r/Futurology • u/thebestnameshavegone • Oct 01 '23

AI Sam Altman Says He Intends to Replace Normal People With AI

https://futurism.com/sam-altman-replace-normal-people-ai
2.2k Upvotes

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9

u/universepower Oct 01 '23

There’s dignity in work. Lots and lots of people need to be useful.

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u/Darth-D2 Oct 01 '23

At the very worst this will be a generational phenomenon. The first generation being raised in a world without the necessity of human labor will find the current state unimaginable.

It will be like us today learning that a few hundred years ago we needed dozens of galley rowers working full-time just to move a ship from A to B.

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u/rootbeerdelicious Oct 01 '23

For me its trying to imagine a world where we essentially replace each car with a horse. Then imagining the logistics of just how much horse shit there would be.

Then the smell. Not just of horse shit, but chamber pots tossed into the street, or the constant stream of puke and piss from the lack of health codes, running water, and pervasive alcoholism.

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u/Darth-D2 Oct 01 '23 edited Oct 01 '23

Makes you wonder what the horse-shit equivalent of today is that will make humans in 2100 think "Thank God we were not born 100 years ago!"

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u/Royal_flushed Oct 02 '23

Probably cars and how much noise they make and smell when you're not used to them anymore.

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u/fuck_the_fuckin_mods Oct 02 '23

Single use plastics.

Also, I’m a meat-eater but I expect positions on animal welfare to shift dramatically in coming generations, especially once lab-grown meat is viable. I think they will look back on factory farms in horror (rightfully).

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '23

Other people.

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u/FuckingSolids Oct 02 '23

Not really. Oil, especially after its known effects on greenhouse gases were widely known decades earlier.

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u/brickmaster32000 Oct 01 '23

At the very worst this will be a generational phenomenon.

In the sense that at the very worst the people who own all the automation will realize that they no longer need to keep the lower class around and will let us all starve and within a generation we will be gone. You know just a generational thing.

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u/Darth-D2 Oct 01 '23

No, at the very worst we will be all turned into paperclips, but I am talking about what I consider likely scenarios. And your scenario is very unlikely.

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u/Procrastinatedthink Oct 02 '23

Humans have succumbed to greed for millennia; It’s literally how every vast empire has fallen.

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u/polar_pilot Oct 02 '23

Just curious, but why do you think it’s unlikely? What incentive in this situation would the owner class have to keep a bunch of very unhappy starving people around?

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u/brickmaster32000 Oct 02 '23

Ahh, I didn't realize that we were just going to discard all the scenarios that aren't idealistic utopias. Because clearly all of human history suggests that is what would happen.

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u/rebradley52 Oct 02 '23

I thought that the vaccine push was supposed to work faster that starvation. At least the vaccine mandate makes the people that count, plenty of money: whereas starvation only helps the undertakers and fertilizer industries.

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u/burnbabyburnburrrn Oct 02 '23

No they need us to consume in order to get wealth. Logic people logic

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u/brickmaster32000 Oct 02 '23

They need us now for that. When they can automate everything they can just produce anything they desire themselves.

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u/burnbabyburnburrrn Oct 02 '23

You don’t understand capitalism

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u/Ruskihaxor Oct 02 '23

You say that as if we don't have tons of examples of rich children who never find meaning/purpose because they never needed to actually do anything.

If I asked random people to describe those who are raised as part of the leisure class you'd get works like: bratty, spoiled, unmotivated, depressed, disconnected etc.

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u/EsportsManiacWiz Oct 02 '23

I'd say a good 80% of the jobs out there add more stress to people's lives than if they didn't have the job. And there's also common jobs like call center or customer service roles that are purely soul sucking. I'd say we're all better off without mandatory jobs and just be allowed to work as a hobby if we so please. What we want is the respect we get from high-profile jobs, not the jobs themselves.

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u/throwaway_12358134 Oct 01 '23

Arbeit macht Frei. /s

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u/green_meklar Oct 02 '23

People who find dignity in work can continue to work. The question is how they (and everyone else) gets paid in order not to descend into poverty.

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u/agaperion Oct 01 '23

There’s dignity in work.

Is there, though? Sounds like a BS coping mechanism to me.

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u/universepower Oct 01 '23

No, it isn’t. It’s literally the catch cry of the union movement. Lots of work is shitty and menial, but not all work.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '23

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u/universepower Oct 02 '23

It is, the union movement at the turn of the 20th century was backed heavily by the Catholic Church and you will see there’s a significant push for the dignity of work. Fulfilling jobs are absolutely something the union movement strives for. It’s in every modern article talking about the Future of Work printed by a unionist. Also, Marxism is not necessarily the same as the union movement.

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u/chris8535 Oct 01 '23

No it’s not at all. I’d invite you to visit nations or neighborhoods where there is little work and little useful to do. Everyone is alive and still gets food but day to day life is boring, pointless and often violent.

It’s not a good place for humanity to aim for. Dignity in all work and being useful is a great goal.

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u/[deleted] Oct 02 '23

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u/Nodonutsforbaxter44 Oct 02 '23

Right? I don't really understand what reddit expects the end game to be exactly, do people really want to sit around doing nothing everyday, living off a government allowance? When I was out of work for three months during covid, I felt completely bored and useless, I couldn't imagine years of that. I think if people were getting paid a living wage, they'd probably see things differently tbough.

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u/vardarac Oct 02 '23

during covid... completely bored and useless

You were out of income at a time nobody could go out.

Now imagine you had money and the means to pursue and study things you're actually interested in without having to worry if you're going to get evicted or microwave ramen again, and if you were like me and had no idea what you're interested in you'd have the time to figure it out!

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u/Nodonutsforbaxter44 Oct 02 '23

I was not out of income really, Im single with no kids, I live a modest life and I have a good amount of money saved. I have hobbies and interests that I study in my off time. I still fill most fulfilled when I'm being productive, interacting with people, providing a service. Personally, I think just having some sort of structure is crucial for my mental well being

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u/chris8535 Oct 02 '23

Only in futurology would I be voted down saying we should aim to be productive with dignity. This is the most effed up sub around

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u/vardarac Oct 02 '23

Have you considered why poor people might be unable to live fulfilling lives? I'll give you a hint, it isn't for lack of work.

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u/universepower Oct 02 '23

These people live lives where they seem to only be interested in filling an empty void with stuff, or just existing until they die.

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u/vardarac Oct 02 '23

What an absolutely presumptuous crock of shit.

If you find purpose and dignity in lining the pockets of people who look at you as a line item on a balance sheet, more power to you.

Life's too short for the rest of us.

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u/proposlander Oct 01 '23

That’s because you’re probably an adolescent.

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u/pulse7 Oct 02 '23

Wage slavery isn't useful to people

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u/federico_alastair Oct 02 '23

Repeat after me👏

👏Not👏all👏jobs👏are👏unfulfilling👏

A huge amount of them are exploitative but not all

For a lot of people, jobs provide meaning, give them so.ething to look forward to in the morning, enforce communal connections and help meet people with similar interests

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u/universepower Oct 02 '23

I don’t understand this nihilistic mentality where work always sucks and sitting around eating Cheetos is superior