People have been talking about a new essay written by none other than Sam Altman, and posted on its own website just a couple of days ago.
Reading it, in my opinion, evokes some pretty great insights about where we are going with AI in these exciting times…so let’s get into it!
Near the beginning, Altman talks about how our generational achievement isn’t a genetic evolution, but instead, a societal change.
Reading this portion of the essay, I was struck by the contrast between previous generations and their analog achievements – and this generation and their digital ones.
“Our grandparents built and achieved great things,” he writes. “They contributed to the scaffolding of human progress that we all benefit from. … AI will give people tools to solve hard problems. The story of progress will continue …”
A bit later, he comes up with this broad description of both analog and digital computing progress that I thought was just brilliant. Here it is in all of its splendor:
“Here is one narrow way to look at human history: after thousands of years of compounding scientific discovery and technological progress, we have figured out how to melt sand, add some impurities, arrange it with astonishing precision at extraordinarily tiny scale into computer chips, run energy through it, and end up with systems capable of creating increasingly capable artificial intelligence.”
Melting sand: it’s an analog pursuit, but it blazes a trail for something profoundly un-analog: the eclipsing of all physical media, in our lifetimes. That’s not nothing. Far from it.
After that, he suggests that we’ll have “superintelligence in a few thousand days” – which is a mind-bending timeline.
Midway through the essay, as Altman talks about the potential for shared prosperity. I have to admit I think a lot of readers would have some skepticism. We are this far without any real progress on a universal basic income – and automation is erasing jobs and gig economy work at a fast clip.
We are no longer able to rely on our natural skills to make us better than machines. The machines are winning. And since it’s a free competitive market – there is some real potential for problems.
However, Altman’s description of this prosperity is based on reasonable projections of what we can do with this technology. We won’t have to do a lot of different kinds of work. The work will be done for us, just like a washer and dryer make it make it unnecessary for us to scrub each of our garments in a pool of sink water.
Then there is Altman’s description of how we got to this point – “deep learning worked.”
That’s succinct, but it makes sense. We have discovered this intelligence, hidden in pulverized rock, and metal, and electricity, that has rocked our collective world. We’re still scratching the surface of what this free-wheeling power is capable of. Not for nothing do the scribes of our time compare it to fire, and electricity.
As Altman puts it, “the path to the intelligence age is paved with compute, energy, and human will.”
And, as he suggests, to get this right, humans must deliberate a good bit.
“We need to act wisely, but with conviction,” he writes.
There’s an interesting part of the essay where Altman talks about democratizing compute through building infrastructure, and giving people enough cheap and accessible resources.
You might think of this as mirroring the state of our housing market, where we need to make housing work accessible. Altman implicitly suggests that we should do the same with compute.
If we can do that, the implication is that we’re going to have tremendous prosperity.
Altman suggests we’ll be able to do big things, like fixing the climate, and establishing a space colony. Presumably, most of us would be happy with fixing the climate, since that existential problem often seems insurmountable.
As for the work world, where Altman acknowledges we have issues, the hope is that we act to support the value of humans, and make sure that AI raises all boats. He voices some optimism:
“People have an innate desire to create and be useful to each other,” he writes. “Nobody is looking back at the past, wishing they were a lamplighter.”
Let’s hope that Altman is right – that we’re able to re-order society so that everyone benefits from the abundant benefits of AI. If that can actually happen, we will be on our way towards something that looks to us like Utopia.
