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OpenAI Ceo Sam Altman believes artificial intelligence (AI) will be at least up to par with human intelligence and perhaps in advance of it within a year. He revealed the reason for his optimism during a recent interview: a form of AI known as artificial general intelligence (AGI).
If Altman is right, AI will arrive at its highest level of AGI much faster than previously envisioned. Most predictions thought AGI would take a decade to achieve. After all, AGI requires AI to do all of an organization’s work independently—for example, competent self-driving cars with no glitches, a supermarket managed completely by AI, or a war being waged by AI without the need for generals to call the shots. Altman thinks we can achieve AGI by 2025, and that getting there is purely an engineering problem.
In the 1960s, the Jetsons TV show envisioned flying cars. In the 1980s, the movie Blade Runner predicted androids more physically capable than humans—and more intelligent—by 2011. However, both are decades away or more in reality. It’s impossible to say whether Altman is being overoptimistic, or trying to justify his company’s work.
What is realistic? Expect the large language models (LLMs) behind current generative AI (GenAI) applications to continue to evolve, growing more capable, more accurate, and more focused on specific datasets.
“While LLMs provide powerful general capabilities, they are not equipped to answer every question that pertains to a company’s specific business domain,” said Mohan Varthakavi, Vice President of AI and Edge at cloud database firm Couchbase. “Businesses will adopt hybrid AI models, combining LLMs and smaller, domain-specific models, to safeguard data while maximizing results.”
If it is ever attainable, arriving at an AGI-like state will require a complete rework of the entire IT infrastructure and existing data structures. It entails a new kind of AI-enabled coding and application creation, more efficient data centers customized for AI, and a whole lot more.
“The long-term future is a comprehensive transformation where every application—small, medium, and large—is going to be revised and rewritten using AI,” said Varthakavi. “This sweeping movement will mark a fundamental shift from bolt-on solutions to ground-up redesigns, as organizations recognize the benefits of building truly AI-first applications that can fully harness the technology’s capabilities.”
Rome wasn’t built in a day, and AGI won’t be built in a year—or maybe even 10. Only time will tell. In the meantime, Altman’s AGI prediction should be viewed as an indication that AI innovation is moving at a more rapid pace than even he expected and that some breakthroughs lie ahead in the very near future. Watch the full interview on Y Combinator’s YouTube channel to learn more.