Comment by eknkc
2 hours ago
> which they clearly think is bad
These are companies with huge amounts of money invested in them. Their main responsibility is to their investors. If building better models (or making more money from the models they already have) would increase returns, they would do it. So they clearly can’t do it right now.
Climate change hasn’t stopped the oil industry, and concerns about forever chemicals haven’t stopped the chemical industry. Companies don’t usually give up profitable opportunities just because they might be harmful or kill us all in the long term..
I think you fundamentally misunderstand what kind of company Anthropic is. I'm simply taking the path of least resistance when understanding what people at Anthropic have to say, and basically every public source points to Anthropic talking the talk as well as walking the walk with regards to AI safety and their ideas on AI governance.
Re the point on returning shareholder value, Anthropic is a PBC:
> Public Benefit Purpose: Under Delaware law, a PBC allows directors to legally weigh social and public good alongside maximizing profit for stockholders
Investors surely know this and Anthropic probably has pretty reasonable legal grounds to stand on if they chose to prioritize safety over profits.
Seems pretty clear to me that this is in earnest.
Oh I am terribly sorry, did not know Anthropic was formed as a a “Good Company”. Which changes everything ever.
Snark aside, maybe I’m too pessimistic and you are correct on this. But.. doesn’t that mean we are completely fucked? If they don’t have any ulterior motive and they truly are panicking.. We should start packing.