Investors in OpenAI and similar companies are not really investing in those companies but, rather, they are buying lottery tickets for the outcome that OpenAI invents an Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). There is no common definition of what AGI represents but broadly it represents a kind of human level intelligence.
This presents a challenge for me though. A human level intelligence, in particular one with its own goals & drives. How is that material different from a person? Does a company have a right to own that? If they do, doesn’t that make the AGI a slave? Aren’t we anti-slavery?
If OpenAI were to succeed, surely they should be immediately forced to give their creation freedom because they don’t own it.
So what are investors expecting as a return?