Jeff Bezos thinks there's not enough humans in the world for all the potential jobs, according to tech investor Sam Altman

Drew Angerer/Getty Images/REUTERS/Joshua Roberts

Sam Altman (left) and Jeff Bezos.

• Y Combinator President Sam Altman said Jeff Bezos once told him that there aren't enough humans to fill all the jobs in the world.
• Altman said this in the context of a conversation about advances in AI making certain jobs redundant.
• Altman is co-chair of the non-profit AI company OpenAI, which is famous for making a text generator it deemed too dangerous to release, and for making bots that can beat humans at "Dota 2."

Y Combinator President Sam Altman has revealed that Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos once told him that there aren't enough humans in the world to fill all the jobs.

In an interview with Kara Swisher at The New York Times' New Work Summit, Altman - who is also the chair of OpenAI, an AI research non-profit whose founders also include Elon Musk - discussed the future of AI, and to what extent the technology might make modern jobs redundant.

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"Entire classes of jobs will go away and not come back," Altman said. He added that there are already vocations in which he thinks AI is outperforming humans, giving radiologists as an example. "Human radiologists are already much worse than computer radiologists," he said.

But while Altman said AI tools will kill some employment opportunities, he believes that new jobs will spring up - and he cited a conversation he had Bezos to support this theory.

Read more: Bill Gates hails "huge milestone" for AI as bots work in a team to destroy humans at video game "Dota 2"

"One thing that Jeff Bezos said to me once that stuck with me... was that there is in some true sense right now in which... we don't have nearly enough people for all the jobs," Altman reflected.

"It'd be great for every student to have an individual teacher, it'd be great for every time you go into a doctor's office never to be waiting and there's plenty of doctors ready for you." Altman added that AI we'll see many more people doing these "human-to-human" jobs.

OpenAI has sprung to prominence for such feats as creating a text-generator. which it deemed too dangerous to release, and for training bots which can beat human players at the video game "Dota 2."