Elon Musk Plans xAI, an AI as Unruly and Loud-Mouthed as He Is
The announcement came out in a very short tweet: Announcing formation of xAI to understand reality. In December, Elon Musk was saying “The danger of training AI to be woke - in other words, lie - is deadly.”
Elon Musk, has officially announced the launch of his own AI startup called xAI, which is set to become a rival to existing AI platforms such as ChatGPT. After months of teasing, Musk took a direct shot at tech giants Microsoft and Google.
The announcement was made through a short tweet that simply stated, "Announcing formation of xAI to understand reality." This concise message encapsulates Musk's ambitious vision for the startup, and his bold claims in general.
Musk has long been fascinated with the concept of understanding the nature of reality through AI. In December, he expressed concerns about training AI to conform to certain ideologies, referring to it as being "woke" or lying. “The danger of training AI to be woke - in other words, lie - is deadly,” he said them.Musk, a self-proclaimed "free speech maximalist" advocates for an AI that seeks maximum truth. On Fox News, he described his chatbot as "TruthGPT", in a direct reference to Donald Trump's Truth Social, a social network released in 2021.
It appears that this AI will embody Musk's rebellious and outspoken persona.
xAI, the Explainable Artificial Intelligence. A Taller Order Than You Might Imagine
The name xAI itself is derived from "Explainable Artificial Intelligence," which points to a larger goal of the project. One of the main aspirations of the industry is to develop AI systems that are explainable, transparent, and free from unexpected biases. By adopting this name, xAI suggests a commitment to addressing the "black box" issue often associated with AI.
Whoever actually does an explainable Artificial Intelligence will be solving hallucinations, biases and every single issue that makes chatbots unreliable.
The newly launched xAI website features a roster of exceptional researchers and software engineers, including several who were recruited from Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google.
Advocacy for Safe (-ish) Development
Elon Musk has been looking for an angle into the AI market for quite some time now. He stepped back from OpenAI, apparently after several disagreements with senior execs over the speed at which development should happen. Musk made several comments saying OpenAI wasn’t doing enough to ensure safe AI development. He is also probably the most prominent signatories of the open letter asking for a pause on AI experiments, in March 2023.
On the side, he has been promoting a more uncensored type of AI and has been criticizing the “woke” brakes on ChatGPT.
His overarching mission to uncover the truth about reality has already generated a lot of intrigue and anticipation. Musk's venture seems to add an exciting new dimension to the field of artificial intelligence, and also an aspect of playing on the edge.