9 Examples of Specification Gaming

Published 2020-04-29
AI systems do what you say, and it's hard to say exactly what you mean.
Let's look at a list of real life examples of specification gaming!

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The list: tinyurl.com/specification-gaming
The blogpost this video is based on: vkrakovna.wordpress.com/2018/04/02/specification-g…
The newer blogpost that happened while I was making this video: deepmind.com/blog/article/Specification-gaming-the…

(Explosion graphic from videezy.com)

Thanks to my wonderful patrons:
www.patreon.com/robertskmiles

Gladamas
James
Steef
Scott Worley
Chad Jones
Chris Canal
David Reid
Francisco Tolmasky
Frank Kurka
Jake Ehrlich
JJ Hepboin
Kellen lask
Michael Andregg
Pedro A Ortega
Peter Rolf
Said Polat
Teague Lasser
Allen Faure
Bryce Daifuku
Clemens Arbesser
Eric James
Erik de Bruijn
Jason Hise
jugettje dutchking
Ludwig Schubert
Qeith Wreid
Andrew Harcourt
anul kumar sinha
Ben Glanton
Benjamin Watkin
Cooper Lawton
Duncan Orr
Eric Scammell
Euclidean Plane
Ian Munro
Igor Keller
Ingvi Gautsson
James Hinchcliffe
Jeroen De Dauw
Jon Halliday
Jonatan R
Julius Brash
Jérôme Beaulieu
Laura Olds
Luc Ritchie
Lupuleasa Ionuț
Michael Greve
Nathan Fish
Nicholas Guyett
Paul Hobbs
Sean Gibat
Sebastian Birjoveanu
Shevis Johnson
Taras Bobrovytsky
Tim Neilson
Tom O'Connor
Tomas Sayder
Tyler Herrmann
Vaskó Richárd
Will Glynn
12tone
14zRobot
Alan Bandurka
Alexander Brown
Anders Öhrt
Andreas Blomqvist
Andrew Weir
Andy Kobre
Anne Kohlbrenner
Anthony Chiu
Archy de Berker
Ben Archer
Ben H
Ben Schultz
Bertalan Bodor
Brian Gillespie
Bryan Egan
Caleb
Chris Dinant
Daniel Bartovic
Daniel Eickhardt
Daniel Kokotajlo
Daniel Munter
Darko Sperac
David Morgan
DeepFriedJif
Devon Bernard
Diagon
Dmitri Afanasjev
Fionn
Fraser Cain
Garrett Maring
Ghaith Tarawneh
HD
Hendrik
ib_
Igor (Kerogi) Kostenko
Ihor Mukha
Ivan
James Fowkes
Jannik Olbrich
Jason Cherry
Jeremy
Jesper Andersson
Jim T
Johannes Walter
Josh Trevisiol
Julian Schulz
Jussi Männistö
Kabs
Kasper
Kasper Schnack
Kees
Klemen Slavic
Leo
lyon549
Marc Pauly
Marcel Ward
Marco Tiraboschi
Marko Topolnik
Martin Ottosen
Matt Stanton
Melisa Kostrzewski
Michael Bates
Michael Kuhinica
Miłosz Wierzbicki
Mo Hossny
Nathaniel Raddin
Oct todo22
Owen Campbell-Moore
Parker Lund
Patrick Henderson
Paul Moffat
Poker Chen
Rob Dawson
Robert Hildebrandt
robertvanduursen
Robin Scharf
Russell schoen
Scott Viteri
Simon Pilkington
Stellated Hexahedron
Tatiana Ponomareva
Ted Stokes
Tendayi Mawushe
Thomas Dingemanse

All Comments (21)
  • @bubinasuit
    I literally did a science fair project where the result of “can a genetic algorithm learn how to arrange solar panels efficiently” was “this genetic algorithm learned to exploit my raytracer”
  • @marccram6584
    There was an experiment where crows were rewarded with a peanut for picking up trash. For each piece of trash the crow deposited in a special bin, the crow received one peanut. This worked great for a while until the crows ran out of trash and then the crows decided to hang around trash cans and assault humans who were trying to throw trash away. The crows would harass the people until they dropped their trash and then go get a peanut. Essentially the crows were taught to mug humans.
  • My algorithm teacher used to say, "The best thing about computers is that they do exactly what you tell them to. The worst thing about computers is that they do exactly what you tell them to."
  • @NoahTopper
    That program that deleted the text file terrifies me deeply.
  • @valshaped
    So an A.I. is an extremely skilled, unsupervised toddler being paid in candy to do a task
  • @famitory
    it would seem that since AI is excellent at finding loopholes, a good application for AI would be finding loopholes in systems we'd rather didn't have loopholes.
  • @ChrisD__
    Robert: "Give it a small reward for every frame the pancake isn't on the floor" Me: already laughing hysterically
  • @plcflame
    I wish there were movies like that. AI isn't evil, it's just extremely good in doing what you asked for
  • There is a program known as Polyworld. The idea is to evolve artificial creatures via natural selection and evolution. One creature evolved a behavior of producing an offspring then eating it. The programmer initial forgot to add a cost when producing offspring so the cannibal creature essential has an unbounded source of food (it's own offspring).
  • @Xelbiuj
    The world turning to gold is some XKCD "what if" stuff.
  • @Merchandise7x
    "I knew everyone would die. I just wasn't sure what would kill us first." Quote of 2020.
  • @nowheremap
    AI has already surpassed humans on malicious compliance.
  • @ZardoDhieldor
    The hacker heart inside me just loves how AI creatively circumvents the restrictions/goals put in front of it. The boat example just makes me smile everytime!
  • @chrisjones5046
    I teach about this in one of my lectures, it's a interesting sub-set of Goodhart's Law "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure". It turns out humans have been dealing with this one for a while. It sort of makes the AI more human.
  • @karapuzo1
    From the list: "CycleGAN algorithm for converting aerial photographs into street maps and back steganographically encoded output information in the intermediary image without it being humanly detectable." That's great, I am not even mad. Second place goes to "Genetic algorithm for image classification evolves timing attack to infer image labels based on hard drive storage location"
  • @piemaster6512
    At 5:02 I absolutely lost it. I would feel personally attacked if my program did that to me. Fantastic!
  • @germimonte
    when the arm fliped the lego i just lost it
  • @unvergebeneid
    "I knew everyone would die, I just wasn't sure what would kill us first." I think this sentence has much broader applicability than it might at first seem 🤔
  • The thing is, setting the wrong targets is what happens all the time even without AI.