[lich_king]

I see some folks here defending Altman because it was an off-the-cuff remark in front of a receptive audience. But why does this make the comment acceptable? Would you give me if I talked about eating babies, but defended myself by saying that I was speaking to a receptive audience?

Most charitably, it's a dumb thing to say. It compares two unrelated things if you see the value of human life to be more than just answering prompts. Less charitably, the argument is evil: if he was trying to make a sincere apples-to-apples comparison, it implies that he doesn't value human life beyond the labor his company can automate.

I can understand edgy teenagers making arguments like that on LessWrong forums, but Altman ought to know better. He either doesn't, or he sincerely believes what the comment implies.