Elon Musk, upon leaving OpenAI in 2018 due to a conflict of interest with his role at Tesla, reportedly had some pointed remarks for the company’s staff. Musk, who co-founded OpenAI in 2015, advised the team to expedite their progress during his departure announcement, according to The New York Times.
However, this suggestion was met with resistance from an OpenAI researcher present at the meeting, as reported by The Times, with the researcher characterizing Musk’s recommendation as impulsive and hastily made. Musk allegedly concluded the meeting by referring to the OpenAI researcher as a “jackass” before leaving.
The revelation that Musk encouraged OpenAI to move faster is noteworthy given his public image as a proponent of a cautious approach to AI innovation. In March of the same year, Musk, along with other notable figures like Steve Wozniak and Pinterest co-founder Evan Sharp, signed an open letter advocating for a six-month hiatus on AI development. The letter emphasized the need to step back from the rapid advancement of “unpredictable black-box models with emergent capabilities.”
Despite his concerns about the potential dangers of AI, Musk announced the establishment of his own AI startup, xAI, in July. The company aims to “accelerate human scientific discovery” through AI technology. Musk later unveiled Grok, xAI’s Chat-GPT competitor, in November, claiming it had a “massive advantage” due to real-time access to X.
As of the report, representatives for Musk and OpenAI had not responded to Business Insider’s request for comment.
