OpenAI CEO Altman waters down fans’ online hype on AGI

OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman has watered down fans’ wild online speculation about his company’s capabilities following rumors the company was close to superintelligence.

This followed excitement among fans as rumors circulated online that the ChatGPT maker had achieved General Artificial Intelligence (AGI) behind closed doors. According to Fortune, OpenAI staffers, including Altman, have been trying to promote a series of AI reasoning models and a slew of updates last month. An AI writer known as Gwern Branwen then fuelled the rumors, claiming the company was close to a huge breakthrough with its new reasoning models.

Altman asked fans to lower expectations of OpenAI

However, the OpenAI boss had to calm fans in a post on the X platform. Altman told fans to lower their expectations, although the company was working on some “cool stuff.”

“Twitter hype is out of control again. We have some very cool stuff for you but please chill and cut your expectations 100x.”

Altman.

Speculation had been high on social media platforms, especially on the X platform that OpenAI will be deploying AGI next month. However, the chief executive has said they will not be deploying any AGI nor have they built it yet.

Altman wrote pushing back against the mounting speculation about OpenAI’s next moves. Some enthusiasts agreed with Altman, although they admitted they were excited about developments at the company, with others saying it “was great to keep our expectations grounded.”

“I feel you! Keeping expectations in check is key. Can’t wait to see what you have in store for us, even if it’s not AGI next month. Excited for the cool stuff coming our way!” wrote Ankish.

Other staffers also stepped in trying to calm the online hype. The tech company’s reasoning expert Noam Brown says there is “lots of vague AI hype” on social media. While acknowledging there are “good reasons to be optimistic” about AI progress, Brown emphasized that plenty of research problems still need solutions, adding that OpenAI has “not yet achieved superintelligence.”

His comments directly challenge recent statements from within OpenAI. In January, OpenAI researcher Stephen McAleer wrote, “I kind of miss doing AI research back when we did not know how to create superintelligence.” McAleer’s sentiments suggest OpenAI at least found a clear path to so-called Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI).

Before joining OpenAI, Brown worked at Facebook AI Research (FAIR), where he developed AI systems that defeated human players in complex games like poker and Diplomacy. His work on systems like the poker AI Libratus explored the concept of “test-time compute,” showing that giving AI more calculation time led to better game moves.

twitter hype is out of control again.

we are not gonna deploy AGI next month, nor have we built it.

we have some very cool stuff for you but pls chill and cut your expectations 100x!

— Sam Altman (@sama) January 20, 2025

Is Altman contradicting himself?

However, the statements by Altman contradict what he earlier said. He said in the age of AI being knowledgeable memorising facts, or knowing where to go find them, is not nearly as valuable as learning how to ask great questions.

“There will be a kind of ability we still really value, but it will not be raw, intellectual horsepower to the same degree,” Altman told Wharton organizational psychologist Adam Grant’s “ReThinking” podcast, in an episode published in December. “Figuring out what questions to ask will be more important than figuring out the answer,” added Altman.

Altman’s observation could be interpreted in a couple of ways, ask other people great questions or design questions for AI chatbots so they will give you the answers you need, a process known as prompt engineering.

Asking other people clear, concise questions can show empathy or establish your credibility, communication expert Matt Abrahams told CNBC in an interview. Prompt engineers are in crazy demand, Lydia Logan, IBM’s vice president of global education and workforce development said in June 2024, with some jobs paying over $100,000 a year.

AI could eventually take over most workplaces’ administrative tasks, but it will not entirely replace human intellect, Altman predicted. Instead, people will need to help the technology learn critical thinking skills to strengthen arguments and come up with new ideas, he said.

“I have certainly gotten the greatest professional joy from having to creatively reason through a problem and figure out an answer that no one has figured out before,” said Altman.

“What I expect to happen in reality is, there is going to be a new way we work on the hard problems,” he added.

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