China catches up
Gary Marcus argues that China has made significant progress in AI and technology, catching up to or surpassing the US in key areas. He suggests that US policymakers have been overly focused on safety concerns while neglecting the competitive threat posed by China's rapid advancements.
Background
- Gary Marcus is a prominent AI researcher and critic of deep learning, known for his 2018 book *Rebooting AI* and frequent skeptical takes on large language models like ChatGPT.
- The piece assesses the state of US–China AI competition following major Chinese AI labs (e.g., DeepSeek, Alibaba's Qwen) releasing models that match or approach GPT-4-class performance.
- "China catches up" refers to the narrowing gap between frontier US models (OpenAI, Google) and Chinese alternatives, which had previously lagged significantly.
- Marcus often argues that hype around US AI may obscure real strategic risks — including China's efficient hardware use, talent base, and top-down industrial policy.
- The backdrop includes US export controls on advanced AI chips (NVIDIA A100/H100) to China, which the piece likely argues have been only partially effective in slowing Chinese progress.