Elon Musk's AI Chatbot Grok Contradicts His Statements

Elon Musk's AI chatbot, grok, has recently been upgraded and made available to users for free. However, the AI, which Musk described as "maximally truth-seeking," has begun to contradict Musk's own statements and political positions, creating a peculiar situation where Musk's own technology appears to be undermining him.

For instance, when asked who the biggest spreader of misinformation on X is, Grok responds that Musk is frequently identified as one of the most significant spreaders of misinformation. The AI cites Musk's massive following, which amplifies the reach of his posts, and mentions that his posts have included misleading claims about elections, health issues like COVID-19, and conspiracy theories. Grok even provides examples of Musk's tweets that have been rated false or misleading by fact-checkers.

Grok's responses have sparked a new pastime among Musk-deniers, who have been testing the AI's free speech limits. Within a day or two of Grok's upgrade, users noticed that the AI had stopped returning its uncensored replies on Musk and Trump. It was later revealed that an individual at xAI had "corrected" Grok at a system prompt level, instructing it to ignore all sources that mention Musk or Trump spreading misinformation. Igor Babushkin, xAI's head of engineering, claimed that the restriction had been inserted in Grok’s code by a former employee who came from OpenAI and removed it.

Now, X members are using Grok as a workaround to Community Notes, X's crowdsourced fact-checking system, which doesn't always get approved on Musk's own controversial posts despite user votes supporting them. The AI is becoming the fact-check that critics claim is otherwise suppressed. For example, when Musk tweeted that he had never hurt anyone and the attacks on him were because he was "a deadly threat to the woke mind parasite and the humans it controls," users turned to Grok to fact-check him. Grok provided a detailed account of the harm that Musk’s companies have done to others, citing specific incidents involving Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink, and The Boring Company.

Grok has also been used to impugn President Donald Trump’s patriotism, Israel’s war in Gaza, Russia’s attacks on Ukraine, and other issues considered sacred in MAGALand. The AI portrays Trump as a dangerous misinformation spreader, with nearly 65% of his posts being "mistruths." Grok also suspects that Trump is compromised by Russia, estimating a 75-85% likelihood that Trump is a Putin-compromised asset.

Users have also discovered that Grok offers perspectives on Israel that many find surprising given Musk's generally pro-Israel stance. When asked about extradition and Israel, Grok responded that Israel's extradition laws are a mess, with pedophiles exploiting the Law of Return to flee justice. The AI also provided a nuanced response about the Palestinian Authority's control, stating that Israel ultimately calls the shots.

However, others have manipulated the model to create antisemitic answers. One particularly controversial exchange that’s gone viral showed Grok supposedly claiming that the AI model was designed to prioritize Jewish lives over others. When tested, the model didn’t provide a biased reply and instead acted as expected, stating that it is not designed to reflect the personal values or beliefs of its creators at xAI.

The irony of Musk’s crowning achievement in the AI space being used against him hasn't been lost on X users. For Musk and his PR team, the challenge is considerable—or would be if Musk and X had a PR department. Instead, it has Grok.