Timothy B. Lee: RSI likely started years ago, but there's no well-defined tipping point
binarybits · x · 2026-09-17
Timothy B. Lee argues that recursive self-improvement (RSI) plausibly began years ago when labs started using LLMs for code generation and training data generation.
Key points:
- "100% automated AI research" is not a well-defined threshold, just like "AGI" — people expect something magical at that point, but the concept is fuzzy the closer we get.
- Forecasters should be skeptical of sharp discontinuities in AI progress.
- He expects rapid AI progress to continue, accelerated by labs using AI in AI research, but maintains there won't be a well-defined moment where "RSI starts."
A notable counterpoint to both doomer and accelerationist framing of recursive self-improvement.
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