Artificial intelligence researcher (1998–2024)
人工智能研究员（1998-2024）
Suchir Balaji (November 21, 1998 – November 26, 2024) was an American artificial intelligence researcher who died several weeks after accusing his former employer, OpenAI, of violating United States copyright law. Balaji's death drew widespread attention due to claims of foul play made by his parents and others, as well as his purported whistleblower status. The San Francisco Police Department investigation found"no evidence of foul play," and the Chief Medical Examiner concluded the death was a suicide.
Suchir Balaji（1998年11月21日至2024年11月26日）是一名美国人工智能研究员，在指控他的前雇主Openai违反了美国版权法。由于他的父母和其他人以及他所谓的举报人身份，巴拉吉的死亡引起了人们广泛的关注。旧金山警察局的调查发现，“没有犯规的证据”，首席医学检查官认为死亡是自杀的。
Early life and education
早期生活和教育
Balaji was born in Florida[1][2] on November 21, 1998, into an Indian-American family.[3] He grew up in Cupertino, California, where both of his parents worked in the technology sector.[1] He started coding with the children's educational tool Scratch at the age of 11 and had built his own computer by the time he was 13.[4]
Balaji于1998年11月21日出生于佛罗里达[1] [2]，进入了一个印度裔美国人。[3]他在加利福尼亚的库比蒂诺（Cupertino）长大，他的父母都在技术领域工作。[1]他从11岁时就开始使用儿童教育工具的编码，并在13岁时就建造了自己的计算机。[4]
Balaji attended Monta Vista High School and was a finalist for the 2015–16 season of the United States of America Computing Olympiad.[5][6] In 2017, he ranked 7th place in a Kaggle"Passenger Screening Algorithm Challenge" sponsored by the TSA, for which he earned $100,000.[6][7] He also won first place in both the 2017 Pacific Northwest Regional and Berkeley Programming Contests, and placed 31st in the ACM International Collegiate Programming Contest 2018 World Finals.[8][9] He wrote a paper about chip design at 14 years old, and at 17, took a gap year to work as a software developer at Quora.[4][10]
巴拉吉（Balaji）就读于蒙塔维斯塔高中（Monta Vista High School），并入围了2015-16赛季的美国计算机奥林匹克运动会。[5] [6]2017年，他在TSA赞助的Kaggle“乘客放映算法挑战”中排名第七，为此，他获得了100,000美元。[6] [7]他还在2017年太平洋西北地区和伯克利节目比赛中赢得了第一名，并在2018年世界决赛的ACM国际大学计划大赛中获得第31位。[8] [9]他在14岁时写了一篇有关芯片设计的论文，并在17岁时花了一年的时间在Quora担任软件开发人员。[4] [10]
Following his gap year, Balaji attended and graduated from the University of California, Berkeley with a BA in computer science. While in college, he interned at Scale AI in 2019, and subsequently joined OpenAI upon graduation in 2021.[10]
差距一年之后，巴拉吉（Balaji）参加了加利福尼亚大学伯克利分校的计算机科学学士学位。在大学期间，他于2019年在AI大规模实习，随后在2021年毕业后加入Openai。[10]
Career
职业
John Schulman, a cofounder of OpenAI, recruited Balaji right out of college. He spent nearly four years working at the company as an artificial intelligence researcher.[10] Among other projects, he was involved in gathering and organizing the internet data used to train GPT-4, a language model used by the company's online chatbot, ChatGPT. He also worked on a precursor model called WebGPT. Writing in an online eulogy, Schulman claimed that"Suchir’s contributions to this project were essential, and it wouldn’t have succeeded without him.”[11][12]
OpenAI的联合创始人John Schulman立即招募了Balaji。他在公司担任人工智能研究员工作了近四年。[10]在其他项目中，他参与了收集和组织用于培训GPT-4的Internet数据，GPT-4是该公司在线聊天机器人Chatgpt使用的语言模型。他还制作了一个名为WebGPT的前体模型。舒尔曼（Schulman）在在线悼词中写道：“ Speir对这个项目的贡献至关重要，没有他就不会成功。” [11] [12]
Balaji left the company in August 2024 after becoming disillusioned with its business practices, saying"If you believe what I believe, you have to just leave the company."[13] After leaving OpenAI, he said he had been working on"personal projects."[14] According to one interview with his mother, he planned to create a non-profit centered on machine learning and neurosciences. Balaji's mother also said that"He felt AI is a harm to humanity."[15][4]
巴拉吉（Balaji）因其业务惯例而幻灭后，于2024年8月离开了公司，他说：“如果您相信我相信的话，就必须离开公司。” [13]离开Openai后，他说他一直在从事“个人项目”。[14]根据他的母亲的一次采访，他计划在机器学习和神经科学上进行非营利的集中。Balaji的母亲还说：“他认为AI对人类有害。” [15] [4]
New York Times article
《纽约时报》文章
In an October 23, 2024 New York Times interview, Balaji alleged that products like ChatGPT violate United States copyright law because they are trained on the products of business competitors, and because the chatbots' outputs can then imitate and substitute those products.[13] He said that ChatGPT and similar chatbots are ruining the commercial viability of the individuals and organizations who produced the data that the AI systems are trained on.[16][13]
在2024年10月23日的纽约时报采访中，巴拉吉声称诸如Chatgpt的产品违反了美国版权法，因为它们接受了商业竞争对手的培训，并且因为聊天机器人的产出可以模仿和替代这些产品。[13] [13]他说，Chatgpt和类似的聊天机器人正在破坏了对AI系统进行培训的数据的个人和组织的商业可行性。[16] [13]
The New York Times piece contains a summary of Balaji's essay"When does generative AI qualify for fair use?", published on his personal website earlier that week. In the essay, he mathematically analyzed the outputs of chatbots such as ChatGPT, and argued that they fail the four-factor test for determining fair use under U.S. copyright law.[16][13][17] He further suggests that the argument could be applied to other generative AI products as well.[17]
《纽约时报》的文章包含了Balaji论文的摘要，“生成的AI何时有资格获得合理用途？”，该论文于当地的个人网站上发表在他的个人网站上。在文章中，他数学上分析了聊天机器人（例如Chatgpt）的输出，并认为他们未能根据美国版权法确定公平使用的四因素测试。[16] [13] [17] [17]他进一步建议该论点也可以应用于其他生成的AI产品。[17]
At the time, OpenAI was being sued for copyright infringement by prominent authors and news publishers, including The New York Times. In a November 18, 2024 court filing, Balaji was identified by the New York Times's attorneys as one of a number of people who might have"relevant documents" in the copyright case against OpenAI. Several of the people named in the news service's court filings as potentially having relevant documents were former or current OpenAI employees.[18] Balaji had said that he would testify against OpenAI.[14] [11] Unlike other OpenAI whistleblowers, Balaji did not reveal any new information about the company.[10]
当时，Openai被包括《纽约时报》在内的著名作家和新闻出版商起诉。在2024年11月18日的法院申请中，《纽约时报》的律师确定了巴拉吉是在针对OpenAI的版权案件中可能具有“相关文件”的许多人之一。新闻服务部在法院文件中提到的几个人可能有相关文件，是前或现任的OpenAI雇员。[18]Balaji曾说过他将作证反对Openai。[14][11]与其他OpenAi举报人不同，Balaji没有透露有关公司的任何新信息。[10]
The New York Times article cites Stanford University law professor Mark Lemley, who disagreed that generative AI services violate copyright law, and intellectual property (IP) attorney Bradley Hulbert, who said a new law might be necessary to settle the question of legality.[13] Months after Balaji's death, which attracted significant public attention, Hulbert told Fortune magazine that Balaji's essay"[reads like] the argument of a really smart non-lawyer who read up on the subject but does not have a thorough understanding." Another IP attorney, quoted anonymously by the magazine due to concerns about conspiracy theories surrounding Balaji's death, said Balaji's analysis"misunderstands the law in some fundamental ways."[10]
《纽约时报》的文章引用了斯坦福大学法学教授马克·勒姆利（Mark Lemley），他不同意生成的AI服务违反了版权法，而知识产权（IP）律师布拉德利·赫尔伯特（Bradley Hulbert）说，他可能有必要解决合法性问题。[13] [13]巴拉吉（Balaji）死后几个月引起了广泛关注的关注，赫尔伯特（Hulbert）告诉《财富》杂志（Fortune Magazine），巴拉吉（Balaji）的论文“ [读起来像是一个非常聪明的非律师的论点，他对这个话题进行了阅读但没有彻底的理解。”Balaji的分析说，该杂志的匿名匿名引用了另一位IP律师，因为对Balaji死亡的阴谋论的担忧，Balaji的分析“以某些基本的方式误解了法律。” [10] [10]
OpenAI argued that its software was"grounded in fair use and related international copyright principles that are fair for creators and support innovation," and was"trained on publicly available data."[14]
Openai认为，其软件是“基于合理使用和相关的国际版权原则，这些原则对创作者和支持创新都是公平的，并且“接受了公开可用数据的培训。” [14]
Death
死亡
Balaji's parents say they last heard from their son on November 22, 2024. After he stopped responding to text messages, they asked San Francisco police to enter his home to conduct a well-being check.[19] On November 26, 2024, the police found Balaji dead in his apartment from a single gunshot wound to the head.[10] He was 26 years old.[14] The gun that was recovered was registered to Balaji, who purchased it in January 2024.[10]
巴拉吉的父母说，他们最后一次在2024年11月22日从儿子那里听到。他停止回复短信后，他们要求旧金山警察进入他的家进行福祉检查。[19]2024年11月26日，警察发现巴拉吉（Balaji）在他的公寓里死了，从一个枪伤到头部。[10]他今年26岁。[14]被收回的枪已注册给Balaji，Balaji于2024年1月购买。[10]
A San Francisco Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (OCME) autopsy report was released on February 14, 2025, stating that Balaji died of a single, self-inflicted gunshot wound on the day that the police found him. The police noted that the only entrance to the apartment was dead-bolted from the inside, and that Balaji had recently researched brain anatomy on his computer. Toxicology results showed he had alcohol, amphetamine and GHB in his system at the time of his death.[18][20][21]
2025年2月14日发布了首席医学检查员（OCME）尸检报告的旧金山办公室，称Balaji在警察发现他的那天死于一个单身，自我造成的枪伤。警方指出，该公寓的唯一入口是从内部死去的，而Balaji最近在计算机上研究了大脑解剖结构。毒理学结果表明，他去世时的系统中有酒精，苯丙胺和GHB。[18] [20] [21]
Due to his purported whistleblower status as a"custodial witnesses" in the New York Times's lawsuit against OpenAI, and his claims that OpenAI violated AI copyright laws and maintained poor AI ethics standards, Balaji's death attracted public and media interest. The news coverage also drew attention to his original essay outlining his legal arguments against OpenAI.[8][22][6]
由于他在《纽约时报》针对Openai的诉讼中称其为“监护人证人”的举报人身份，因此他声称Openai违反了AI版权法，并维持了贫困的AI道德标准，Balaji的死亡吸引了公众和媒体利益。新闻报道还引起了他的原始文章，概述了他针对Openai的法律论点。[8] [22] [6]
Skepticism and calls for further investigation
怀疑并要求进一步调查
Despite the preliminary statements from San Francisco authorities describing the death as a suicide, the circumstances of the death and an initial lack of detailed information from authorities led to widespread speculation and conspiracy theories suggesting Balaji had been deliberately silenced before he could testify against OpenAI.[23]
尽管旧金山当局的初步陈述将死亡描述为自杀，但死亡的情况和最初缺乏当局的详细信息导致了广泛的猜测和阴谋理论，暗示巴拉吉在他能够作证反对Openai之前已经被故意沉默了。[23] [23]。
Prior to the official autopsy report being released in February, doubts were raised by Balaji's parents about the cause of his death. They campaigned publicly to raise awareness of what they claimed was an inaccurate verdict from San Francisco authorities. Among other factors for their claim, they described Balaji's mood as"cheerful" about two weeks prior to his death and the"lack of a suicide note [as well as] blood spatter anomalies" in his apartment.[23][20] His parents announced in December 2024 that they had hired private investigators and had a second autopsy performed. They said that this showed evidence of homicide, claiming that Balaji was shot"in the back of the head from an angle at which he could not have shot himself", although they did not provide a copy of the autopsy and their lawyer said he"would not characterize it as conclusively proving murder".[20] Claims of foul play gained momentum after Elon Musk (who has publicly feuded with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman) stated that the death"doesn't seem like a suicide" in response to a tweet by Balaji's mother. In January, Tucker Carlson discussed the death with Balaji's mother on his podcast. On the same day, Silicon Valley Congressman Ro Khanna called for a"full and transparent investigation" into the cause of death. San Francisco Supervisor Jackie Fielder said she was"concerned" about the circumstances of Balaji's death.[20]
在2月份发布官方尸检报告之前，Balaji的父母对他的死亡提出了疑问。他们公开竞选以提高人们对自己声称的意识的认识，这是旧金山当局的不准确判决。除其他因素的要求外，他们将巴拉吉的心情描述为“开朗”，大约在他去世前两周，并且“缺乏自杀记录，以及他的公寓中的血溅异常”。[23] [20]他的父母在2024年12月宣布，他们雇用了私人调查员，并进行了第二次尸检。他们说，这表明了凶杀案的证据，声称Balaji被“从他无法开枪的角度枪杀”，尽管他们没有提供尸检的副本，而他们的律师说他“不会将其描述为最终证明谋杀案”。[20] [20]在埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）（与Openai Ceo Sam Altman公开争执之后）表示，死亡“似乎不像是自杀”，以回应Balaji的母亲的推文，这一声明获得了动力。一月份，塔克·卡尔森（Tucker Carlson）在播客中与巴拉吉（Balaji）的母亲讨论了死亡。同一天，硅谷国会议员罗汉纳（Ro Khanna）呼吁对死亡原因进行“全面和透明的调查”。旧金山主管杰基·菲尔德（Jackie Fielder）说，她对巴拉吉（Balaji）死亡的情况“担心”。[20]
Fortune magazine attributes the parents' actions to a sincere desire to understand what has happened to their only son. The magazine interviewed several of Balaji's friends, who shared the parents' confusion and grief. The article cites Daren Firestone, an"attorney who works regularly with whistleblowers," who said whistleblowers often experience loneliness and doubt, can be under"enormous pressure," and may come to feel the"world is against [them]." Fortune also emphasized that"Balaji wasn’t divulging any previously unknown inside information about the company" and, comparing the controversy to the John Barnett case, states that the parents' actions had fueled speculation on the internet.[10]
《财富》杂志将父母的行为归因于理解唯一儿子发生的事情的真诚渴望。该杂志采访了巴拉吉的几个朋友，他们分享了父母的困惑和悲伤。文章引用了“与举报人一起经常合作的律师达伦·弗雷斯通（Daren Firestone），他说举报人经常会感到孤独和怀疑，可能会承受“巨大的压力”，并可能会觉得“世界反对[他们]。”《财富》还强调，“巴拉吉没有泄露任何以前未知的有关公司的内部信息”，并将争议与约翰·巴内特案进行比较，并指出，父母的行动助长了互联网上的猜测。[10] [10]
Official position
官方职位
As of April 2025 the conclusion of the San Francisco Police Department and the San Francisco Office of the Chief Medical Examiner is that Balaji shot himself.[20]
截至2025年4月，旧金山警察局和旧金山首席医学检查官办公室的结论是Balaji自杀。[20]
See also
参见
