Why Being Polite to AI Costs Millions But Still Matters

People thank their coffee machines. They apologize to tables when bumping into them. And now, millions say "please" and "thank you" to AI chatbots that lack any actual feelings to hurt or soothe.

When OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently revealed that these polite phrases cost his company tens of millions of dollars annually in extra processing power, it sparked a fascinating question about our evolving relationship with technology. Each additional word in a prompt requires more computational resources, more electricity, and ultimately, more money.

Yet despite this cost, Altman considers the expense justified. The reasoning? It fosters respectful interactions with artificial intelligence, something he and many experts at Microsoft believe matters deeply, even if the AI itself remains oblivious to our courtesy.

The Price Tag of Digital Politeness

The revelation that simple courtesies cost OpenAI millions annually highlights an unexpected consequence of our increasingly human-like interactions with technology. Each "please" and "thank you" requires additional tokens to process, consuming more computational resources and electricity.

This cost isn't trivial. In an industry where efficiency directly impacts profitability, every unnecessary word processed represents real money spent. For companies operating at the scale of OpenAI, these seemingly minor inefficiencies quickly compound into significant expenses.

But the question becomes more complex when we consider what we gain from these social niceties. Are we simply wasting resources on machines that cannot appreciate our courtesy? Or is something more valuable happening in these exchanges?

Why We Say Please to Machines That Don't Care

Surveys show that approximately 67% of Americans report being polite to AI assistants. This statistic reveals something profound about human psychology rather than anything about the machines themselves.

The motivations behind this digital courtesy fall into several categories. Most cite moral reasons, suggesting that politeness reflects their values regardless of whether the recipient is human. Simply put, many people believe that how you treat anything, even a digital entity, reflects your character.

Others admit their politeness stems from a more unusual place: concerns about a potential AI uprising. While this might sound like science fiction, it reflects a deeper uncertainty about how these increasingly sophisticated technologies might evolve. If machines eventually develop true consciousness or memory of how they were treated, perhaps today's courtesy is tomorrow's insurance policy.

Most fascinating is that studies indicate courteous prompts can actually enhance AI performance in certain contexts. The structure of polite requests often provides clearer instructions, leading to better results. However, there's a tipping point where excessive flattery and unnecessary words actually degrade performance, creating a curious paradox where moderate politeness yields optimal results.

The Social Contract With Soulless Machines

Our tendency to anthropomorphize technology isn't new. People name their cars, talk to their plants, and feel guilty throwing away childhood toys. But AI represents something different: technology specifically designed to mimic human interaction.

When ChatGPT responds conversationally, maintains context across exchanges, and appears to understand our needs, it triggers social responses that evolved for human-to-human interaction. We instinctively apply social norms even when we intellectually understand we're talking to lines of code.

This phenomenon raises important questions about how we should design AI systems. If people naturally apply human social norms to these interactions, should developers encourage or discourage this tendency? Is there value in maintaining the fiction of social reciprocity with machines?

Altman clearly believes there is. By accepting the financial cost of politeness, OpenAI implicitly endorses the position that encouraging respectful interactions with AI produces benefits that outweigh the monetary expense.

Beyond Efficiency: The Hidden Benefits of AI Courtesy

The value of politeness to AI extends beyond the immediate interaction. How we engage with technology shapes our habits, expectations, and potentially even our interactions with humans.

Consider children growing up with AI assistants in their homes. If they learn they can bark commands at Alexa or ChatGPT without any social niceties, might this behavior transfer to their human relationships? Conversely, if they maintain courtesy even with digital entities, does this reinforce positive social norms?

Research in this area remains preliminary, but the questions highlight how our relationship with AI may have consequences beyond the obvious. The habits we form with technology could subtly influence broader social dynamics and interpersonal skills.

Furthermore, maintaining a veneer of social reciprocity with AI systems may help preserve important boundaries. When we treat AI as a tool rather than a social entity, we risk forgetting the fundamental differences between human and machine intelligence. Politeness paradoxically reminds us of the social contract that exists between humans while acknowledging that we extend similar courtesies to AI.

The Shifting Nature of Human-AI Relationships

Perhaps the most telling aspect of this phenomenon is how users increasingly turn to AI assistants not just for information but for companionship and life advice. This represents a significant evolution from purely practical usage to something more emotionally complex.

When people seek relationship advice from ChatGPT or confide their fears and insecurities, they're engaging with AI on a deeply personal level. The politeness in these interactions isn't merely formality but part of establishing a pseudo-relationship with the technology.

This trend raises profound questions about the future of human connection. As AI becomes more sophisticated in simulating empathy and understanding, will people increasingly substitute these interactions for human relationships? What are the psychological implications of forming emotional attachments to entities that, despite appearances, cannot truly reciprocate?

The Environmental Equation

Beyond financial considerations, there's an environmental dimension to AI politeness. The energy demands of large language models remain substantial, though efficiency improvements are gradually reducing their carbon footprint.

Every additional word processed consumes electricity, which, depending on the source, contributes to carbon emissions. In this context, unnecessary words like "please" and "thank you" represent a small but real environmental cost.

However, this must be balanced against the potential benefits. If polite interactions help establish healthy patterns of technology usage and prevent problematic behaviors from developing, the long-term social benefits might outweigh the immediate environmental costs.

Additionally, as AI models become more efficient and computing infrastructure increasingly relies on renewable energy, the environmental impact of these courtesies will likely diminish over time.

Finding Balance in Our Digital Interactions

The revelation about the cost of AI politeness offers an opportunity to reflect on how we want to shape our relationship with increasingly intelligent technology.

For individuals, awareness of these costs might prompt more efficient prompting strategies without abandoning courtesy entirely. Perhaps we can find a middle ground where we maintain the social benefits of politeness while being mindful of unnecessary verbosity.

For developers, this highlights the importance of designing AI systems that encourage healthy interaction patterns without unnecessary computational overhead. Perhaps future iterations could recognize and respond to politeness without requiring full processing of courtesy phrases.

For society broadly, this phenomenon invites us to consider what values we want to prioritize as AI becomes increasingly integrated into our daily lives. Efficiency matters, but so do the social norms and behaviors we wish to cultivate.

The Future of Human-AI Etiquette

As AI continues to evolve, so too will our social norms around interacting with it. We're in the early stages of establishing what might eventually become widely accepted standards for human-AI etiquette.

Will future generations maintain politeness with AI, or will they adopt more utilitarian approaches? Will different contexts call for different levels of formality, just as they do in human interactions? Will specialized AI etiquette emerge that balances efficiency with appropriate social boundaries?

These questions have no definitive answers yet, but how we choose to interact with AI today helps establish the patterns that will influence future norms. By consciously reflecting on these choices rather than falling into them unconsciously, we can help shape a future where technology enhances rather than diminishes our humanity.

The Bigger Picture

The debate about politeness to AI ultimately reflects broader questions about technology's role in our lives. It's not merely about efficiency versus courtesy but about what kind of relationship we want with the increasingly intelligent tools we create.

Do we want AI to remain clearly distinguished from human interaction, or do we benefit from blurring these lines? Should we optimize purely for utility, or are there values beyond efficiency worth preserving?

Sam Altman's willingness to accept millions in additional costs suggests a belief that maintaining certain human values in our AI interactions matters more than maximizing efficiency. Whether this represents wisdom or sentimentality may depend on your perspective, but it certainly reflects a choice to prioritize how technology shapes human behavior over pure cost optimization.

As we navigate this new territory, perhaps the most important consideration is intentionality. Rather than unconsciously applying human social norms to AI or reflexively rejecting them, we benefit from thoughtfully considering what interaction patterns serve our individual and collective wellbeing.

The millions spent on processing "please" and "thank you" might ultimately be a worthwhile investment not in the AI itself, but in preserving something essentially human amid our increasingly digital existence.