What 'AGI' Actually Means — and Why the Goalposts Keep Moving
Artificial general intelligence is the industry's north star and its favorite elastic band. Stretch it far enough and nothing ships today qualifies; pull it tight and your office copilot counts. Both moves happen on purpose.
The four working definitions in circulation
- The economic one: AI that can do most economically valuable work better than humans. Serious, far, and conveniently unfalsifiable this decade.
- The benchmark one: beats humans on a chosen test suite. Passes whenever the suite is chosen kindly — and benchmarks leak into training data.
- The business-contract one: whatever milestone a lab's investor agreement names. Real money rides on these; real clarity does not.
- The vibe one: "you'll know it when you talk to it." Most press coverage lives here.
Why the goalposts move
Definitions are set by whoever needs them. A lab nearing a benchmark definition shrinks the benchmark; a lab fundraising on the economic definition keeps it astronomical. The word itself carries no measurement — the measurement is always attached externally, by someone with a stake.
How to read the next AGI headline
- Which definition is being used, and who chose it?
- Was the benchmark designed before or after the model?
- Does the claim come with a task you can try today?
Our model coverage skips the AGI question entirely — shipped capabilities, measured this quarter, are the only currency we accept.