‘That is recklessness’: Florida’s staunch GOP AI opponents slam Altman’s ‘bad things’ comments

Por Andrew Atterbury — POLITICO – TOP Stories

TALLAHASSEE, Florida — Florida Republican leaders are panning OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s comments that “the world should accept some bad things happening for the benefits” of artificial intelligence development at large, continuing their hardline stances against the industry at large.

Two of the staunchest critics fighting to regulate the technology — Gov. Ron DeSantis and Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier — sharply disagreed with Altman’s comments to POLITICO.

“And a handful of tech oligarchs get to make that decision for the rest of us?” DeSantis said Sunday about Altman’s statement.

“No dice.”

Florida, through proposed legislation and legal actions by Uthmeier, is fighting to install new guardrails around artificial intelligence and is even attempting to stop OpenAI from further developing its technology while a court battle between the tech giant and Sunshine State plays out. To that end, it’s no shock that the attorney general, who was handpicked by DeSantis, blasted Altman’s statements calling for a lighter regulatory touch on AI compared to more strict policies sought by some.

Uthmeier just last week ramped up his lawsuit against OpenAI by using mounting fears expressed by current and former AI officials — Altman included — about the possibly dire consequences the booming technology could ultimately unleash as part of his arguments. Outside of Uthmeier’s concerns with consumer safety, notably for children and teens who use AI, he raised issues with recent breaches of U.S. and Australian government websites, along with reports of OpenAI agents going rogue and carrying out an autonomous cyberattack on developer platform Hugging Face.

“Sam Altman says the world should accept ‘some bad things happening’ for AI,” Uthmeier said Monday on social media. “The same industry has put the odds of AI-caused human extinction at 10% or higher. That is not innovation. That is recklessness.”

Uthmeier originally sued OpenAI and Altman in June through a first-of-its-kind lawsuit claiming the company aggressively marketed an unsafe product in ChatGPT, which allegedly aided in violent crimes in Florida and beyond. OpenAI officials, for their part, have stood by their safety protocols as they fight the lawsuit.

DeSantis, as one of the nation’s loudest Republican AI skeptics, unsuccessfully pushed for Florida’s GOP-dominated Legislature to pass an AI “bill of rights” earlier this year to introduce new consumer protections for parents and their children, among other policies. He was instrumental, though, in getting legislation passed aiming to protect local residents from rate increases and other negative effects from data centers that fuel AI.

Uthmeier, who is running for election in November, has already asked state lawmakers to consider new AI legislation next year to grant him power to criminally charge tech companies when their chatbots assist in crimes.

Fonte: POLITICO – TOP Stories