From Driverless Cars To Parentless Parenting: Is Sam Altman Running Out Of Things To Outsource?

Altman’s back at it again, and this time, he’s giving us parenting advice – exactly what we were all hoping for, I’m sure.

The OpenAI CEO recently spoke about using ChatGPT as a parenting tool, describing it as a helpful resource for answering questions and navigating some of the endless uncertainties that come with raising children.

Sure, that’s not totally outrageous, and it’s definitely something that many people have already done, are doing and will do in the future. However, when Altman continued to post on X about how he recommends that on the drive to school, parents should use AI to personalise little messages to their children about things going on in their lives, people didn’t take that so well.

It’s not the first time he’s suggested something like this. Of course, he’s also previously discussed creating personalised AI-generated videos for his children during travel and said that he doesn’t really know how people parented before modern technology.

But I think that the comment about using AI to talk to your children on the way to school got more negative reactions than he may have expected, and there may be a few reasons.

My first thought when I read this latest Altman revelation was (after the obvious, “not again” thought) that my mom used to talk about how her time in the car with my brother and me – on the way to school, on the way home from school, to and from sports practices and extra mural and so on – was often the most meaningful. It’s when she had one-on-one time with us, away from other distractions, and apparently, it’s where she had some important and meaningful conversations with her young children (even though we may not necessarily have realised this at the time).

So, while some (like Altman, perhaps) may see that part of daily life as merely monotonous, there are others who see great value in it. Just because it’s routine and it could, potentially, be made more convenient, easier or require less effort, doesn’t necessarily mean it should!

Is Altman Just Trying To Automate Everything?

Of course, everybody has different parenting techniques and philosophies – whether you allow screens or not, how much time you want your kids to spend outdoors, what you feed your children and a million other things. But in this case, it really feels like something different. Indeed, it feels, to many, like the latest example of Silicon Valley’s obsession with trying to automate every aspect of human life. Further to that, it almost feels like proof that the tech industry has finally reached the point where it sees parenting itself as a problem waiting to be solved.

But, before we all start panic-buying wooden toys and moving off-grid, we should probably consider something else too. That is, why are we treating Sam Altman’s parenting habits as if they are official policy for the rest of humanity?

I know he’s a big shot. I know he’s the CEO of OpenAI and he has deep insight into modern artificial intelligence development and all the rest of it. But, he’s not a child psychologist, he’s not a paediatrician and he’s not the world’s leading expert on child development (unless he is and I’m sorely mistaken). He’s just a very famous technology CEO who happens to have children. Much like if and when he talks about AI being used in modern dating apps, he’s fully entitled to have an opinion, but there’s no reason we (or anybody else) should take as word as tthe master of relationships and finding love.

But still, for some reason, every time he mentions how he uses technology at home, it seems to trigger a global debate about the future of parenting.

Of course, part of this is understandable. Altman isn’t just any CEO, after all. As the face of OpenAI, he’s one of the most influential figures in the technology industry, and the tools his company creates are shaping how millions of people work, learn and communicate. So naturally, when he talks about using AI in his personal life, people tend to assume he’s offering a glimpse into what he thinks the future should look like.

But perhaps we’re giving these comments more weight than they deserve. Parents have always disagreed about how children should be raised. Long before AI entered the picture, people were arguing about television, video games, smartphones, social media and screen time. They disagreed on what children should eat, when they should eat, how often they should nap, where they should nap and about a million other things. Today, parenting discussions often resemble political debates, with fierce camps forming around everything from sleep training to whether children should ever be allowed near an iPad.

In that context, AI feels less like a revolutionary new issue and more like the latest addition to a very long list of things parents disagree about.

The difference is that AI arrives at a time when many people already feel overwhelmed by technology’s growing role in everyday life. Over the last decade, we’ve become accustomed to apps helping us find restaurants, order groceries, navigate traffic, manage our finances and organise our calendars. There seems to be a digital solution for every inconvenience, frustration or moment of uncertainty, and the feeling is that whenever something doesn’t go completely smoothly or is even slightly challenging, we should find a way to develop technology to make that friction disappear.

So when someone suggests using AI to help with parenting, it’s easy to see why people start asking whether we’re in danger of outsourcing too much.

Where the Real Disagreement Lies

The concern isn’t really about asking ChatGPT for advice on a sleepless baby or a fussy eater – of course, parents have been searching Google for answers to those questions for years. Rather, the concern is the broader mindset that sometimes emerges from the tech world, that every human activity can be optimised, automated or improved through software.

But parenting is not particularly efficient. Children are unpredictable, emotional and gloriously irrational. Many of the most important parts of raising them involve patience, presence and trial and error rather than productivity hacks and algorithmic recommendations. So much of the beauty of development, learning and relationship building between parents and children comes from these difficulties.

And I think that’s why some people find Altman’s comments unsettling. Not because AI can’t occasionally be useful, but because they fear a future where parents become increasingly reliant on technology to navigate experiences that were once considered fundamentally human.

Warranted, But Maybe Disproportionate 

At the same time, the backlash itself feels slightly overblown. Not every opinion expressed by a tech CEO needs to become a cultural flashpoint. After all, plenty of parents use technology in ways others would strongly disagree with – some enforce strict screen-time limits, while others hand their children tablets on long journeys and think nothing of it. Most people, however, recognise these as parenting choices rather than existential threats to civilisation.

So perhaps the same principle should apply here. Sam Altman is entitled to use AI however he wants while raising his children (within reason), and other parents are equally entitled to ignore him completely.

The more interesting issue to consider here actually may not be whether Altman is right or wrong, but rather why we’re so eager to treat his personal preferences as a blueprint for the future. Somewhere along the way, tech leaders seem to have evolved from software executives into lifestyle commentators whose views on everything from education to parenting are dissected as if they carry special authority.

Maybe they don’t. In fact, I, personally, would like to say that they certainly shouldn’t.

Because while AI may eventually help parents answer questions, organise schedules and explain why dinosaurs are extinct for the 400th time in two weeks, there’s still one task that it can’t fully automate: actually being there.