What will AI tell us about our world and how we are going to make it work for the betterment of the world? A conversation with Altman

I worry about the supposed bonanza that will come when our big problems are solved. Let’s concede that AI might actually crack humanity’s biggest conundrums. We humans would have to actually implement those solutions, and that’s where we’ve failed time and again. We do not need a large language model to know war is bad. and we shouldn’t kill each other. Yet wars keep happening.

Altman is a big fan of universal basic income, which he seems to think will cushion the blow of lost wages. Artificial intelligence might indeed generate the wealth to make such a plan feasible, but there’s little evidence that the people who amass fortunes—or even those who still eke out a modest living—will be inclined to embrace the concept. Some kind souls in the Playa seem to be up in arms about a proposal that only affects people worth $100 million or more, and that would affect some of their capital gains. It is questionable as to whether people who become super rich at artificial intelligence companies will use their wealth to fund leisure time for the rest of us. One of the US political parties can’t stand Medicaid, so how populist demagogues will regard UBI is hard to imagine.

When many jobs go the way of 18th century lamplighters, we don’t know what life will be like. We did get a hint of his vision in a podcast this week that asked tech luminaries and celebrities to share their Spotify playlists. When explaining why he chose the tune “Underwater” by Rüfüs du Sol, Altman said it was a tribute to Burning Man, which he has attended several times. The festival is a part of what he thinks the post-AGI world will look like when people care for each other and make amazing gifts for each other.

The march of technology has brought luxuries like some that used to be only available to the well-off. Charlemagne never enjoyed air-conditioning! Some people on public assistance have delivery services that bring pumpkin latte and pet food to their door, as well as TVs with giant screens, in addition to a dishwasher, and delivery services that bring big screens and food to the door. The whole story isn’t being acknowledged by Altman. Despite massive wealth, not everyone is thriving, and many are homeless or severely impoverished. To paraphrase William Gibson, paradise is here, it’s just not evenly distributed. Technology has failed, but that is not the reason. Since so many jobs will be automated, I believe the same thing will happen if AGI arrives.

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

The Strawberry Shortcut: A Future Artificial Intelligence for Humans, Humans and Machines? Sam Altman tells us how AI can make us better

No matter what you think of Sam Altman, it’s indisputable that this is his truth: Artificial general intelligence–AI that matches and then exceeds human capabilities–is going to obliterate the problems plaguing humanity and usher in a golden age. I suggest we dub this deus ex machina concept The Strawberry Shortcut, in honor of the codename for OpenAI’s recent breakthrough in artificial reasoning. The premise looks appetizing but is less substantial in the eating, like the shortcake.

Maybe he published this to dispute a train of thought that dismisses the apparent gains of large language models as something of an illusion. He says Nuh-uh. We’re getting this big AI bonus because “deep learning works,” as he said in an interview later in the week, mocking those who said that programs like OpenAI’s GPT4o were simply stupid engines delivering the next token in a queue. He said that after it can start to prove math, he wondered if we still wanted to debate: “Oh, but it’s just predicting the next token?”

Gently does it. In the past week or so, we have had a logo upgrade, a New York Times profile, and a Moncler outerwear collaboration with LoveFrom and Jony Ive. The real news is that LoveFrom is working with OpenAI to build a device with investors like Laurene Powell Jobs and Ive himself.

Not everyone thinks this is an appealing prospect. The same business model that has been exploitative to consumers for decades has been the reason why Yves Béhar thinks artificial intelligence on mobile devices is apathetic. The use of artificial intelligence for our daily communications and social media is the same as it is for the attention economy, and isn’t contributing to society.

Details so far are scarce but revealing, at least where intentions are concerned. LoveFrom is designing “a product that uses AI to create a computing experience that is less socially disruptive than the iPhone.” The form the device will take and when it will be released is still to be determined. The language is suggestive of a mass-market device. and Dall-E, and rival the likes of just-announced Apple Intelligence features, which include typing requests, prompts to Siri, and pointing the camera for visual queries on the latest-gen iPhone 16.

The former Apple chief design officer is sometimes gently mocked for his obsession with seemingly small details, but when it comes to a potential mainstream human-AI interface, the man who has spent the past five years preoccupied with buttons—going so far as to create a five-volume history of garment fasteners—could be, in a somewhat inevitable way, the exact kind of person required to walk this particular tightrope of ethics and ambition.