[ { "i": 0, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Let's start with today and what you're working on. You are building interaction models at thinking machines. Models that you say keep humans in the loop. What exactly does that mean?" }, { "i": 1, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "We've been working for the past year and a half on the foundations of building a frontier AI lab and with with the specific um focus that we have and the interaction models were a first look at" }, { "i": 2, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "our concentrated bet towards human AI collaboration." }, { "i": 3, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um and you know the the reason why we even started thinking machines is because we wanted to build the frontier AI lab that's really focused on um really human AI collaboration piece and" }, { "i": 4, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "that means a lot of things and there are specific research bets that go into that but we wanted to showcase um our work in one of the first bets through the interaction models and the interaction" }, { "i": 5, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "models are a new kind of model. If you consider the types of models that we work with today, they're very um turnbased." }, { "i": 6, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> And so you talk, they talk, then they go off and think. Um once you've given sort of uh prompt on what it is that you want to do and while they're thinking, it's almost like they're deaf and blind. They" }, { "i": 7, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "cannot perceive anything else about what's going on. And then it's your turn. And while you're talking um they really cannot perceive anything about how you're talking. It's not happening" }, { "i": 8, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "in real time. And by contrast, our interactions with each other are very rich. There is a lot of information in our interactions when we are silent, when we're thinking, when we're" }, { "i": 9, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "interrupting one another. And so interaction models are able to capture all of these neurons. They're not turnbased. They're more like timebased interaction where they're continuously" }, { "i": 10, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "taking in audio, text, video and continuously providing output. Now, we cut this up in chunks of 20 milliseconds. And this enables you to actually uh catch these things like interactions and simultaneous speech um" }, { "i": 11, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "and really create a rich high bandwidth interaction between humans and machines which we think is critical to actually enable um agency and uh and and enable people to be more in this loop um as we" }, { "i": 12, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "advance AI further and further." }, { "i": 13, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "You're basically trying to build an AGI lab from scratch." }, { "i": 14, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "You've got OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, all with a significant head start." }, { "i": 15, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "All of them racing to build smarter models. What is the bet that you're making that they aren't and what do you think they are underestimating?" }, { "i": 16, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "So first of all, I think um advancing the frontier of AI is incredibly positive sum and I think there is plenty of space for many different perspectives and ways of developing the technology" }, { "i": 17, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "and I think um plurality is good. Um having a plurality of perspectives of ways of building technology, different products is great for the world. Now this is a pretty hard thing to do. So um" }, { "i": 18, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "I think that's why we don't actually have many players. I think the barrier to entry is incredibly high. Um but in terms of creating something differentiated, I do think there is plenty of room. Um, I have always been" }, { "i": 19, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "very passionate about advancing the frontier of AI systems and I think that there is a potential for so much transformation for civilization that comes from that. But it's not a predestined outcome. The way that we go" }, { "i": 20, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "about building it and deploying the systems really matters. And I think an area where there is uh very little work that's been done so far is um bringing the machine intelligence closer to where" }, { "i": 21, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "the knowledge is. And so what I mean by that is there is one path of advancing frontier systems which is uh very autonomous and it doesn't rely too much on the messiness of reality or the um" }, { "i": 22, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "the the experience that humans have daytoday and that's quite a fast way of advancing AI systems very autonomously." }, { "i": 23, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Autonomy is definitely a part of it and it's a very important part but I think a missing part where we haven't done much work is um really focusing on human intent of the messiness of interaction" }, { "i": 24, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "enabling people more and building um conceptually building frontier systems more like tools for thought >> where I mean I think the the most advanced AI systems are the the most incredible" }, { "i": 25, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "tools for thought that humanity can ever have. And so how can this change the way that we think >> and we're we're still thinking and uh but it's changing the nature of thought what we're thinking about" }, { "i": 26, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> um and and this part I don't think is actually this part is familiar to us you know um since the beginning of time like technologies have um deep technologies have changed what we think about like" }, { "i": 27, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "language writing uh numerals Like imagine if you had to do multiplication with Roman numerals, it would be miserable. But you know, we invented uh today's numerals and and and this enabled a whole area of mathematics" }, { "i": 28, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "like a child could can do mathematics um very quickly and so it enabled these very tangible new ways of thoughts. And I think this is the opportunity ahead of us. This possibility to expand what we" }, { "i": 29, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "think about um and have new tangible things that we think about. And this requires um this this requires a very intentional uh research work and product work in this direction." }, { "i": 30, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> When I interviewed you, it was early 2023. Chat GPT had just changed everything. and you were CTO of Open AI." }, { "i": 31, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "A few folks I talked to said you basically ran the place. Just saying. Um when you left to and and founded thinking machines, were you running towards something or away from something?" }, { "i": 32, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> Um I most definitely was running towards something once I figured out what that thing was. Um, but I had an incredible I mean I had an incredible experience at OpenAI. I was so incredibly lucky to work with some of" }, { "i": 33, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "the most dedicated and uh most talented people in the world and that's that's incredibly special and uh I'm very grateful for that experience. Um and you know eventually I had my own view of um" }, { "i": 34, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "and very strong view of how I think this technology ought to be developed and it's very rare to start something from scratch once you have uh developed such a strong perspective on it" }, { "i": 35, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> and that's that's a rare privilege to have and I think having a company like thinking machines gives us an opportunity to focus on where we have the highest conviction and build and orient the entire company" }, { "i": 36, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "around that conviction." }, { "i": 37, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> Take me back to the board crisis of that year. Later that year, you testified under oath that you were worried Open AI was at catastrophic risk of falling apart. You raised concerns about Sam" }, { "i": 38, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Alman's leadership, but in that moment, you had to act." }, { "i": 39, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Looking back, do you think you got that moment right?" }, { "i": 40, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> It was a very intense time and it was uh a very complex situation and I'm sure many people have been in situations that I felt impossible where you have to make really hard calls and very quickly and I" }, { "i": 41, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "think there is a part of this complexity that wasn't to the world. It appeared that it happened overnight, but to me it was years of thinking about you know the mission, the governance, how you build a" }, { "i": 42, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "team that can build durable transformational technologies with that responsibility." }, { "i": 43, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um there was a lot of complexity to the organization that was there for years and we had thought about a lot. um this particular thing that happened this acute moment uh there was a lot of" }, { "i": 44, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "intensity intensity to it and time uh and you know when uh the board asked me for feedback I I shared feedback and I I stand by that and when they made the decision uh and asked me to step up as interim CEO I did" }, { "i": 45, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "that and um when I realized that their decision was like potentially catastrophic for the company and things would potentially fall apart. Uh I felt like I had to act very quickly. And even though on the" }, { "i": 46, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "surface it just looked very chaotic, I think at each point in time I I felt very clear about what I had to do. uh because I the thing that I cared the most about was the mission, the" }, { "i": 47, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "continuity of the mission and the people and the team and this is not like an abstract thing. It's real people that I worked with for many many years and cared very deeply about um and all of" }, { "i": 48, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "this was about to you know potentially implode. Um, so it was very clear to me what I had to do to create to to provide continuity, stability and help bring SEM back, restore that, get the team in" }, { "i": 49, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "place to then deliver um, GB40 and 01." }, { "i": 50, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um, and so that was that was I think it was that principle that made it very clear to me what I had to do. In retrospect, um I I think that I would have paused more >> on understanding the" }, { "i": 51, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "transition plan >> and uh like of course with the benefit of hindsight there wasn't uh any transition plan and there wasn't uh much thought put into uh transparency bringing uh the team along providing a" }, { "i": 52, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "continuity and in retrospect I would have I would have paused more on that." }, { "i": 53, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Interesting. Helen Toner testified." }, { "i": 54, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Former OpenAI board member. Meera was waiting to see which way the wind would blow and she didn't realize she was the wind. What do you think would have happened if you didn't do what you did?" }, { "i": 55, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> I think quite likely open would have imploded." }, { "i": 56, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> The case got thrown out on a technicality. So the court never decided whether the leaders of open AAI breached their mission. How much does the character of the people building the" }, { "i": 57, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "most powerful technology in the world?" }, { "i": 58, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "How much does that matter? Whose hand is on the dial?" }, { "i": 59, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "I think the integrity, character, values of the people matter a lot because there are a lot of decisions, micro decisions you have to make every day and you have to trust your team that they're making" }, { "i": 60, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "the right calls. Um, and I do think there's plenty of focus on that and that's great. Um where there is less focus is sort of like the institutional design, decision making, transparency" }, { "i": 61, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "um increasing the level of agency uh that people have to actually decide for themselves. So it doesn't have to be like an authority that says you know this is safe, this is good stamp of" }, { "i": 62, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "approval, but each person can sort of weigh for themselves >> um what works for them. And I think the way that we're going about building AI systems today is just very concentrated and it's a part of the" }, { "i": 63, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "legacy way because you know we didn't have real world uh data and experience." }, { "i": 64, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "We the only way to to advance AI was sort of in silo in the in a vacuum. Um but I think yeah today is it's a different time to build where we can actually learn a lot from the capabilities tensions limitations in the" }, { "i": 65, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "real world and use that data and information to actually steer the direction of research and this enables people to actually um think for themselves. Like often people will ask me about you know Chad GPT and how that" }, { "i": 66, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "the impact of all of that and of course it's magnificent from a technology perspective but I think the most important aspect of or impact of childbing AI in the public consciousness" }, { "i": 67, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> and people every everyone kind of understanding what it is by interacting with it versus being told what AI can do and what the capab abilities and limitations are." }, { "i": 68, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> What do you think the AI this moment demands of a leader and should we trust the the leaders in power right now?" }, { "i": 69, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Should we trust Sam?" }, { "i": 70, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> I think that everyone should be everyone should have the tools and information to be able to make these decisions for themselves. And ideally like you know the structure of governance uh in decision making should" }, { "i": 71, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "not hinge on one person. There should be checks and balances. Um I think it's very important who is working on the systems and you know the character of people. But uh I I do think that the" }, { "i": 72, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "conversation gets too wrapped up there and not enough thinking more broadly about checks and balances than system because even people that are well intend well intentioned they can make mistakes" }, { "i": 73, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "and uh they can misestimate the the uh consequences of making a call and so morality is not everything. You have to think about actual, you know, decision- making structures and transparency and" }, { "i": 74, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "governance. And these are all complicated things. And to get as many people um involved in these things as possible, you actually have to share the knowledge. You have to share uh tools." }, { "i": 75, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "And this is part of the reason why we've actually um taken a more open approach with our lab. So that was my next question which is how is everything that you've learned shaping what you're" }, { "i": 76, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "building at thinking machines and how you're building and the culture that you want to create." }, { "i": 77, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Yeah, I think um I I have very high conviction that the way to continue building frontier AI systems is to bring people along and to have humans in the loop. Like actually having humans in the loop" }, { "i": 78, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "doesn't quite describe it because it sounds like a checkpoint where we're signing off something and then you're good to go. It's more like creating systems that are not just like autonomously advancing and leaving" }, { "i": 79, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "civilization behind, but are more like a tandem bike where, you know, you have like both both people are pedalling. Uh, but you know, when you're going up a hill, maybe whoever is stronger is" }, { "i": 80, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "pedalling harder, but both hands are on the are on the wheel. And that's quite important because that's a different system. It's a system designed for collaboration." }, { "i": 81, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um and and that's that's what we're trying to build with thinking machines." }, { "i": 82, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "And I think it's quite differentiated and um uh and and I hope that it will increase the level of agency um that people have and also it will help us steer the research direction towards" }, { "i": 83, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "uh creating outputs that are more value aligned. And so you also get alignment as a result of this approach. Um in in addition to usefulness like actually creating technologies that are useful in" }, { "i": 84, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "the real world." }, { "i": 85, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> You've hired a lot of top talent. We've reports of nine figure deals. There have also been some um high-profile departures. How would you describe the war for talent? How brutal is it? And" }, { "i": 86, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "what should we read into these exits?" }, { "i": 87, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "It's definitely a big part of building a Frontier AI lab. Um, having the right people and that's, you know, people that have the competence to do it, but also are aligned with your overall mission," }, { "i": 88, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "conviction, what you're trying to achieve. Um, I yeah, I wouldn't call it a war because it might mean that the the highest bidder wins. uh and and I think for the most part people that are" }, { "i": 89, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "working in this field are very you know uh they they genuinely care about advancing the field. Now it is an absolutely crazy time and a lot of it is unprecedented. It's incredibly intense" }, { "i": 90, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "to build the frontier AI lab from scratch during such competitive times." }, { "i": 91, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um and so that leads to you know a lot of um uh uncertainty, unpredictability, some some of the volatility that we've seen. Um but yeah, I think when you're trying to compress progress in such a" }, { "i": 92, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "short amount of time, things that happen in other startups, companies over the course of 10 years, five years, both good and bad, are going to happen in the course of a few months and in a course" }, { "i": 93, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "of a year. And I think part of um part of what we're seeing is contextualized in that >> just compressing uh the the amount of progress that's happening and whenever you have something good something bad will come" }, { "i": 94, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "with it >> and so you have to balance the two but people leave for different reasons you know maybe uh the the their passion evolve for what they want to work on um I think the the high numbers" }, { "i": 95, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "and the compensation numbers they capture the imagination of people because obviously they're very big. Um, but I do think that, you know, some of the most sought after people. Uh, that's" }, { "i": 96, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "that's not that's not the main story." }, { "i": 97, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "And I think there is a lot uh that goes on here and it is very intense to build a company from scratch, let alone a frontier AI lab. Um so that's part of you know it's part of the challenges and" }, { "i": 98, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "suffering of building a company and doing anything zero to one." }, { "i": 99, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> Daria Abaday has predicted mass you know white collar job loss. Sam though recently walked back some of his predictions about a you know job jobs apocalypse. Where do you think the" }, { "i": 100, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "industry is being too pessimistic and too optimistic? like what is Mera Maradi's vision for the future?" }, { "i": 101, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "So, you know, predicting um uh sort of a dystopia or utopia uh to me feels uh feels very very simplified because the truth is we actually have a lot of agency in how we build this technology" }, { "i": 102, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "in the tools that we're building, how we're deploying it and and so it's not a predestined outcome. There are certainly those risks. we all understand uh the potential for greatness that comes with" }, { "i": 103, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "building frontier ice systems and that's why we're working on them. Um, and I think there's been a lot of talk around the uncertainty around the downsides and I I agree with a lot of these risks and" }, { "i": 104, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "perhaps where I might disagree or take a different path is that I think we have a lot of agency like this period of time where um both humans and AI systems have their hands on the wheel and we can" }, { "i": 105, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "collaborate is very important time to get right and the more that we can reduce the discontinuity that comes from new capabilities and huge change in capabilities the better." }, { "i": 106, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> Um and and this is why we took this approach with thinking machines and why the company exists." }, { "i": 107, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> So you say the goal is to keep humans in the loop but is there ever a point where humans don't need to be in the loop and then what happens? It is it is possible." }, { "i": 108, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um it's it's more about aligning at that point. It's more about aligning intent and aligning values. Uh but if you if you sort of reduce uh progress to removing humans from this uh loop of" }, { "i": 109, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "development already now then I see very little future possibilities that we can get this right in the future when AI systems are even more capable. And so I think the more likely path and more" }, { "i": 110, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "durable path to to advance AI in a way that um enables and advances civilization is by keeping humans in the loop uh for as long as we can and really making sure that this period is actually" }, { "i": 111, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "very meaningful." }, { "i": 112, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> You've raised a lot of money. There's great expectations. If anything's clear from, you know, the last few months in in AI news, uh there are some, you know, it's a cutthroat competition out there." }, { "i": 113, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Do you think you have that killer instinct to take on OpenAI and Anthropic and Meta and Google and China and X like it's it's a competitive world." }, { "i": 114, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> It is extremely competitive and uh yeah, we did raise a lot of money. We're we're proud of that, but that's that's not any big accomplishment. we didn't set out to break some sort of record. Um, it's" }, { "i": 115, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "really what you do with that and uh and and it's it we're not a normal company and so you do need a lot of capital uh in order to build the infrastructure, the foundations of science and all" }, { "i": 116, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "that's required to actually have a claim at uh building frontier AI systems that are differentiated." }, { "i": 117, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "Um and so I think that part in itself um is not unique. And yeah, in terms of Killer Instinct, I say that's not really what motivates me um to you know uh uh like I think there's actually a lot of" }, { "i": 118, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "room. We're building we're building a technology that has, you know, infinite uh potential and I think that it's going to be hard to capture all of that potential. And what motivates me is um really capturing part" }, { "i": 119, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "of that potential, creating uh useful things in the world, bringing the technology into the world in a way that's uh useful and increases human agency and advances our civilization. I" }, { "i": 120, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "think u you know there is there is healthy competition and competition is good. it it it actually like creates better products and better technologies for people. It raises the bar in many" }, { "i": 121, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "ways. Um and and you know I I respect a lot of the companies that that are doing this. Uh but my my motivation is not necessarily daytoday when I wake up in the morning I am not thinking about how" }, { "i": 122, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "to kill the competitor." }, { "i": 123, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> Love it." }, { "i": 124, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": "Um, you've said you plan to release a preview later this year. How far along are you? What will we see with all of these other companies going public? Do you think they'll be distracted and you" }, { "i": 125, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "have a little more room to run?" }, { "i": 126, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> Um, we're we're on our own path. Of course, the competition is fierce and we have to move quickly, but it's important to balance that with, you know, durable long-term progress. I" }, { "i": 127, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "care a lot about u the decisions that we make today being good for our long-term success. Um and and that's something that um I really try to instill in the team dayto-day. There is a lot of" }, { "i": 128, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "details here with how you build the team, how you build the infrastructure and really resisting the shortterm pressures. Um and and in in some cases you do have to kind of embrace the" }, { "i": 129, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "pressure. But yeah, I would say for us this is just a first step. Um and in in showcasing the interaction models and making it more concrete what it is that we think about and care about. Um and I" }, { "i": 130, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "expect the next few months and uh to to show increased capabilities for us to show increased capabilities on the model side. um more um products in this direction and uh and make it more" }, { "i": 131, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "obvious like really letting the technology and the products speak for themselves." }, { "i": 132, "speaker": "Speaker 1", "text": ">> So a thinking machine succeeds beyond your wildest expectations. What exists in five years that doesn't exist today?" }, { "i": 133, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> It is extremely difficult to predict the future. Uh but I'd say that the most important thing would be um to create a future where regardless of how how many of hours of work we do dayto day or week" }, { "i": 134, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "to week uh we feel a sense of um agency, a sense of dignity and um possibility about the future. And I hope that we'll continue to advance the capabilities that will enable a lot of progress and" }, { "i": 135, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": "we'll do it in this way that um will keep will keep us hopeful and also with a sense of possibility that we can drive about the future." }, { "i": 136, "speaker": "Speaker 2", "text": ">> Well, here's to less impossibility and more possibility. Thank you." } ]