Sam Altman doesn’t think the world is ready for humanoid robots

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the world is not yet ready to see humanoid robots walking down the street, though that moment is not far off.

In a Bloomberg interview aired Tuesday, Altman said, “I don’t think the world has really had the humanoid robots moment yet.”

He predicted that soon people could spot “like seven robots that walk past you doing things or whatever,” making daily life feel like science fiction. He added that this shift isn’t “very far away from like a visceral, like, ‘Oh man, this is gonna do a lot of things that people used to do.’”

He noted that many have only “abstractly thought” of AI taking on tasks such as programming or customer support. In February, OpenAI signed a deal with Figure AI, a startup developing humanoid machines meant to “help in everyday life.” Figure says its model, Figure-01, is built for manufacturing, logistics, warehousing and retail roles.

Altman acknowledged the broad impact ahead. “AI is, for sure, going to change a lot of jobs, totally take some jobs away, create a bunch of new ones,” he said. Moreover, OpenAI has “always tried to be super honest about what we think the impact may be, realizing that we’ll be wrong on a lot of details.”

Altman’s OpenAI has already replaced humans in other areas.

In 2023, GPT-4 scored in the top 10% on the bar exam, and more recent models now outperform OpenAI’s own chief scientist at coding. Since ChatGPT’s release, freelance writing roles have dropped sharply, and the same effect has hit graphic design jobs when popular AI image generators arrived. In San Francisco, driverless cars are becoming a common sight on city streets.

Despite these shifts, a senior Chinese official said humanoid robots will not replace human workers and trigger mass unemployment. Liang Liang, deputy director at the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area, told foreign media on May 16 that robots will instead boost output and take on tasks in hazardous settings. Liang said he does not believe machines will supplant the people who created them.

However, Altman says, “I think I am way too self-aware of my own limitations to sit here and try to say I can, like, tell you what’s on the other side of that wormhole.”

Sam Altman’s rival has a somewhat positive outlook for humanoid robots

Elon Musk shared his own take on humanoid robots on Tuesday at the US-Saudi Investment Forum in Riyadh.

The Tesla CEO said personal robots could one day number in the tens of billions, reshaping the global economy. “Everyone will want their personal robot,” Musk said. “You can think of it like having your own personal C-3PO or R2-D2 — but even better.”

Musk predicted such wide use of robots would boost productivity and bring about a “universal high income,” where goods and services become so plentiful that “no one wants for anything.”

He pointed to Tesla’s own work on humanoid technology, calling the Optimus robot potentially the “biggest product ever of any kind” during a launch event for its new robotaxi last October. Musk said Tesla aims to build up to one million robots a year, though he acknowledged the project still faces technical and geopolitical hurdles.

Earlier, at an AI safety summit in the UK in 2023, he said AI would eventually do “everything,” making work optional and something done only for “personal satisfaction.”

Musk also sounded a note of caution. “You can have a James Cameron sort of movie — you know, ‘Terminator.’ We don’t want that one,” he said. “But having sort of a ‘Star Trek’ future would be great.”