People asked for a citation so here’s one: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://www.kellogg.northwestern.edu/faculty/jones-ben/htm/age%2520and%2520scientific%2520genius.pdf&ved=2ahUKEwiJjr7b8O-JAxUVOFkFHfrHBMEQFnoECD0QAQ&sqi=2&usg=AOvVaw0HF9-Ta_IR74M8df7Av6Qe
Although my belief was more based on anecdotal knowledge of the history of science. Looking up people at random: Einstein’s annus mirabilis was at 26; Cantor invented set theory at 29; Hamilton discovered Hamiltonian mechanics at 28; Newton invented calculus at 24. Hmmm I guess this makes it seem more like early 20s − 30. Either way 25 is definitely in peak range, and 18 typically too young(although people have made great discoveries by 18, like Galois. But he likely would have been more productive later had he lived past 20)
Yeah I definitely agree you should start learning as young as possible. I think I would usually advise a young person starting out to learn general math/CS stuff and do AI safety on the side, since there’s way more high-quality knowledge in those fields. Although “just dive in to AI” seems to have worked out well for some people like Chris Olah, and timelines are plausibly pretty short so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯