‘I very much dislike his vengeful politics’: Meta AI chief Yann LeCun takes on Elon Musk; billionaire responds

In a heated exchange on social media, Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk and Yann LeCun, Chief AI Scientist at Facebook AI Research (FAIR), publicly argued about AI research and company ethics. The spat began when Musk invited followers to join his AI startup, xAI, with a bold message.

Elon Musk tweeted, "Join xAI if you believe in our mission of understanding the universe, which requires a maximally rigorous pursuit of the truth, without regard to popularity or political correctness."

Yann LeCun, a prominent figure in AI research, responded with a sharp critique, mocking Musk's management style: "Join xAI if you can stand a boss who:

-Claims that what you are working on will be solved next year (no pressure).
-Claims that what you are working on will kill everyone and must be stopped or paused (yay, vacation for 6 months!).
-Claims to want a 'maximally rigorous pursuit of the truth' but spews crazy-ass conspiracy theories on his own social platform."

Another user intervened, suggesting that LeCun's comments were unprofessional: "Not a good look... Maybe explain what you have against Elon?"

LeCun clarified, "I like his cars, his rockets, his solar panels, and his satellite network. I very much dislike his vengeful politics, his conspiracy theories, and his hype."

The exchange escalated when Musk retorted, "What 'science' have you done in the past 5 years?"

LeCun countered, "Over 80 technical papers published since January 2022. What about you?"

Musk fired back, "That’s nothing, you’re going soft. Try harder!"

LeCun replied, "Now you're acting as if you were my boss."

Musk then commented, "Yann is 'just following orders'."

LeCun ended with, "You don't seem to understand how research works."

The argument has sparked widespread discussion within the AI community. The social media is abuzz with reactions with most people on X siding with Elon Musk, given his massive following on the platform. 

LeCun has been proponent for generative AI. He recently claimed that AI will never be able to replace humans. LeCun said that even though these large language models (LLMs) like OpenAI's GPT are good at some tasks, they have big limitations and will never be able to think and plan like humans.

He pointed out several issues: they don't understand logic, have a poor understanding of the physical world, lack long-term memory, can't reason well, and are unable to make complex plans.

Join xAI if you can stand a boss who:
- claims that what you are working on will be solved next year (no pressure).
- claims that what you are working on will kill everyone and must be stopped or paused (yay, vacation for 6 months!).
- claims to want a "maximally rigorous pursuit…

— Yann LeCun (@ylecun) May 27, 2024