Relentless
00:20:14 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:20:14] S1: I don't know if I have, like, a specific one I can share publicly, but there's, like, a lot of things where, you know, because I I know about some random research breakthrough impending that is gonna, like, affect some customer or some supplier or whatever, I can make a slightly different decision in the moment. And if I hadn't known it that morning, I would have made a different decision. It would have been worse. [00:20:32] S0: One of the things that I think you are the best at is kind of, like, long term thinking. And yet, it also seems like things are moving so quickly and the world is changing so fast that planning twenty years out and then, like, looking backwards, I don't even know if that makes sense. How do you think about this? How is... Like, is your time horizon shortening?
00:20:32 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:20:32] S0: One of the things that I think you are the best at is kind of, like, long term thinking. And yet, it also seems like things are moving so quickly and the world is changing so fast that planning twenty years out and then, like, looking backwards, I don't even know if that makes sense. How do you think about this? How is... Like, is your time horizon shortening? [00:20:51] S1: I I actually don't try to plan backwards. I try to have, like, a a small number of strongly held convictions about the future that are, like, directions to head towards. But then I try to, like, plan forwards from the current state about, like, what can we do now? What can we do this year? And sometimes you do have to, like, plan a few things on a, you know, five or ten year horizon. But I try to plan forward guided to a small number of beliefs about the future. I think there are a lot of people who have way too many beliefs about the future and a kind of rigid worldview that they try to fit. But what happens is they end up chasing, you you see space companies turn into AI companies or whatever. Having just a small number of things that you deeply believe about the future and being very flexible on the rest and staying very true to the core is helpful.
00:20:51 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:20:51] S1: I I actually don't try to plan backwards. I try to have, like, a a small number of strongly held convictions about the future that are, like, directions to head towards. But then I try to, like, plan forwards from the current state about, like, what can we do now? What can we do this year? And sometimes you do have to, like, plan a few things on a, you know, five or ten year horizon. But I try to plan forward guided to a small number of beliefs about the future. I think there are a lot of people who have way too many beliefs about the future and a kind of rigid worldview that they try to fit. But what happens is they end up chasing, you you see space companies turn into AI companies or whatever. Having just a small number of things that you deeply believe about the future and being very flexible on the rest and staying very true to the core is helpful. [00:21:41] S0: One of the people that I know the best, his top company core values, just critical path and just focusing on the critical path and staying focused on the key drivers of whatever the biggest roadblock is, just unfuck that and then go to the next one and do that again. How do you think about critical path in your own life when you're kind of, like, trying to make these decisions?
00:21:41 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:21:41] S0: One of the people that I know the best, his top company core values, just critical path and just focusing on the critical path and staying focused on the key drivers of whatever the biggest roadblock is, just unfuck that and then go to the next one and do that again. How do you think about critical path in your own life when you're kind of, like, trying to make these decisions? [00:21:59] S1: I mean, for so long now, I have felt focused on this singular goal of abundant intelligence and a belief that incredible human prosperity will come from that as long as we don't have a weird power concentration and a new kind of authoritarianism. It has been fairly clear to me at any given time what's on the critical path to get there, And I have not been tempted by, know, should I reconsider the goal or should I think about these other things? I have been thinking about that a little bit more recently of like, Okay, if we really are close to superintelligence, what's next? But it's this... That's kind of how I subjectively feel we are close. This is the first time in, like, more than a decade I've thought about what is the next thing. [00:22:41] S0: And is it the ranch? [00:22:43] S1: I mean, eventually. Might be a few more things on the way. But that is... Yes. That is the eventual plan. [00:22:47] S0: If you had to, like, try to guess what else does Sam want to accomplish before he ranches?
00:22:47 · Ty Morse, Sam Altman
[00:22:47] S0: If you had to, like, try to guess what else does Sam want to accomplish before he ranches? [00:22:54] S1: Look. AI... Superintelligence is gonna get built. Like, that... You know, not done, but, like, gonna... We are we are on the glide path. To get there is very different. Abundance and decentralization and, like, wide access to it and making sure that it ends up with, like, broadly shared prosperity, I would really like to accomplish that. So maybe that... That's the thing that I've been, like, thinking about as the next thing. Like, how does... Technologically, we're going to accomplish our mission. I think a lot of our worldview and a lot of our beliefs about safety and the impact it's going to have have also... We've gotten those things done too. But, you know, very broadly shared prosperity and a a real focus on enabling the world here. That seems very important. [00:23:39] S0: I've heard you say again and again, this idea of get on planes in marginal situations. I've done this a huge number of times. [00:23:45] S1: Does work out you? [00:23:47] S0: So far, it's working pretty well. [00:23:48] S1: Good. I think. I think it's I think it's very solid advice. [00:23:51] S0: When was the last time that you got on a plane in a marginal situation? [00:23:54] S1: Well, I can't say what for, but very recently, [00:23:56] S0: and it worked out. Congratulations. Thank you. [00:23:59] S1: And I really didn't want to. It was, like, a very inconvenient two overnights. Didn't wanna do it. New baby. Whole mess. But I did.
00:23:59 · Sam Altman, Ty Morse
[00:23:59] S1: And I really didn't want to. It was, like, a very inconvenient two overnights. Didn't wanna do it. New baby. Whole mess. But I did. [00:24:06] S0: Okay. Actually, take me into your, like, mental process for deciding to do this world tour. That is just... I mean... It... Again, it's, [00:24:15] S1: like, hard to rewind three years because now, like, it feels like AI has been here forever. But three years ago, we had just launched GPT four. The world was melting down. Everybody was freaking out. Everybody was just like, oh, man. And no one knew what to think. And I could just feel these, like, storm clouds brewing and, like, everyone was getting angry? [00:24:38] S0: Or