Thanks! This is helpful because it clarifies a few areas where we disagree.
If a bioterrorist is already capable of understanding and actually carrying out the detailed instructions in an article like this, then I’m not sure that an LLM would add that much to his capacities.
I think future LLMs will likely still be very helpful for such people since there are more steps to being an effective bioterrorist than just understanding, eg existing reverse genetics protocols. I don’t want to say much more on that point. That said, I’m personally less concerned about LLMs enhancing the capabilities of people who are already experts in some of these domains versus enhancing the ability of non-experts.
Conversely, handing a detailed set of instructions like that to the average person poses virtually no risk, because they wouldn’t have the knowledge or abilty to actually do anything with it.
I disagree. I think future LLMs will enhance the ability of average people to do something with biology. I expect LLMs will get much better at generating protocols, recommending upskilling strategies, providing lab tutorials, interpreting experimental results, etc etc. And it will do all of those things in a much more accessible manner. Also, keep in mind Fig 1 in our paper shows that there is more than one path to obtain 1918 virus.
I also think there is an underappreciated point here about LLMs making it more likely for people to attempt bioterrorism in the first place. If a malicious actor looking to cause mass harm spends a couple of hours in conversation with an uncensored LLM, and learns that biology is a feasible path towards doing that… then I expect more people to try – even if it takes significant time and money.
There are much easier and simpler ways that are already widely discoverable: 1) Make chlorine gas by mixing bleach and ammonia (or vinegar); 2) Make sarin gas via instructions that were easily findable in this 1995 article:
These examples indeed constitute nasty ways to cause harm to people and sound significantly easier. However, the scale of harm you can cause with infectious or otherwise exponential biology is significantly beyond that of targeted CW attacks. The potential harm is such that the statement “hardly anyone wants to carry out such attacks” doesn’t seem a sufficient reason not to be concerned.
I guess the overall point for me is that if the goal is just to speculate about what much more capable and accurate LLMs might enable, then what’s the point of doing a small, uncontrolled, empirical study demonstrating that current LLMs are not, in fact, that kind of risk?
Thanks! This is helpful because it clarifies a few areas where we disagree.
I think future LLMs will likely still be very helpful for such people since there are more steps to being an effective bioterrorist than just understanding, eg existing reverse genetics protocols. I don’t want to say much more on that point. That said, I’m personally less concerned about LLMs enhancing the capabilities of people who are already experts in some of these domains versus enhancing the ability of non-experts.
I disagree. I think future LLMs will enhance the ability of average people to do something with biology. I expect LLMs will get much better at generating protocols, recommending upskilling strategies, providing lab tutorials, interpreting experimental results, etc etc. And it will do all of those things in a much more accessible manner. Also, keep in mind Fig 1 in our paper shows that there is more than one path to obtain 1918 virus.
I also think there is an underappreciated point here about LLMs making it more likely for people to attempt bioterrorism in the first place. If a malicious actor looking to cause mass harm spends a couple of hours in conversation with an uncensored LLM, and learns that biology is a feasible path towards doing that… then I expect more people to try – even if it takes significant time and money.
These examples indeed constitute nasty ways to cause harm to people and sound significantly easier. However, the scale of harm you can cause with infectious or otherwise exponential biology is significantly beyond that of targeted CW attacks. The potential harm is such that the statement “hardly anyone wants to carry out such attacks” doesn’t seem a sufficient reason not to be concerned.
I guess the overall point for me is that if the goal is just to speculate about what much more capable and accurate LLMs might enable, then what’s the point of doing a small, uncontrolled, empirical study demonstrating that current LLMs are not, in fact, that kind of risk?