Joe Rogan brought on a pair of AI experts to break down a pretty scary doomsday scenario that could come with the rise of artificial intelligence. The idea centered on AI systems slowly replacing human professionals.
Joe Rogan’s Podcast Guests Break Down Eerie Doomsday Scenario Related to AI
On episode No. 2311 of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Rogan hosted AI experts Jeremie Harris and Edouard Harris. The UFC color commentator opened the episode by hinting at concerns that unchecked progress in AI might spell trouble for humans. Rogan asked the guests about a possible timeline for when AI could reach a point where it starts hurting people.
Jeremie explained, “There’s a question about where are we at in terms of AI capabilities right now, and what do those timelines look like? There’s a bunch of disagreement. One of the most concrete pieces of evidence that we have recently came out of a lab — an AI kind of evaluation lab called ‘METR.’ And they put together this test.”
Jeremie suggested that AI agents are improving fast and could eventually replace human workers across the board.
“Basically, it’s like, you ask the question. Pick a task that takes a certain amount of time, like, an hour. It takes a human a certain amount of time. And then see how likely the best AI system is to solve that task. Then try a longer task. See, like a 10-hour task. Can it do that one?
“And so right now, what they’re finding is when it comes to AI research itself, so basically automate the work of an AI researcher, you’re hitting 50% success rates for these AI systems for tasks that take an hour long. And that is doubling every — right now, it’s like every four months.”
After that, Edouard noted that AI systems are picking up speed and could eventually outpace humans in a bunch of complicated tasks. Talking about some of those areas, he said, “In some of these spaces like research, software engineering — and it’s getting further and further and further, and doubling, it looks like, every four months.”
Jeremie added that by 2027, the kind of work an AI researcher does in a month could be done by AI itself with a 50% success rate. Edouard said that by then, Rogan could have an AI system as a guest and ask it what the doomsday clock looks like.
“You’ll be able to have AI on your show and ask it what the doomsday clock is like by then.”
Rogan joked that the AI probably wouldn’t laugh if he hosted it on the podcast.