Ilya Sutskever (OpenAI Chief Scientist) - Building AGI, Alignment, Spies, Microsoft, & Enlightenment

Asked Ilya Sutskever (Chief Scientist of OpenAI) about
- time to AGI
- leaks and spies
- what's after generative models
- post AGI futures
- working with MSFT and competing with Google
- difficulty of aligning superhuman AI

Hope you enjoy as much as I did!

Timestamps
00:00 Time to AGI
05:57 What’s after generative models?
10:57 Data, models, and research
15:27 Alignment
20:53 Post AGI Future
26:56 New ideas are overrated
36:22 Is progress inevitable?
41:27 Future Breakthroughs

[paulcnichols]

Ilya is 100% signal, 0% noise. Really great interview.

[brettb.coolin]

you gotta work on asking questions that more closely expand on a previous topic. instead of asking random follow up questions that hardly relate. ilya said hes tempted to become part AI and you just move right past it.

[photorealm]

Ilya can process and answer questions (super accurately) faster than I can figure out what the question is. And his answers are short elegant descriptions with loads of content. Happy that he is out there doing these interviews. Life as we know it, is about to go through a new doorway that we don't know what's on the other side. I am glad there are some people like Ilya at the front of the line.

[adambutton]

I've seen so many interviews with the top people at OpenAI and this is BY FAR the best one. You ask the important questions and resist all the boring traps. So good. More like this please.

[amulpatel]

Hearing his responses, I can’t help but admire his clarity and intellect

[UserHuge]

For a non-native the interviewer speaking 2x by default was a bit hard to keep catching but Ilya's answers were very clear and informative.
Thanks!

[deniztekalp]

Ilya answers that he doesn't know why he was the first and still a top researcher, he says these seem uncorrelated. One answer is that, Ilya continued to be a big a believer in Deep Learning when others weren't. Believing Deep Learning could work was a contrarian bet in 2012. Moreover, after it worked, that this paradigm would remain powerful and wouldn't hit a wall was still contrarian among ML researchers in academia. So there is some correlation, I think.

[kinggicu]

Man, this interview is just amazing. The interviewer asks the most interesting questions and Ilya has no difficulty in answering and also explain the hard terms and topics.

[d.l.bearden]

Illya speaks very carefully and clearly. The hosts run their words together and lack logical progression.

[AdityaPrasad]

Dude just blew past so many key insights like it was breakfast. 41:32 so many people don't realize what it means for the AI to have an IO channel to humans. How it can act on the "real" world through us.

Ilya is super impressive. Glad to listen to him. I just think it would be interesting to hear what he thinks about fast takeoff or sudden capabilities jump. Like sure maybe for now alignment is keeping pace with capabilities (press X to doubt but whatever), why would anyone think this trend will continue seeing how the state of the field is.

[neithanm]

A humble opinion of mine: I had problems understanding a few words, so did youtube's cc, particularly from Dwarkesh. I think it's a mix of not-great vocalization (example 28:02) and suboptimal sound processing/mic, at least the bass is too cranked up. Can't watch more than 1x or I miss entire words :(
EDIT: Dwarkesh, in case this is useful to you in any way: after limiting lower frequencies with a band pass, the sound has improved greatly, for me at least. Also I think you should speak more slowly, making sure you vocalize, we need to hear you well. Thank you for the interview. Peace.

[lamkawan]

Super thanks for inviting Ilya! He deserves all due respect for creating the most impactful technology in human history!

[CarlosEscapa]

I learned a lot from your interview. Thank you! I appreciate all the hard work that went into preparing the questions and editing the video.

[codfather]

People like Ilya amaze me. Dedicate what seems to me an entire life to solve and work with just one subject.

[dylanphillips]

Always a pleasure to listen to Ilya. Thanks for the interview!

[caseyczarnomski]

This is honestly the best interview I have seen in years, and I'm a first time watcher. These are great questions and they follow the conversation perfectly. Subscribed and can't wait for more!

[zheen]

Ilya slays with FACTS. I am so pleased that there is no boring fluff to pad this interview to 2h. Thank you!

[dariuszkrause]

Brilliant video. Structured, logical, systemic, cold blooded reasoning, , and informative with conclusions. Plus with good humor. Great content. Thanks!

[stevenschilizzi]

Dwarkesh, this was a brilliant interview, one of those that warrant listening to more than once, and I certainly will. One of those that will still be of interest well into the future, even as a historic document. Ilya is so thoughtful in all his answers, and honest too. It felt like every word was worth gold. He reminded me of Richard Feynman when he too, in an interview about him being a genius, replied: No, I am like everybody else. It’s just that I was passionate about the subject and worked very very hard. I did all the exercises and solved all the problems in the textbooks, especially the hard ones. - No doubt Ilya has done the same.

[TheBlackClockOfTime]

What a joy it was to listen to someone that can ask the types of questions worthy of answering by Ilya. Great job!