1984, but with LLM’s

Gary Marcus

Marcus on AI

06/21/2025

He couldn’t get Grok to align with his own personal beliefs so he is going to rewrite history to make it conform to his views.1

Elon Musk couldn’t control Washington, so now he is going to try to control your mind instead.

If you don’t think Altman and Zuckerberg are going to try to do the same, you aren’t paying attention. Together with Jony Ive, Altman is apparently aiming to build a smart necklace or similar, presumably with 24/7 access to everything you say — and to make his LLMs, which he can shape as he pleases, your constant companion. Surveillance tools Orwell himself barely dreamed of.

Zuckerberg, meanwhile, is spending his billions trying to make AI to his own liking (and trying his best to hire Altman’s best staff away, apparently offering $100 million annual salaries to some). The Chinese government has already made conformity to their Party line a legal requirement; Putin is probably on it, and it’s not inconceivable that the present US government might pressure companies to do the same.