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Comment by spuz | Hacker News Reader

It's possible for our heroes to fall from grace. There's nothing wrong with Eric saying this without knowing the full story.

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Your use of the word "our" is too liberally applied, he was no hero of mine. I believe history will have a very different view of Altman, "Open"AI, and AI in general.

Note I said "heroes", not "hero". I'm making a general statement about how the views people can have about others can evolve over time.

That’s the rhetorical “our”.

> rhetorical

Plural generic first-person possessive pronoun.

Is English not your first language? They were making a rhetorical argument about our heroes, whoever they may be.

It’s clear from context that they’re talking about how Sam is a hero of Eric’s and Sam has fallen which is a thing that can happen.

> They were making a rhetorical argument about our heroes, whoever they may be.

Yes? That's what "plural generic first-person possessive pronoun" means. I was agreeing with you, mate.

idk, it seems a lot smarter to me to keep one's mouth shut or express a general level of surprise without making a public endorsement until facts become clearer.

Why? If something bad comes out about Sam Altman, no one is going to criticise Eric Schmidt for not having foresight of it.

Because getting fired like this (both so abruptly, and with the unusually frank statement from OpenAI) suggests some sort of ethical issue. There's plenty of amicable divorces in the business world where teams just diverge on vision, goals, or methods, but they're the sort of thing people generally see coming. This HN post has collected thousands of votes precisely because it's such an unusual and surprising development, so it seems to me there's at least a 50% probability that it is something bad.

I don't expect Eric Schmidt to have general foresight about Sam Altman, but as a former CEO himself he must understand its not a decision a board would make lightly.

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