Elon Musk has revealed what pushed him to establish OpenAI. He said that the foundation of the AI company was spurred by ‘a philosophical clash’ with Google co-founder Larry Page who, the Tesla CEO says, was on the side of computers. In an video interview, which is now making rounds on the internet, Musk recounted a conversation during his birthday party where Page reportedly called him a “speciesist” – a term used to describe someone who favours the survival of the human species over that of digital superintelligence.“The reason I founded OpenAI was because I was concerned, based on my conversations with Larry Page, that he was not sufficiently concerned about the dangers of AI. At my birthday party, he, in front of a large group of people, called me a speciesist, for favoring humanity over computers,” he said in the video, adding, “So after that, I was like, We got to have some counterbalance to Google, because Larry doesn’t seem to care if humans make it or not.”
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Elon Musk on what ‘Open’ means in OpenAI
According to Musk, he thought about a different kind of organisation with a structure that was directly opposite of Google’s for-profit model.“So I thought, what’s the opposite of Google? It would be an open source nonprofit, and that’s where the word open, in OpenAI comes from. It means open source,” he explained. Musk went on to say that he “provided all the money, recruited the key people, and taught them everything I know. I actually even got them to deal with Microsoft”, highlighting his role in the startup’s infancy.
Elon Musk says he refused financial rewards at OpenAI
Continuing with the non-profit stance, Musk highlighted that he intentionally turned down an offer for shares in the company to maintain the integrity of its ‘non-profit’ mission.“I did not seek any financial reward whatsoever. The reason I actually took down the offer for shares is because, I mean, I felt like what are the shares, and why like nonprofits supposed to have shares? Nonprofits are not supposed to be self enrichment, so that’s why I turned on the offer of shares,” he concluded.