OpenAI CEO warns that AI is advancing faster than society can adapt

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has publicly admitted that artificial intelligence is advancing so rapidly that both experts and the public may struggle to keep up.

In an interview on The Tonight Show, he noted that the scale and pace of deploying generative models like ChatGPT are unprecedented, and that in just three years the technology has reshaped medicine, education, software development and many other fields.

Altman said that AI has the potential to accelerate the development of treatments for severe diseases and help solve fundamental scientific problems, but in the wrong hands the same tools could cause global harm. He added that the growing influence of AI comes with enormous energy demands, the need for ever-larger data centers and a significant environmental footprint.

He acknowledged that OpenAI must be cautious when bringing new generations of models to market and give society time to adjust: “We have to introduce this technology to the world in a responsible way… you could imagine us getting that wrong.” Altman stressed that the sheer speed of change is a source of real concern for him.

ChatGPT remains the most downloaded app globally, with more than 1.36 billion installs since 2022. The surge in adoption has fueled renewed concerns among experts, who warn about potential over-reliance on AI tools, weakened cognitive skills among users and a possible increase in severe incidents linked to excessive use of such systems.