“A decent fraction of the AI community has already recognized that the primary forte of large language models is in generating bullshit; many also see that the current path to autonomous vehicles is not making the progress that some expected.”
Our reading, the sentence that was checked:
A decent fraction of the AI community has already recognized that the primary forte of large language models is generating bullshit, and many also see that the current path to autonomous vehicles is not making the progress that some expected.
Assessment: Unresolved Evidence as of
Where and when Gary Marcus wrote it
Marcus on AI, AGI will not happen in your lifetime. Or will it?, paragraph 70.
- Said
- Source observed
- live page, full text, public
- Evidence as of
- the cutoff for this assessment
- Assessment recorded
- assessment marcus-agi-will-not-happen-in-your-lifetime-98aaf5-a1
We recorded 28 claims from this post. See every claim from this post.
The wording above is the version this site observed on 2026-10-29. The source may have been edited after 2023-01-22. This page does not claim the wording was captured then.
What the claim commits to
- Kind
- Observation
- Deadline, as the speaker wrote it
- None stated. This site does not add one.
- Deadline state when assessed
- No horizon
- Deadline state on 2026-10-29
- No horizon (the release’s reference date)
Conditions
- a decent fraction of the AI community (scope, stated by the speaker)
- many (scope, stated by the speaker)
- that some expected (qualifier, stated by the speaker)
From the speaker
- A decent fraction of the AI community
- has already recognized
- the primary forte of large language models is in generating bullshit
- many also see
- not making the progress that some expected
Our interpretation
- This is a claim about the prevalence of two beliefs, not simply whether LLMs make errors or autonomous-driving projects experienced delays.
- The plain reading of 'generating bullshit' is producing plausible language without dependable regard for truth; 'primary forte' says this is their main strength.
- A decent fraction and many mean a sizeable, non-isolated constituency, without requiring a majority.
- For this ongoing community assessment, use the latest completed calendar year and the pre-publication portion of January: January 1, 2022 through January 22, 2023. This reporting window is an evaluator choice, not a period Marcus supplied.
- The population is the AI community broadly. Findings about NLP researchers or vehicle-industry executives alone require scope qualifications.
Counts as supported if: Contemporaneous surveys or sufficiently broad documented statements establish both that a sizeable share of the AI community held the stated primary-strength assessment of LLMs and that many regarded autonomous-driving progress as falling short of expectations.
Counts as contradicted if: Representative evidence directly measuring either belief shows it was confined to a small fringe. Evidence that some researchers disagreed is insufficient.
Retrospective: these criteria were written after the outcome was public.
Current assessment
Was it true for the period described?
Outcome: Unresolved
The record was checked, and the evidence available by the cutoff does not settle it.
Scored on a plain reading. The speaker named no measure for this claim, so it was judged on the reading an informed reader would take, stated below under our interpretation. Both reviews had to find that reading fair.
- Evidence as of
- Deadline state when assessed
- No horizon
- Assessment recorded
- Policy version
- 2026-10-28.7
Rationale
Contemporaneous records show disagreement about language-model understanding and a significant autonomous-driving reassessment at Ford. They do not measure Marcus's stronger claim about LLMs' primary forte or establish the prevalence of both views across the AI community. The evidence therefore neither supports nor contradicts the complete statement.
Limitations
- The survey predates the post and covers NLP researchers rather than all AI researchers.
- Ford's disclosure is evidence of one company's assessment, not a community survey.
- The historical population-level outcome is not established by the records found.
Evidence (2 items)
Context only: Julian Michael and coauthors via arXiv,
with 51% agreeing.
Why it matters here: The survey establishes substantial disagreement about language understanding among NLP researchers. Its question does not measure whether generating unreliable text was considered LLMs' primary strength, and its population is narrower than the whole AI community.
- Publisher
- Julian Michael and coauthors via arXiv
- Kind of source
- Preprint, not peer reviewed
- Describes events of
- Public from
Context only: Ford Motor Company,
unable to attract new investors.
Why it matters here: The disclosure also explains Ford's revised commercialization expectations and shift away from Argo's Level 4 work. This documents a relevant industry reassessment, but cannot establish how many AI researchers shared it.
- Publisher
- Ford Motor Company
- Kind of source
- Company disclosure: the company describing itself, not an independent finding
- Describes events of
- Public from
What would settle it
A representative survey conducted near the post, or a broad contemporaneous record with a defensible population denominator, measuring both attitudes in substantively equivalent wording.
Where it was said (1)
Said once in the sources this register covers.
: Marcus on AI, AGI will not happen in your lifetime. Or will it?
A decent fraction of the AI community has already recognized that the primary forte of large language models is in generating bullshit; many also see that the current path to autonomous vehicles is not making the progress that some expected.
- Where
- paragraph 70
- Published
- 2023-01-22
- Source observed
- , live page
- Access
- full text, public
History
Assessment versions
- Assessment marcus-agi-will-not-happen-in-your-lifetime-98aaf5-a1: Current. Outcome: Unresolved. Evidence as of 2026-10-28. Public date not recorded.
Recorded events
Assessment publishedBy this site
First assessment published after both reviews and the final-text check passed.
About assessment marcus-agi-will-not-happen-in-your-lifetime-98aaf5-a1.