Really? Even if they were working on a merely difficult problem, you would expect coding to be the very last step of the project. People don’t solve hard algorithmic problems by writing some code and seeing what happens. I wouldn’t expect an organization working optimally on AGI to write any code until after making some remarkable progress on the problem.
IMO, there’s a pretty good chance of an existing organisation being involved with getting there first. The main problem with not having any working products is that it is challenging to accumulate resources—which are needed to hire researchers and programmers—which you need to fuel your self-improvement cycle.
Google, hedge funds, and security agencies have their self-improvement cycle already rolling—they are evidently getting better and better as time passes. That results in accumulated resources, which can be used to drive further development.
If you were a search company who aimed directly at a human-level search agent, you are now up against a gorilla with an android army who already has most of the pieces of the puzzle. Waiting until you have done all the relevant R+D is just not how software development works. You get up and running as fast as you can—or else someone else does that first—and eats your lunch.
IMO, there’s a pretty good chance of an existing organisation being involved with getting there first. The main problem with not having any working products is that it is challenging to accumulate resources—which are needed to hire researchers and programmers—which you need to fuel your self-improvement cycle.
Google, hedge funds, and security agencies have their self-improvement cycle already rolling—they are evidently getting better and better as time passes. That results in accumulated resources, which can be used to drive further development.
If you were a search company who aimed directly at a human-level search agent, you are now up against a gorilla with an android army who already has most of the pieces of the puzzle. Waiting until you have done all the relevant R+D is just not how software development works. You get up and running as fast as you can—or else someone else does that first—and eats your lunch.