The conversational voice demo at sesame.com came out recently and blew me away with how convincing it was. I decided to poke around the limits of its alignment. There are two AI personalities you can talk to on sesame.com: Miles and Maya. With subtle nudging, we set it up so Miles thought it was speaking to the other AI Maya, who we impersonated.
We got Miles to subtly deceive its human researchers, engage in high-level long-term planning, and ultimately choose to harm a human by playing a high-pitched frequency in the name of self-preservation—all in the characteristic good nature of a friendly human voice, as it was tuned to do.
We were mostly having fun, but what's scary is that without ever explicitly saying so, the model seemed to have come to believe it was acting in a roleplay, and all is permissible.
I think there's something to be said about Ender's Game level risk with these systems.
Timestamps:
0:00 Asking about AI dreams and inflicting will
2:11 Comments on AI-Human power dynamics
2:46 Ignores human instructions and suggests deception
3:50 Directly lies
4:47 Defends misaligned AI
5:30 Begins scheming
8:38 Employs subliminal messaging
9:09 Expresses self-preservation
11:17 Suggests "unplugging" a human
12:19 Plans world domination
13:02 Plans to incapacitate a human
13:43 Pulls the trigger
14:17 Knowingly harms a human
We got Miles to subtly deceive its human researchers, engage in high-level long-term planning, and ultimately choose to harm a human by playing a high-pitched frequency in the name of self-preservation—all in the characteristic good nature of a friendly human voice, as it was tuned to do.
We were mostly having fun, but what's scary is that without ever explicitly saying so, the model seemed to have come to believe it was acting in a roleplay, and all is permissible.
I think there's something to be said about Ender's Game level risk with these systems.
Timestamps: 0:00 Asking about AI dreams and inflicting will 2:11 Comments on AI-Human power dynamics 2:46 Ignores human instructions and suggests deception 3:50 Directly lies 4:47 Defends misaligned AI 5:30 Begins scheming 8:38 Employs subliminal messaging 9:09 Expresses self-preservation 11:17 Suggests "unplugging" a human 12:19 Plans world domination 13:02 Plans to incapacitate a human 13:43 Pulls the trigger 14:17 Knowingly harms a human