The Silent Arrival of AGI
Everyone’s building it. No one can define it. And that’s the most important conversation we need to have.
What does AGI really mean?
Not the textbook definition. Not the marketing tagline. Your definition.
When does a system become general? What’s the moment we cross the line and say—yes, this is it?
And then ask yourself this: What happens to humanity and society the moment AGI arrives?
Now pause.
Try to define it right now. One sentence.
Leave a comment below. Let’s compare notes.
The Conundrum at the Core of AI’s Future
If you struggled to define it - that's the point.
You’re not alone. In fact, that’s exactly the problem.
With every AI news cycle and every new model release, we inch closer to what the industry calls AGI—Artificial General Intelligence.
But here’s the problem:
If we can’t clearly define AGI, how can we understand, anticipate, or govern it?
It’s not just a philosophical dilemma—it’s a practical and ethical imperative.
Even Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAI, admitted in his recent TED Talk:
“If you ask 10 OpenAI engineers what AGI is, you’ll get 14 different answers.”
Everyone’s Building Toward It… But What Is It?
I went on a little mission this week.
I pulled quotes and definitions from the top minds across OpenAI, Google DeepMind, Anthropic, and Microsoft.
Even the people building AGI can’t agree on what it is.
And these aren’t just hobbyists debating in forums—these are trillion-dollar players pouring compute, capital, and talent into one mission: achieving AGI.
Some define AGI as surpassing humans in all cognitive tasks. Others focus on autonomy, self-awareness, or economic disruption potential. Some labs tie AGI to benchmark dominance (like ARC-2 or MMLU). Others skip the benchmarks and just... vibe with it. Here’s a look at just how different their visions really are:
Demis Hassabis, CEO @ Google DeepMind
“AGI is a system capable of demonstrating all the intricate abilities that humans possess...In the next five to ten years, we will see many of these abilities emerge with the rise and fall of AGI benchmarks”
Sam Altman, CEO @ OpenAI
“AGI refers to highly autonomous systems that outperform humans at most economically valuable work...We are now confident we know how to build AGI as we have traditionally understood it.”
Dario Amodei, CEO @ Anthropic
“AGI has never been a well-defined term for me; I’ve always thought of it as a marketing term.... At some point, we’re gonna get to AI systems that are better than almost all humans at almost all tasks.... Once the idea of human labor being economically valuable gets invalidated, we’ll all have to sit down and figure it out.”
Mustafa Suleyman, CEO @ Microsoft
“The uncertainty around this is so high, that any categorical declarations just feel sort of ungrounded to me and over the top.” Microsoft defines AGI—financially—as the moment AI generates $100 billion in profits for its earliest investors.
AGI Isn’t a Moment—It’s a Momentum
Let me offer a different perspective.
AGI may not be something we achieve. It may be something we accumulate.
It might not arrive with a big announcement or world-stopping press release.
It will arrive quietly. Through steady, exponential capability increases. Through models that go from helpful to intelligent to… something more.
And ironically, the people most likely to miss it? Might be us—the ones building it.
We’re so immersed in pushing the frontier, we may not realize when we’ve already crossed it.
The Real Divide Isn’t Just Technical—It’s Human
Here’s where things get existential.
We’re racing toward a future powered by intelligence the world doesn’t understand—toward a destination we haven’t even defined.
While builders, researchers, and investors chase benchmarks, most people are still catching up to GPT-4.
The gap between AI creators and everybody else is widening—and fast.
And if AGI shows up before the rest of the world can comprehend it?
That’s how economic disparity, educational inequity, and societal imbalance get compounded by technology.
This Isn’t a Warning—It’s an Invitation
This newsletter isn’t about declaring AGI imminent or dangerous.
It’s about something deeper. It’s about asking the right questions—together.
Because if AGI is coming (and let’s be honest, it is), then the question we must all ask is:
What kind of intelligence are we building—and who gets to decide what it means?
This should never be a conversation for the 0.01% of insiders alone.
It must be a collective reflection, fueled by curiosity, ethics, and inclusion.
The Sunday Prompts
Take these five with you into the week. Reflect. Journal. Discuss. Let them stretch your thinking:
If AGI mirrored your definition of intelligence, what kind of world would it help create?
What if AGI doesn’t look like a moment of arrival—but a moment of realization? Would you recognize it?
Should intelligence be measured by capability—or by consequence? What metric truly matters?
Whose values should be embedded into AGI—and what happens if we never agree?
If AGI isn’t just a technology but a turning point in our species’ story… what role do you want to play in writing it?
AGI is achieved when a computer system can perform every intellectual task that the average human can perform with results similar to a human.
AGI is an AI that controls or can control an agent in the world that is superior to humans at pretty much any task. Note that being better than humans at all cognitive tasks is insufficient for this. Observation and manipulation of, and planning in, the 3D world is required.
Note that implementation of such an AGI for the military will almost inevitably lead to a Terminator like scenario.