We know that the top-tier AI labs are spending unbelievable amounts of money on talent. But what are these researchers actually working on? And how do we know that they're making progress? And furthermore, how can we even measure that progress? On this episode, we speak with Jack Morris, an AI researcher and Ph.D. candidate at Cornell University, who is also a part-time researcher at Meta. We talk about what he does, and why breakthroughs seem to be lumpy and unpredictable. We also talk about the battle between open- and closed-source approaches, US vs. Chinese labs, and how an individual talent thinks about where they want to spend their time, balancing the desire for research and prestige with a big fat paycheck.

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