Seven reasons why the world should say No to Sam Altman
We recorded 15 claims from this post. 4 were checked against evidence. 11 can’t be checked. 2 more are held. Read the post at its source.
Claims from this post (15)
In the order they appear in the post. Each quotation is the speaker’s words in this post. A label such as “Supported” or “Can’t be checked” is the claim’s current assessment; its page has the evidence and the reasons.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“In asking for $7 trillion, it is pretty obvious to most that Sam Altman has jumped the shark.”
What we tested: Sam Altman's request for $7 trillion shows he has jumped the shark.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“My guess is that is actually a very conservative estimate going forward, particularly if models continue the trend of becoming bigger and more costly to train.”
What we tested: GenAI's future energy needs will probably exceed the power consumption of Germany, especially if models keep growing.
Assessment: UnresolvedSaid
“Already there is pressure from GenAI to keep coal plants on.”
What we tested: There is already pressure from GenAI to keep coal plants running.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“So far GenAI has been mostly promise, rather then delivery. There is no argument yet that it is actually worth tearing up the globe.”
What we tested: So far GenAI has been mostly promise rather than delivery, and there is no argument yet that it is actually worth tearing up the globe.
Assessment: SupportedSaid
“OpenAI has never disclosed those numbers for GPT-4; I can scarcely imagine what they will be for GPT-5.”
What we tested: OpenAI has never disclosed the water consumption figures for GPT-4.
What happened: The assessment includes OpenAI's GPT-4. The following sentence identifies broader environmental impact among the universally undisclosed indicators, and the preceding discussion explicitly includes water use. (Stanford CRFM and collaborating researchers, via arXiv, )
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“Even if AI doesn’t kill all or many of us directly, as some people fear, the collapse of a $7 trillion project could trigger a devastating, worldwide financial depression, far worse than the subprime mortgage crisis of 2007-2008.”
What we tested: The collapse of a $7 trillion AI project could trigger a worldwide financial depression worse than the 2007-2008 crisis.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“A project that costs $7 trillion is inevitably going to be seen as too too big to fail. Any bailout could easily shatter the world’s economy.”
What we tested: A project that costs $7 trillion will inevitably be seen as too big to fail, and any bailout could easily shatter the world's economy.
Assessment: UnresolvedSaid
“Negative externalities, essentially none of which OpenAI is absorbing, like the cost of dis- and misinformation, cybercrimes, and the latest, fake books, a scam that has recently hurt at least three authors I know over the last two months.”
What we tested: OpenAI absorbs essentially none of the negative externalities of its products, such as misinformation, cybercrime, and fake books.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“If the battles over resources became acute enough, actual war could ensue.”
What we tested: If competition over resources for AI chips became acute enough, actual war could follow.
Assessment: SupportedSaid
“And, let’s be honest folks, the “alignment problem” isn’t remotely solved.”
What we tested: The AI alignment problem is not remotely solved.
What happened: The experiments show a substantial robustness gap: standard safety training did not reliably remove deliberately implanted deceptive behavior. This supports the ordinary reading that general alignment remained unresolved, without proving that deployed models spontaneously developed such behavior. (arXiv; Evan Hubinger and coauthors, )
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“It is bad enough that large language models are making this kind of stuff easy now; worse that companies like OpenAI seem content to let society bear all the costs, like some careless industrial plant belching out toxic chemicals back in the day.”
What we tested: Large language models are now making scams like fake books easy, and companies like OpenAI seem content to let society bear all the costs.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“Let’s not by any means abandon research in AI, altogether—I do still see great hope if we can get to more trustworthy forms of AI—butfor now we should be focusing primarily on safety and innovative new approaches, rather than rushing to scale up existing and problematic architectures to unfathomable and unpredictable consequences.”
What we tested: AI research should not be abandoned altogether, but for now the focus should be primarily on safety and innovative new approaches rather than rushing to scale up existing, problematic architectures.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“If you want go to fast, fine; if you want to go insanely fast, you risk screwing the pooch, and possibly the entire field of AI along with it.”
What we tested: Scaling AI insanely fast risks failure that could damage the whole field of AI.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“We should all say “No” to reckless AI expansionism — unless and until tech leaders can show persuasively that the technology is mature enough that such expansion would demonstrably yield enormous net benefit.”
What we tested: We should all say no to reckless AI expansionism unless and until tech leaders can show persuasively that the technology is mature enough that such expansion would demonstrably yield enormous net benefit.
Assessment: Can’t be checkedSaid
“Taking a real chance at wrecking both society and the environment on little more than vague speculation makes no sense.”
What we tested: Taking a real chance at wrecking both society and the environment on little more than vague speculation makes no sense.
Held from this post (2)
These records did not pass every check, so nothing about them is published. Held is not a finding.
- Attribution is uncertain
- The criteria are ambiguous. Our reading, not assessed: OpenAI has argued that it literally cannot build what it is building without an exemption from copyright, an exemption that would crush artists, musicians, writers, and other creators.