In a recent announcement, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman revealed that the company is not currently working on developing GPT-5. Instead, their focus has shifted to improving their existing language model, GPT-4.
This news comes after an open letter was circulated among the tech community calling for OpenAI to halt the progress of language models beyond GPT-4. The letter, which has been supported by several technology leaders including Elon Musk and Steve Wozniak, details concerns about the safety of AI systems as they advance and asks that the training of future versions be paused by at least six months.
In response to the letter, Altman stated that it lacked “most technical nuance about where we need the pause”. He also noted that the company is doing other things on top of GPT-4 that have all sorts of safety issues that are important to address and were totally left out of the letter.
GPT-4 is the latest version of OpenAI’s Generative Pretrained Transformer (GPT) language model. It has been praised for its ability to generate human-like text and perform a wide range of natural language processing tasks. However, as with any advanced technology, there are concerns about its potential impact on society.
The open letter calling for a pause in the development of future language models highlights these concerns. It states that “AI systems with human-competitive intelligence can pose profound risks to society and humanity as shown by extensive research and acknowledged by top AI labs”. The letter goes on to ask questions such as “Should we let machines flood our information channels with propaganda and untruth?” and “Should we risk loss of control of our civilization?”
In his response to the letter, Altman acknowledged the importance of addressing safety issues as AI capabilities become more advanced. However, he also pointed out that there are other things being done on top of GPT-4 that have safety issues that need to be addressed.
It remains to be seen what improvements will be made to GPT-4 and how this will impact the development of future language models. For now, it seems that OpenAI is taking a cautious approach and focusing on improving their existing technology rather than rushing to develop something new.
