Sam Altman’s article from 2021 raised and still does a lot of interpretations, explanations, and analyses. Due to Altman and OpenAI’s roles in the AI and AGI ecosystem, the article is considered by many as a foundational statement.
The article suggests that similar to “Moore’s Law,” exponential improvements would occur across the AI-AGI field due to technological innovation and increased computational power.
Altman presents three crucial consequences that will “follow the recursive loop of innovation, as these smart machines themselves help us make smarter machines, which, in turn, will accelerate the revolution’s pace.”
- This revolution will create phenomenal wealth. The price of many kinds of labor (which drives the costs of goods and services) will fall toward zero once sufficiently powerful AI “joins the workforce.”
- The world will change so rapidly and drastically that an equally drastic change in policy will be needed to distribute this wealth and enable more people to pursue the life they want.
- If we get both of these right, we can improve the standard of living for people more than we ever have before.”
As we’re shifting to the new system, adds Altman, “a great future isn’t complicated: we need technology to create more wealth, and policy to fairly distribute it. Everything necessary will be cheap, and everyone will have enough money to be able to afford it. As this system will be enormously popular, policymakers who embrace it early will be rewarded: they will themselves become enormously popular.”
