Sam Altman is the CEO of OpenAI since 2019. All these years, the company’s mission is to achieve what is called ‘artificial general intelligence’ (AGI). The idea is to make it safe and beneficial for humanity.

It is still not precisely known what AGI is. It is a lofty but vague idea.

In a recent interview with Financial Times, Altman poetically calls AGI ‘magic intelligence in the sky.’ Interpreted in concrete terms, it amounts to some divine or godly entity.

OpenAI itself defines AGI as a system that outperforms humans at most (economically valuable) work. It is so mundane description of something that is superintelligence for Altman.

It is not known to many that Elon Musk is the co-founder of OpenAI who left it in 2018 before Altman joined it as CEO. Musk is worried about AI that could outsmart humans, and could become a digital God. While staying with Larry Page, the cofounder of Google in Palo Alto, Musk would talk about AI safety.

Altman who has made AGI as his mission still sounds ambiguous on the details. Altman expects Microsoft to back OpenAI financially to achieve its mission. He realizes that there is a lot of work, between here and the accomplishment of the mission. Altman also says that OpenAI Board of six people will decide when the company has reached AGI. It leaves a lot of wriggle room for him.

Whether AGI would be just robotized help to high-school students or elevation of tech to divine levels, one thing is certain — AGI requires astronomical investment.