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# Andrej Karpathy Says AGI Decades Away, Calls AI Agents 'Slops'
- URL: https://www.theleftshift.com/andrej-karpathy-says-agi-decades-away-calls-ai-agents-slops/
- Published: 2025-10-18T06:01:08.000Z
- Updated: 2025-10-18T06:08:31.000Z
- Description: Karpathy’s comments come amid a frenzy of AI agent launches, with companies touting autonomous digital assistants that can browse, code, and execute complex workflows.
- Author: Pritam Bordoloi 
- Tags: AI News

Andrej Karpathy — one of the most respected figures in modern artificial intelligence and a key architect behind OpenAI’s GPT models and Tesla’s Autopilot — is not buying the current AI hype. In a new episode of *The Dwarkesh Podcast*, Karpathy said that Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is still *“decades away”* and dismissed the current wave of AI agent startups as overblown.

“Overall, the models, they are not there,” Karpathy said. “And I feel like the industry \[...\] it's making too big of a jump and it's trying to pretend that this is amazing. And it's not — it's slop! And I think they are not coming to terms with it. Maybe they are trying to fundraise or something like that, I’m not sure what’s going on.”

Karpathy’s comments come amid a frenzy of AI agent launches, with companies touting autonomous digital assistants that can [browse](https://www.theleftshift.com/microsoft-upgrades-copilot-in-windows-11-with-vision-voice-and-file-savvy-ai-upgrades/), code, and [execute complex workflows](https://www.theleftshift.com/salesforce-ushers-in-the-era-of-the-agentic-enterprise-with-agentforce-360/). But for the former OpenAI founding member and ex-Senior Director of AI at Tesla, the reality is far from science fiction.

> The [@karpathy](https://twitter.com/karpathy?ref%5Fsrc=twsrc%5Etfw&ref=theleftshift.com) interview  
>  
> 0:00:00 – AGI is still a decade away  
> 0:30:33 – LLM cognitive deficits  
> 0:40:53 – RL is terrible  
> 0:50:26 – How do humans learn?  
> 1:07:13 – AGI will blend into 2% GDP growth  
> 1:18:24 – ASI  
> 1:33:38 – Evolution of intelligence & culture  
> 1:43:43 - Why self… [pic.twitter.com/rpVYjKNTNZ](https://t.co/rpVYjKNTNZ?ref=theleftshift.com)
> 
> — Dwarkesh Patel (@dwarkesh\_sp) [October 17, 2025](https://twitter.com/dwarkesh%5Fsp/status/1979234976777539987?ref%5Fsrc=twsrc%5Etfw&ref=theleftshift.com)

He was also the inventor of the term *“vibe coding,”* which means guiding AI models to write software through natural language prompts — focusing more on describing *what* you want built rather than manually coding *how* to build it.

Recently, he launched a lightweight $100 ChatGPT alternative. When he was asked if he leveraged any AI coding models like Claude or GitHub Copilot, Karpathy said the [entire codebase is handwritten](https://analyticsindiamag.com/ai-news-updates/andrej-karpathy-says-nanochat-is-entirely-hand-written-not-vibe-coded/?ref=theleftshift.com). 

He mentions he did try to use Claude/ Codes agents, but they were 'unhelpful'. His candid remarks reflect a growing unease among AI veterans who believe the field may be running ahead of its technical limits — and that the road to true AGI might be far longer, and messier, than Silicon Valley’s pitch decks suggest.

Interestingly, AI scientist and long-time critic of generative AI, Gary Marcus, has been voicing similar concerns for years — warning that today’s AI models are overhyped, unreliable, and far from truly intelligent. Reacting to Karpathy’s remarks, Marcus quipped on X, *“When Karpathy sounds like Marcus, the gig is up.”*