While technology experts sound the alarm on the pace of artificial-intelligence development, philanthropists — including long-established foundations and tech billionaires — have been responding with an uptick in grants.
Much of the philanthropy is focused on what is known as technology for good or “ethical AI,” which explores how to solve or mitigate the harmful effects of artificial-intelligence systems. Some scientists believe AI can be used to predict climate disasters and discover new drugs to save lives.
Eric E. Schmidt, co-founder of Schmidt Futures, listens Feb. 23, 2021, on Capitol Hill in Washington during a hearing on emerging technologies and their impact on national security.
Others are warning that the large language models could soon upend white-collar professions, fuel misinformation and threaten national security.
What philanthropy can do to influence the trajectory of AI is starting to emerge. Billionaires who earned their fortunes in technology are more likely to support projects and institutions that emphasize the positive outcomes of AI, while foundations not endowed with tech money tended to focus more on AI’s dangers.
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For example, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and his wife, Wendy, committed hundreds of millions of dollars to AI grantmaking programs housed at Schmidt Futures to “accelerate the next global scientific revolution.” In addition to committing $125 million to advance research into AI, last year the philanthropic venture announced a $148 million program to help postdoctoral fellows apply AI to science, technology, engineering and mathematics.
Also in the AI enthusiast camp is the Patrick McGovern Foundation, named after the late billionaire who founded the International Data Group and one of a few philanthropies that made AI and data science an explicit grantmaking priority. In 2021, the foundation committed $40 million to help nonprofits use artificial intelligence and data to advance “their work to protect the planet, foster economic prosperity, ensure healthy communities,” according to a news release. McGovern also has an internal team of AI experts who work to help nonprofits use the technology to improve their programs.
“I am an incredible optimist about how these tools are going to improve our capacity to deliver on human welfare,” said Vilas Dhar, president of Patrick J. McGovern Foundation. “What I think philanthropy needs to do, and civil society writ large, is to make sure we realize that promise and opportunity — to make sure these technologies don’t merely become one more profit-making sector of our economy but rather are invested in furthering human equity.”
Salesforce also is interested in helping nonprofits use AI. The software company announced last month that it will award $2 million to education, workforce and climate organizations “to advance the equitable and ethical use of trusted AI.”
Billionaire entrepreneur and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman is another big donor who believes AI can improve humanity and has funded research centers at Stanford University and the University of Toronto to achieve that goal. He is betting AI can positively transform areas like health care and education, he told the New York Times in May.
The enthusiasm for AI solutions among tech billionaires is not uniform, however.
EBay founder Pierre Omidyar has taken a mixed approach through his Omidyar Network, which is making grants to nonprofits using the technology for scientific innovation as well as those trying to protect data privacy and advocate for regulation.
Grantmakers that hold a more skeptical or negative perspective on AI are also not a uniform group; however, they tend to be foundations unaffiliated with the tech industry.
The Ford, MacArthur and Rockefeller foundations number among several grantmakers funding nonprofits examining the harmful effects of AI.
For example, computer scientists Timnit Gebru and Joy Buolamwini, who conducted pivotal research on racial and gender bias from facial-recognition tools — which persuaded Amazon, IBM and other companies to pull back on the technology in 2020 — received sizable grants from them and other big, established foundations.
Gebru launched the Distributed Artificial Intelligence Research Institute in 2021 to research AI’s harmful effects on marginalized groups “free from Big Tech’s pervasive influence.” The institute raised $3.7 million in initial funding from the MacArthur Foundation, Ford Foundation, Kapor Center, Open Society Foundations and the Rockefeller Foundation. The Ford, MacArthur, and Open Society foundations are financial supporters of the Chronicle.
Buolamwini is continuing research on and advocacy against artificial-intelligence and facial-recognition technology through her Algorithmic Justice League, which also received at least $1.9 million in support from the Ford, MacArthur and Rockefeller foundations as well as from the Alfred P. Sloan and Mozilla foundations.
The Ford Foundation also launched a Disability x Tech Fund through Borealis Philanthropy, which is supporting efforts to fight bias against people with disabilities in algorithms and artificial intelligence.
There are also AI skeptics among the tech elite awarding grants. Tesla CEO Elon Musk warned AI could result in “civilizational destruction.” In 2015, he gave $10 million to the Future of Life Institute, a nonprofit that aims to prevent “existential risk” from AI.
Is ChatGPT running out of steam? AI chatbot’s performance raises burnout concerns
Is ChatGPT running out of steam? AI chatbot’s performance raises burnout concerns
After taking the tech world by storm and almost single-handedly starting an AI arms race among big tech companies, OpenAI’s ChatGPT appears to be experiencing fluctuations in performance, raising questions about potential burnout.
What Happened: A study conducted by researchers at Stanford University delved into the performance of ChatGPT over several months, focusing on four diverse tasks: solving math problems, answering sensitive questions, generating software code, and visual reasoning.
The study revealed wild fluctuations, referred to as drift, in the chatbot’s ability to perform these tasks. Benzinga reviewed the research and highlighted the study’s key findings.
GPT-3.5 Vs. GPT-4
The study compared two versions of OpenAI’s AI-powered platform: GPT-3.5 and GPT-4. Surprisingly, GPT-4’s performance in solving math problems showcased a significant decline in just three months – between March and June.
In March, the model correctly identified that 17077 is a prime number 97.6% of the time, but by June, its accuracy plummeted to a mere 2.4%. Conversely, GPT-3.5 demonstrated an almost opposite trajectory, with the March version answering correctly only 7.4% of the time and the June version consistently right 86.8% of the time.
The Black Box Dilemma
Since OpenAI decided against making its code open source, researchers and the public have little visibility into the changes made to the neural architectures or the training data, making it difficult to understand the hidden complexities behind these fluctuations.
ChatGPT’s Fading Explanation Skills
In addition to the declining performance, ChatGPT’s ability to explain its reasoning has become less apparent over time. The study stated that the chatbot provided step-by-step reasoning for specific questions in March, but by June, it ceased to do so without clear reasons.
Not Sure Of The Exact Reason
James Zuo, a Stanford computer science professor and study author, highlighted the unintended consequences of tweaking large language models. These adjustments aimed at improving specific tasks can harm others due to complex interdependencies in the model’s responses, which remains poorly understood due to the model’s closed-source nature, reported Fortune.
Why It’s Important: Earlier last month, it was reported that ChatGPT has been experiencing a summer slump with a surprising 9.7% decrease in website traffic in June compared to May, raising concerns about its sustained popularity.
Unique visitors also dropped by 5.7%, and time spent on the site declined by 8.5%, hinting at a possible decline in user engagement. Some experts suggest that the initial novelty of ChatGPT may be wearing off, while the launch of the iOS app in May could have also diverted traffic to the more convenient mobile application.
This story was produced by Benzinga and reviewed and distributed by Stacker Media.
