OpenAI CEO Sam Altman warns about the future: ‘Children will rely on tools they can't control, relationships will shift'
OpenAI co-founder and CEO Sam Altman believes that while his children may not be smarter than artificial intelligence, they will grow up significantly more capable thanks to the tools it provides. Speaking on the first episode of the OpenAI Podcast, Altman – who announced the birth of his first child in February – said he's optimistic about what AI will enable for future generations.
'My kids will never be smarter than AI. They will grow up vastly more capable than we grew up, and able to do things that we cannot imagine. And they'll be really good at using AI,' he said during the podcast.
Altman also said that the rise of such advanced tools will also pose new challenges for societies, including the risk of over-reliance. 'There will be problems. People will develop these somewhat problematic – or, maybe, very parasocial – relationships, and, well, society will have to figure out new guardrails,' he told podcast host Andrew Mayne.
Referring to himself in the podcast as 'extremely kid-pilled' (a term suggesting he believes 'everyone should have a lot of kids') Altman shared that he 'constantly' relied on ChatGPT's guidance on how to do basic childcare during the initial week of his son's life. 'Clearly, people have been able to take care of babies without ChatGPT for a long time. I don't know how I would have done that,' he said.
Later on in the episode, Altman acknowledged that ChatGPT is known to 'hallucinate,' meaning it can provide the user with false information, and yet many users blindly believe the chatbot for all their queries.
'People have a very high degree of trust in ChatGPT, which is interesting, because AI hallucinates. It should be the tech that you don't trust that much,' he said.
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