Today, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman addressed the United Nations Security Council on artificial intelligence. He discussed AI’s potential to expand opportunity, the importance of keeping powerful systems under human control, and the need for international cooperation on AI safety.
Thank you, Mr. President and your Excellencies. I’m honored to be here and to be able to speak with you all at this important time.
We have been talking about artificial intelligence for years, but it feels different in recent weeks and months. Rapid model progress has made the timeline feel more compressed, the upside more tangible, but also the stakes and the risks more immediate.
We have a choice in front of us. AI can either be more like a new Renaissance of creativity and discovery, or more like a new Industrial Revolution of upheaval and disarray.
The Renaissance was a time when new tools, new ideas, and new institutions expanded what people believed they could do. AI can play that role for our time. I believe that people are much more capable than they imagine themselves to be, but have been held back by limited technology that was meant to empower but instead distracts and often steals attention.
The best version of AI is not about making people cogs in a giant machine, or optimizing every part of life until the human parts disappear. It is about giving people more agency in an ever more complex world: more ability to learn, to create, discover, build, participate. There are many things that AI cannot—and should not—automate.
AI should be built for people, not simply to turn the crank of the machines faster for their own sake. Some of the things people working to build AI have said are so dystopian that they sound like the plot of bad science fiction movies.
Anything this powerful is also intimidating. This moment is complicated as we feel both tremendous potential and very understandable anxiety at the same time.
These models can help people discover new knowledge: new medicines, better health care, stronger education, and build more productive economies. They can be new tools for people to pursue dreams and ambition that today feel out of reach. The complexity of life has increased so dramatically for the average person. AI can be a defensive tool against this complexity as much as it can be this tool of unprecedented discovery and innovation.
On the other hand, as AI systems become more capable and more autonomous, they could move faster than our institutions, concentrate power in too few hands, or make decisions that people no longer understand or control.
That concern becomes especially important as we approach systems that can improve themselves and future versions of themselves, often called recursive self-improvement. As the process of building AI becomes more automated, the pace of AI progress could accelerate rapidly. This moment calls for extreme care.
I largely agree with Professor Bengio. Although I’ll say two instead of three—I believe there are two ways that AI progress could go very badly that we have to avoid.
First, we could lose control of the future to AI. The risk is that it moves so fast that people can no longer follow what’s happening or intervene when needed. This would obviously be terrible.
The industry must not accept too much technological risk just because the benefits are too great and that they feel too important to slow down. Beating companies in a competitive pace is not a reason to make rash decisions. Nor do we believe we are locked in a race where we are unable to do that. We have unilaterally slowed down in the past. We will do so in the future. We do not want to build systems—we think it’s important that everyone avoids building systems—where we cannot make the alignment, monitorability, and safety guarantees that we must.
We need to understand what these systems are doing and have strong evidence that they will do what people intend, even as they get very, very smart. Actually especially as they get very very smart. It doesn’t matter whether people put the risk of catastrophe at 10%, or 1%, or 12%, or .1%. None of these levels are remotely acceptable. And we should not train models that we cannot make an extremely strong case that we will be able to keep under human control.
So that’s one way things can go wrong. In the other direction, these systems could concentrate too much power in too few hands. No one person or company or country should be able to use the most powerful AI models to impose their worldview on everyone else. A company or country that believes only it can be trusted with this technology can use that belief to justify almost anything else. We have to reject that logic, even when it’s convenient for any one actor.
我相信，有一條務實的道路能讓我們應對這兩方面的問題。在 OpenAI，我們以明確目標處理這些問題：人工智能應讓人們更有能力掌控自己的生活。讓人們有更多自由，按自己的意願生活。讓人們更有能力解決大大小小的問題，改善所屬社群。我們不想陷入盲目樂觀，也不想陷入末日悲觀論。走向任何一個極端，都無助我們妥善應對眼前的挑戰。尤其當下，世界各地的人們正面對極其嚴峻的挑戰，而這項技術能協助解決這些難題。因此，我們嘗試在這兩個極端之間，走出一條平衡的道路。
對我們而言，這代表三項原則。
第一，隨着人工智能能力提升，人類必須繼續處於人工智能決策的核心。對齊並非抽象的研究問題。這項工作旨在確保這些系統可靠地受人類控制、體現人類價值觀，並協助人們引導下一階段的發展。我們不打算、也絕不能將人類判斷或人類價值觀自動化。
第二，科學進步和經濟增長帶來的裨益，必須由人創造，並由人享有。人工智能應協助研究人員取得新發現、醫生治療病人、教師教導學生、創業者成立公司，以及社群解決以往看似無法解決的問題，並在更多方面提供協助。人類不斷進步，並不是因為工具取代了人自主決定和行動的能力，而是因為合適的工具讓人更有能力。我相信，這種能力的提升將遠超我們目前認為可能的程度。
第三，這項技術必須提升每個人的能力。美好的未來，有賴人們發揮潛能，為自己、所屬社群、國家以至整個世界創造價值。我們或許是這項技術的開發者之一，但並非這個故事的英雄。我們的角色是幫助世界各地的人發揮能力，並相信人類技能與才智所蘊藏的奇妙力量。
如今，我們已有能夠發現人類從未掌握的新知識的模型。以數學方面的進展為例：3 年前的夏天，我們的模型處理小學數學問題的表現尚算可以；2 年前的夏天，模型在高中數學競賽中已表現不俗；去年夏天，我們在最享負盛名的國際數學競賽中達到金牌水平。就在幾星期前，也就是今年夏天，我們其中一個模型解決了千禧年大獎難題之一：納維－斯托克斯方程。
這些方程用於飛機設計、天氣預報和血流研究。我們並非純粹為解題而解題，而是要讓人們有能力發現新知識，並運用這些知識改善醫療、提升生活水平，以及拓展全球每一個人的潛能。仍有大量未知事物等待發現。
但至關重要的是，企業不可取代民主程序。
要讓人工智能符合民主原則，最重要的決策就不能只由三藩市的實驗室作出。民主程序，以及對其所服務的人民負責的政府，都必須參與塑造這些決策。
在國際層面，這需要各方合作。回顧歷史，面對強大的新技術，即使彼此競爭、關係未必融洽的國家，也曾為共同利益和集體福祉攜手合作。我們相信，此刻也必須如此。
我們需要一套機制，讓國家及國際層面的前沿人工智能標準互相配合。這些標準應涵蓋能力衡量、風險評估、保障措施是否充足的判斷，以及如何在系統日益自主的情況下，維持有效的人類監督。
我們需要共同標準，讓各國能夠比較證據、核實合規情況，並就當前發展建立共通的語言和理解。
我們需要準確迅速的事故通報，以及分類和報告規程，讓全球能從失誤中汲取教訓，避免其演變成災難。
我們亦需要在各國政府、關鍵基礎設施營運者和技術專家之間建立安全渠道，以分享新出現的漏洞和威脅。
這些標準顯然不應鞏固現有企業的地位，也不應偏袒任何一種商業模式。標準必須同時支持開放及封閉模型的開發人員、新加入的企業及已有根基的實驗室，並兼顧各國的決策權限與國際合作。各國政府應自行決定如何將標準納入本國法律制度。但如果我們能在全球層面，就甚麼是可靠的證據、完善的保障措施及有效的監督達成共識，所有人都會受惠。
我們並非掌握所有答案，也非常樂意聽取任何更好的想法。我們已準備好與各位攜手合作，竭盡所能找出前路。
我們正身處十字路口。其中一條路通往權力集中、決策不透明的世界，人們會覺得，這項一生中最重要的技術正強加於自己身上。另一條路則通往這樣的世界：人工智能為人服務，因為人們透過民主制度參與決定其發展方向並加以引導；科學進步真正改善生活；更多人能參與塑造未來；而這項技術繼續賦予個人和社群更大力量，按自己的意願生活。在這個未來，潛能得以實現，處處令人振奮和驚歎。
我們相信，這樣的未來值得建設。非常感謝各位。
