OpenAI researchers warned about a potentially dangerous artificial intelligence discovery ahead of CEO Sam Altman being ousted from the company, according to reports. Several staff members of the AI firm wrote a letter to the board of directors detailing the algorithm, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters. The disclosure was reportedly a key development in the build up to Mr Altman’s dismissal. Prior to his return late Tuesday, more than 700 employees had threatened to quit and join backer Microsoft in solidarity with their fired leader. The sources cited the letter as one factor among a longer list of grievances by the board leading to Altman’s firing, among which were concerns over commercialising advances before understanding the consequences. The staff who wrote the letter did not respond to requests for comment and Reuters was unable to review a copy of the letter. OpenAI declined to comment on the letter but acknowledged in an internal message to staffers a project called Q* and a letter to the board before the weekend’s events, one of the people said. An OpenAI spokesperson said that the message, sent by long-time executive Mira Murati, alerted staff to certain media stories without commenting on their accuracy. Some at OpenAI believe Q* (pronounced Q-Star) could be a breakthrough in the startup’s search for what’s known as artificial general intelligence (AGI), one of the people told Reuters. OpenAI defines AGI as autonomous systems that surpass humans in most economically valuable tasks. Given vast computing resources, the new model was able to solve certain mathematical problems, the person said on condition of anonymity because the individual was not authorised to speak on behalf of the company. Though only performing maths on the level of grade-school students, acing such tests made researchers very optimistic about Q*’s future success, the source said. Reuters could not independently verify the capabilities of Q* claimed by the researchers. Researchers consider maths to be a frontier of generative AI development. Currently, generative AI is good at writing and language translation by statistically predicting the next word, and answers to the same question can vary widely. But conquering the ability to do mathematics where there is only one right answer implies AI would have greater reasoning capabilities resembling human intelligence. This could be applied to novel scientific research, for instance, AI researchers believe. Unlike a calculator that can solve a limited number of operations, AGI can generalize, learn and comprehend. In their letter to the board, researchers flagged AI’s prowess and potential danger, the sources said without specifying the exact safety concerns noted in the letter. There has long been discussion among computer scientists about the danger posed by highly intelligent machines, for instance if they might decide that the destruction of humanity was in their interest. Researchers have also flagged work by an “AI scientist” team, the existence of which multiple sources confirmed. The group, formed by combining earlier “Code Gen” and “Math Gen” teams, was exploring how to optimise existing AI models to improve their reasoning and eventually perform scientific work, one of the people said. Altman led efforts to make ChatGPT one of the fastest growing software applications in history and drew investment – and computing resources – necessary from Microsoft to get closer to AGI. In addition to announcing a slew of new tools in a demonstration this month, Altman last week teased at a summit of world leaders in San Francisco that he believed major advances were in sight. “Four times now in the history of OpenAI, the most recent time was just in the last couple weeks, I’ve gotten to be in the room, when we sort of push the veil of ignorance back and the frontier of discovery forward, and getting to do that is the professional honor of a lifetime,” he said at the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit, a day before he was fired by OpenAI’s board. Additional reporting from agencies. Read More 10 ways AI will change the world – from curing cancer to wiping out humanity YouTube reveals bizarre AI music experiments AI-generated faces are starting to look more real than actual ones One of the world’s most hyped tech products just launched – and made a big mistake

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Seven years ago, I was at my local antenatal class preparing for the birth of my firstborn. In my forties and armed with a coloured birthing ball, I looked around and gasped. All the other soon-to-be-mums were at least a decade younger than me. Some were nearly half my age. It briefly panicked me. Would I make any friends? Why did I leave it so late to have kids? Was I doing something wrong? In hindsight, though, I had no reason to worry: your forties is absolutely the best decade in which to have your first child. According to data published last week in The Daily Telegraph, the number of women becoming first-time mothers in their forties has increased in recent years: today, one in 25 UK births is to a woman aged 40-plus. That’s a lot of women just like me, despite the fact that getting pregnant over 35 gets you labelled as someone of “advanced maternal age”. That might sound harsh until you remember that older pregnancies used to be termed “geriatric” – thank God that’s been phased out. I’ve never regretted waiting until my forties, even if I had been trying for children for years by that point. My story is undeniably unique: my partner Alex took his own life while we were doing IVF, but that didn’t stop me from continuing to try to get pregnant. The maternal call was strong, so I decided to carry on with the process using Alex’s frozen sperm. Today I have two beautiful daughters with him: Lola, seven, and Liberty, five. It is an understatement to say I was ready for a baby at 40. I was grounded. Confident. Unlike when I was in my twenties or thirties, I knew exactly who I was and what made me tick. I had life experience. I no longer got FOMO. I didn’t even drink, having been through hell and back to become sober 20 years earlier. My career was fully off the ground, and therapy had helped me identify the family dysfunction I knew to ditch for the sake of my kids. I also wasn’t worried about my body bouncing back after the birth. I just desperately wanted to be a mum. Of course, there are all sorts of advantages to having children in your twenties and thirties. A huge bonus is that you’re simply more fertile. According to research, 31 is the magic age to have a baby – you’re still as fertile as in your twenties, but you also have more money. I’m sure motherhood in your fifties is great, too – although using your own eggs is highly unlikely, unless you froze them at some point before you turned 35. It means that some older mums often turn to donor eggs. Thinking back on my twenties and thirties, I don’t know how I would have managed motherhood. I don’t think I was ready to put my own needs on hold. I can’t imagine how hard it would have been to juggle work and my children, especially with the spiralling costs of childcare. I do accept that there are greater risks inherent in waiting to have kids. Both the quantity and quality of eggs dwindle. The rates of failed fertilisation, miscarriage and birth defects rise with age. There’s also the social pressure that comes with not having children early – you’re forced into endless conversations about the “ticking timebomb” of your fertility, and expected to fend off probing inquiries about your biological clock. The British Fertility Society advises women to start trying for a baby by the age of 32 at the latest, for a 90 per cent guarantee of having a child without resorting to IVF. But this advice simply wouldn’t have worked for me – I was determined to find the right person to have children with, and that didn’t happen until I was 35. When mine and Alex’s attempts to naturally conceive failed, and then Alex died, only at that point did I know I had the maturity to go it alone. I do have some regrets – I wish I’d frozen my eggs at the peak of my fertility in my mid-twenties, for instance (this process costs between £4,000 and £7,000 in the UK). But otherwise, having children in my forties was the right thing to do. Yes, I had my wobbles. I remember sobbing on the bathroom floor after yet another failed pregnancy test. I would berate myself for leaving it so late. I had to force myself to remember that many women experience fertility struggles in their twenties and thirties, too. All of those anxious feelings, though, flew out the window once I had my first child. When I left the hospital to begin parenthood alone, a new bag of nappies in hand, I didn’t have a meltdown. I was just so grateful that I’d had a baby, especially when the odds seemed so stacked against me. Sleepless nights trying to coax my child back to sleep were what I had most desired. It was all so good, in fact, that I went on to have a second child in my forties. I had a spare embryo in a freezer in St Petersburg. Now I call her Liberty. Every day since becoming a mum, I have embraced the mess and chaos, and appreciate every minute. I’m sure my younger self would cringe at the thought of me spending my evenings helping my children with their homework. But I’m proud to say that I’m living my best life. Read More Vanessa Hudgens addresses pregnancy speculation amid Cole Tucker engagement Rachel Bilson reveals she’s suffered multiple miscarriages Pregnant woman has maternity photo shoot in hospital before giving birth Hailey Bieber responds to ‘disheartening’ pregnancy rumours Like Rebecca Adlington, I also lost my baby at 20 weeks Britney Spears reveals she had an abortion while dating Justin Timberlake

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