Book review: The Infinity Machine

In a review of Sebastian Mallaby's 'The Infinity Machine: Demis Hassabis, DeepMind, and the Quest for Superintelligence,' Peter McCluskey explores the central tension in Hassabis's identity: he sees himself as a pure scientist, valuing knowledge for its own sake, but also identifies with Ender Wiggin, wanting to play a pivotal role in a critical interaction between intelligences. Mallaby documents how this emphasis on science over engineering led DeepMind to underestimate scaling laws around 2019, falling behind OpenAI's more engineering-led approach. The review notes that 'underestimating brute force has been a more widespread mistake in AI than underestimating intelligence,' referencing the Bitter Lesson.

The book also covers DeepMind's early funding challenges, leading to its sale to Google in 2014 after Peter Thiel withdrew support. Hassabis rejected Facebook's higher offer partly because Zuckerberg didn't grasp AI's importance over VR or 3D printing. Elon Musk played a complex role: he prompted Google's acquisition by bragging about his investment, then turned against Hassabis after being rejected. Musk's fear of AI controlled by a big corporation is ironic given his later merger of xAI into a trillion-dollar conglomerate. Hassabis's dream of a Manhattan Project-style singleton for AI safety failed against the egos of AI's top minds, leading to OpenAI's founding and the fragmented AI landscape we see today.