OpenAI boss Sam Altman thinks people should have more faith in his company and others like it to do the right thing when it comes to artificial intelligence (AI) development amid rising public concerns about all the risks.
“The world should trust that we are going to do the right thing because it’s the right thing and we feel the magnitude of this,” Altman said on Tuesday during a conference in San Francisco.
However, Altman noted that people were justified in their fears around AI, as the capability of the tools has progressed rapidly.
“It doesn’t take as much imagination as it used to for [us] to imagine how this could go wrong,” he said. “I think the world is right to be afraid of this.”
Altman’s comments came during an appearance at an annual conference hosted by software firm Salesforce.
It was the first time he had spoken publicly since a post went viral last week by a researcher who quit the AI firm Anthropic. The researcher claimed AI could kill all humans by the end of the decade if left unchecked.
A handful of other AI executives and experts responded by saying they agreed with the assessment, though they didn’t explain how they came to their conclusions or how exactly AI could accomplish such a thing.
The fervor over the claims has led to more scrutiny of AI development in recent days, and in response, Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei called for the pace of all AI development to slow, external and urged governments to regulate the industry.
The post was applauded by Altman, as well as co-founder of Google’s DeepMind Demis Hassabis, and Elon Musk, owner of social media site X and AI assistant Grok.
By Tuesday, more AI leaders were voicing support for self-regulation rather than government involvement.
Altman said that he felt AI companies like his own were capable of essentially regulating themselves.
“We will get it right, I’m very confident in our company’s and industry’s ability to do this safely,” Altman said, adding that he was sure that they would “keep alignment and safety way ahead of capabilities” and if they couldn’t, they would “slow down or stop”.
