# WATCH: Sam Altman Compares AI Training to 20 Years of Human Life | APT *APT* · https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CujJ74iC41c ## Summary In this short interview clip, Sam Altman argues that comparing AI energy use to human energy use is unfair unless you count the cost of training humans, including 20 years of life and the evolution of all humanity. He says AI has probably already caught up with humans on energy efficiency per query. On the question of whether AI makes kids dumb, he acknowledges some kids abuse it to cheat, but says most use it to accomplish more, and schools will need new ways to teach and evaluate, comparing the shift to how education adapted to Google. ## Key points - Altman says comparing AI training energy to a single human inference is unfair because training a human takes about 20 years of life and food. - He adds that producing a human also required the evolution and learning of the hundred billion people who have ever lived. - He claims AI has probably already caught up with humans on an energy-efficiency basis per answered question. - Altman concedes some kids say they cheated their way through high school with AI, which he calls very bad. - He says most kids report accomplishing more with AI, building new workflows and using it like Google for homework help. - He recalls his own middle school teacher saying Google made teaching pointless, and watching the education system adapt over time. - He predicts kids born today will graduate high school able to do things no one today can. - He says we will need new ways to teach and evaluate in school so every kid is brought along. ## Notes ### Energy efficiency of AI vs. humans - Altman argues the common comparison of AI training energy to a single human inference query is unfair. - Training a human takes about 20 years of life and all the food eaten during that time. - Beyond that, producing a human required the widespread evolution of the hundred billion people who have ever lived, who learned not to get eaten by predators and figured out science. - The fair comparison is the energy for ChatGPT to answer one question after training versus a human answering it, and on that basis AI has probably already caught up. ### Does AI make kids dumb? - Altman says this is true for some kids. - Some kids admit cheating their way through high school with AI, doing no homework, and assume they can keep using ChatGPT for their jobs — which he calls very bad. - Most kids, however, say they can't believe what they can accomplish now, building new workflows and using AI the way earlier students used Google for homework. ### Education and adaptation - Altman believes we need new ways to teach and evaluate in school so every kid is brought along. - He recalls his middle school teacher saying Google was the worst thing ever, since memorizing dates became pointless. - His own view was that memorizing birth years is a waste of time when you can look them up. - He watched teachers come to peace with Google and the education system evolve; with new tools, potential and expectations both go up. - He predicts a kid born today, graduating high school at 18, will be able to do things no one today can, and thinks that's great. ## Transcript [00:00] One of the things that is always unfair in this comparison is people talk about how much energy it takes to train an AI model relative to how much it costs a human to do one inference query. But it also takes a lot of energy to train a human. It takes like 20 years of life and all of the food you eat during that time before you get smart. And not only that, it took like the very widespread evolution of the hundred billion people that have ever lived and learned not to get eaten by predators and learned how to like figure out science and whatever to produce you and then you took whatever you you know you took. So the fair comparison is if you ask chatbt a question, how much energy does it take [00:38] once its model is trained to answer that question versus a human? And probably AI has already caught up on an energy efficiency basis measured that way. >> Wow. Okay. Font fantastic. AI is making my kids dumb. >> True for some kids. Um, [applause] [01:03] look, when I when I hear kids talk about AI, uh, there are definitely some kids who are like, "This is great. I cheated my way through all of high school. I never did any homework. Thank you." And I'm like, hm, what's your plan for like the rest of your life? And they're like, well, I assume I can like still use CHB to do my job. This is very bad. Um, we absolutely have to still teach our kids to to learn and to think and to be creative and to use these tools. That's not what most kids say, though. Most kids say, uh, I can't believe what I can accomplish now. Um, look at this thing that I've just made. I've built these incredible new workflows. you know, sure, like I may use chat GBT and the way you use Google [01:51] when you were in high school to help with your homework. Um, but now that I have this new tool, I'm doing these amazing things. I think we will need to find new ways to teach and evaluate in school to make sure every kid is brought along. But the potential of this technology, the ability to learn more, do more, I have no doubt about that. Um, when I was in school, Google had just come out and uh the like my middle school teacher was like, "This is the worst thing ever. You know, there's no point to teaching anymore. Why do you have to memorize, you know, the date that someone in history was born if you could just look it up on Google?" And my answer was, I think it's a complete waste of time to [02:31] memorize what year someone was born. I will just go look that up on Google if I ever need to know it again, which usually you don't that often. And then I watched over the next few years, teachers come to peace with this, the education system evolve. And like always happens with new tools, the the potential goes up and expectations go up. And we'll have to teach people to think harder, create more, and you know, I'm pretty sure that like a kid born today when they're 18, graduating high school will be able to do things that no one today can. And I think that's great.