‘Hard Fork’ Live, Part 3: Differing Visions of an A.I. Future

**SPEAKER_1** (0:00)
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This episode of Hard Fork is brought to you by our Hard Fork Live 2026 sponsors. Premier sponsor, IBM. Associate sponsors, Everpure, Pureleaf, and the University of Notre Dame. And supporting sponsor, Atlassian.

**Kevin Roose** (1:10)
Well, Casey, we are still on our annual summer vacation, and can you believe there is yet more amazing stuff from Hard Fork Live that we have not shared with our podcast listeners?

**Casey Newton** (1:20)
There is. In particular, we had a really fun discussion at the event between Daniel Kokotajlo and Sayash Kapoor, who have somewhat different views of how fast the AI conversation is gonna go. We've heard them debate before. We wanted to sort of have an updated discussion with them now that it's been getting close to a year since the last time they had it. I think you'll really enjoy hearing what they have to say about that. We also had the great podcaster, Dwarkesh Patel, stop by and hang out with a bit, tell us a little bit about what is on his mind. Just to round it out, we took some live Q&A and heard what was on the minds of our audience after a spectacular Hard Fork Live 2

**Kevin Roose** (1:56)
These are all conversations that I would classify in the same bucket of insider sense-making. People who are deeply enmeshed in the AI scene in San Francisco, trying to understand and explain what is going on, the pace of progress, the trajectory of these models to the outside world. And Sayash, Daniel and Dwarkesh are among the three most gifted people I have ever heard try to explain this stuff to an outside world that doesn't always know exactly what's going on.

**Casey Newton** (2:24)
It's a great set of conversations. We think you'll really enjoy it. This is our final installment of our episodes from Hard Fork Live 2

**Kevin Roose** (2:31)
We will be back in two weeks to our regularly scheduled Hard Fork programming. In the meantime, enjoy your summer, wear sunscreen.

**Casey Newton** (2:48)
So, this next segment I am so excited for, because we're going to have a conversation with two people who have very different views about how AI is going right now.

**Kevin Roose** (2:58)
Yes, we have Daniel Kokotajlo with us tonight. He is the co-author of AI 2027, a report that many of you, I'm sure, have read. This came out in 2025 and laid out a vivid scenario or account of how AI could fundamentally upend the world, achieving tasks like autonomous coding and R&D.
He's since updated that prediction a few times. We'll ask him about that. He'll be joined by Sayash Kapoor, who is an AI researcher at Princeton, with a very different view of the future. He's the co-author of AI as Normal Technology, which looks at evidence that AI is much like previous technologies that have upended the economy, that take a long time to diffuse through society. We've invited them both here tonight because we saw last year a very interesting debate that the two of them had at an AI conference called The Curve. We thought it was so interesting that we decided to bring them back tonight and hear how their views have evolved since then and where they continue to disagree and where they might agree now. Please give a warm welcome to Daniel Kokotajlo and Sayash Kapoor.

**Sayash Kapoor** (4:06)
Hey, Daniel.

**Casey Newton** (4:07)
Hey, Sayash.
All right. So, Daniel, Kevin mentioned this up top. You have updated your timelines a few times since you first published AI 2027 Give us the most up-to-date view of your thinking. What's your best estimate for when we will achieve AI models that can do their own AI R&D?

**Daniel Kokotajlo** (4:26)
Probably 50 percent by late 2028

**Casey Newton** (4:29)
Okay.

**Kevin Roose** (4:31)
That's soon. I'm thinking about the calendar. That's two years.

**Daniel Kokotajlo** (4:35)
Yeah. That's a little bit later than anthropic expects, I think. Things take longer than you plan for.

**Casey Newton** (4:42)
Which is a point that Sayash makes sometimes. Sayash, can you summarize where your views are today? My sense is that you do not believe in the sudden takeoff scenario that some other observers believe in.