Funny how the meaning of "AGI" evolved from "a super intelligent self-improving god" to "anything that makes a bunch of people lose their jobs"

Oct 26, 2025 · 6:04 AM UTC

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Replying to @Noahpinion
check OpenAI’s original definition
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i wrote about some of the history of this here, in January: open.substack.com/pub/garyma…
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Not true. "AGI ~= ASI" only under fast-takeoff assumptions. That was always a fringe opinion.
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Replying to @Noahpinion
A shift largely pushed by OpenAI in pursuit of their contractual get out of jail clause with Microsoft
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The problem has always been how to measure the definition.
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"Artificial general intelligence" in the sense of "Generally, I have some artificial rules about whether I personally think this is intelligence"
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AGI means it will do this because it hates you, and not because it's stupid.
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It's going to come down to "performs better on these 2025 benchmarks than a moderately inebriated human doing the test for $15" before this is over.
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"highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work"
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“Efficient market theory”😆
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ASI is the god one
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The god version is ArI: Artificial roon Intelligence.
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People clucking at us that 'AGI' is 'meaningless' incoming in 3..2..1
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But that’s a good thing, isn’t it? After all it’s just a useful tool, better like search, but same category.
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still the only definition that really matters in the end
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“Loss of jobs” is a popular rage bait. Only a matter of time before every issue gets reduced to the most negative, inflammatory reading
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It’s always been AGI (final invention ) -> super intelligence (after an indeterminate period)
Replying to @Noahpinion
that was never the meaning of agi, in what world does "general intelligence" imply "self-improving god"? Agi just means that it's capable of reasoning and adaptating to new environments and, to a degree, aware of it's own functioning
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Replying to @Noahpinion
we're screaming into the void but arxiv.org/abs/2502.03689

Stop treating `AGI' as the north-star goal of AI research

The AI research community plays a vital role in shaping the scientific, engineering, and societal goals of AI research. In this position paper, we argue that focusing on the highly contested topic...

arxiv.org
Replying to @Noahpinion
Nobody knows what it is, and that's the point the whole time
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The self improvement seems to be the most important attribute that makes something "AGI" but I guess that's difficult to sell to shareholders?
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You’re confusing AGI and ASI.
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Strawman argument, @Noahpinion . Do better.
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Being able to compete against human labour is a far better test of intelligence than any Turing test.
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Is the steam engine AGI?
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I still think of it as a dump stat for my wizard
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Think about it, what measure of intelligence and ability is more objective than the ability to perform a role in society competently? If an AI is good enough to displace human workers, then a milestone has been achieved.
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you conflated agi and asi
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That’s ASI
Replying to @Noahpinion
Or is you are a tax person, = adjusted gross income
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