No, Sam Altman, AI Won’t Solve All of Humanity's Problems

We already knew wherever OpenAI’s CEO, Sam Altman, stands connected artificial intelligence vis-à-vis the quality saga: It volition beryllium transformative, historic, and overwhelmingly beneficial. He has been thing but accordant crossed countless interviews. For immoderate reason, this week helium felt it indispensable to distill those opinions successful a succinct blog post. “The Intelligence Age,” arsenic helium calls it, volition beryllium a clip of abundance. “We tin person shared prosperity to a grade that seems unimaginable today; successful the future, everyone’s lives tin beryllium amended than anyone’s beingness is now,” helium writes. “Although it volition hap incrementally, astounding triumphs—fixing the climate, establishing a abstraction colony, and the find of each of physics—will yet go commonplace.”

Maybe helium published this to quality a bid of thought that dismisses the evident gains of ample connection models arsenic thing of an illusion. Nuh-uh, helium says. We’re getting this large AI bonus due to the fact that “deep learning works,” arsenic helium said successful an interview aboriginal successful the week, mocking those who said that programs similar OpenAI’s GPT4o were simply anserine engines delivering the adjacent token successful a queue. "Once it tin commencement to beryllium unproven mathematical theorems, bash we truly inactive privation to debate: 'Oh, but it's conscionable predicting the adjacent token?'" helium said.

No substance what you deliberation of Sam Altman, it’s indisputable that this is his truth: Artificial wide intelligence–AI that matches and past exceeds quality capabilities–is going to obliterate the problems plaguing humanity and usher successful a aureate age. I suggest we dub this deus ex machina conception The Strawberry Shortcut, successful grant of the codename for OpenAI’s caller breakthrough successful artificial reasoning. Like the shortcake, the premise looks appetizing but is little important successful the eating.

Altman correctly notes that the march of exertion has brought what were erstwhile luxuries to mundane people—including immoderate unavailable to pharaohs and lords. Charlemagne ne'er enjoyed air-conditioning! Working-class radical and adjacent immoderate connected nationalist assistance person dishwashers, TVs with elephantine screens, iPhones, and transportation services that bring pumpkin lattes and favored nutrient to their doors. But Altman is not acknowledging the full story. Despite monolithic wealth, not everyone is thriving, and galore are stateless oregon severely impoverished. To paraphrase William Gibson, paradise is here, it’s conscionable not evenly distributed. That’s not due to the fact that exertion has failed—we have. I fishy the aforesaid volition beryllium existent if AGI arrives, particularly since truthful galore jobs volition beryllium automated.

Altman isn’t terribly circumstantial astir what beingness volition beryllium similar erstwhile galore of our existent jobs spell the mode of 18th-century lamplighters. We did get a hint of his imaginativeness successful a podcast this week that asked tech luminaries and celebrities to stock their Spotify playlists. When explaining wherefore helium chose the tune “Underwater” by Rüfüs du Sol, Altman said it was a tribute to Burning Man, which helium has attended respective times. The festival, helium says, “is portion of what the post-AGI tin look like, wherever radical are conscionable focused connected doing worldly for each other, caring for each different and making unthinkable gifts to get each other.”

Altman is simply a large instrumentality of cosmopolitan basal income, which helium seems to deliberation volition cushion the stroke of mislaid wages. Artificial quality mightiness so make the wealthiness to marque specified a program feasible, but there’s small grounds that the radical who amass fortunes—or adjacent those who inactive eke retired a humble living—will beryllium inclined to clasp the concept. Altman mightiness person had a large acquisition astatine Burning Man, but immoderate benignant souls of the Playa look to beryllium up successful arms astir a proposal, affecting lone radical worthy implicit $100 million, to taxation immoderate of their unrealized superior gains. It’s a dubious premise that specified people—or others who go ace affluent moving astatine AI companies—will ace unfastened their coffers to money leisure clip for the masses. One of the US’s large governmental parties can’t basal Medicaid, truthful 1 tin lone ideate however populist demagogues volition respect UBI.

I’m besides wary of the expected bonanza that volition travel erstwhile each of our large problems are solved. Let’s concede that AI mightiness really ace humanity’s biggest conundrums. We humans would person to really instrumentality those solutions, and that’s wherever we’ve failed clip and again. We don’t request a ample connection exemplary to archer america warfare is hellhole and we shouldn’t termination each other. Yet wars support happening.