‘It will probably lead to the end of the world’ — what tech bros really think about AI

TECHNOLOGY - In Empire of AI, Karen Hao examines the rise of Sam Altman, the founder of OpenAI - Angus Colwell

OpenAI’s Sam Altman was sacked by his own board in 2023 over concerns the company was moving too fast
Sam Altman is one of the most powerful men there has ever been. 

He runs OpenAI, the lab that gave us ChatGPT. 

He’s just turned 40 and he looks like he was AI-generated to run a tech company: casual clothes, big salesman eyes, furrowed brows. 

He tries not to think too much about artificial intelligence turning on us, he has said. 

• But if it does, “I have,” he told The New Yorker in 2016, “guns, gold, potassium iodide, antibiotics, batteries, water, gas masks from the Israeli Defence Force and a big patch of land in Big Sur I can fly to.” 
• He also once said, “AI will probably most likely lead to the end of the world, but in the meantime there’ll be great companies.”

What’s the most sensible reaction to this? 

I’ll propose one, it’s: Aaaaaarrrgghhh!!!...