent.

         Why do you want an exemption for cars?

         1. TheCoelacanth · 1790883978 · focus · HN ↗

            Name one other multi-ton object that you can move through public spaces at high velocities without the law considering it inherently grossly negligent.

            1. lelanthran · 1790921963 · focus · HN ↗

               Sigh.

               > Name one other multi-ton object that you can move through public spaces at high velocities without the law considering it inherently grossly negligent.

               That is not the point I replied to.

               This is a different point, namely, "Using a car on public roads is, by itself, grossly negligent".

               1. TheCoelacanth · 1790960348 · focus · HN ↗

                  Using a car on public roads at the speeds they typically go now would be (and was) considered grossly negligent without special laws allowing it.

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