The Fractured Entangled Representation Hypothesis (Kenneth Stanley, Akarsh Kumar)

Machine Learning Street Talk (MLST)

Are the AI models you use today imposters?

Please watch the intro video we did before this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1q6Hhz0MAg

In this episode, hosts Dr. Tim Scarfe and Dr. Duggar are joined by AI researcher Prof. Kenneth Stanley and MIT PhD student Akash Kumar to discuss their fascinating paper, "Questioning Representational Optimism in Deep Learning."

Imagine you ask two people to draw a perfect skull. One is a brilliant artist who understands anatomy, the other is a machine that just traces the image. Both drawings look identical, but the artist understands what a skull is—they know where the mouth is, how the jaw works, and that it's symmetrical. The machine just has a tangled mess of lines that happens to form the right picture.

An AI with an elegant representation, has the building blocks to generate truly new ideas.

The Path Is the Goal: As Kenneth Stanley puts it, "it matters not just where you get, but how you got there". Two students can ace a math test, but the one who truly understands the concepts—instead of just memorizing formulas—is the one who will go on to make new discoveries.

The show is a mixture of 3 separate recordings we have done, the original Patreon warmup with Tim/Kenneth, the Tim/Keith "Steakhouse" recorded after the main interview, then the main interview with Kenneth/Akarsh/Keith/Tim. Feel free to skip around. We had to edit this in a rush as we are travelling next week but it's reasonably cleaned up.

TOC:

00:00:00 Intro: Garbage vs. Amazing Representations

00:05:42 How Good Representations Form

00:11:14 Challenging the "Bitter Lesson"

00:18:04 AI Creativity & Representation Types

00:22:13 Steakhouse: Critiques & Alternatives

00:28:30 Steakhouse: Key Concepts & Goldilocks Zone

00:39:42 Steakhouse: A Sober View on AI Risk

00:43:46 Steakhouse: The Paradox of Open-Ended Search

00:47:58 Main Interview: Paper Intro & Core Concepts

00:56:44 Main Interview: Deception and Evolvability

01:36:30 Main Interview: Reinterpreting Evolution

01:56:16 Main Interview: Impostor Intelligence

02:11:15 Main Interview: Recommendations for AI Research

REFS:

Questioning Representational Optimism in Deep Learning:

The Fractured Entangled Representation Hypothesis

Akarsh Kumar, Jeff Clune, Joel Lehman, Kenneth O. Stanley

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2505.11581

Kenneth O. Stanley, Joel Lehman

Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned: The Myth of the Objective

https://amzn.to/44xLaXK

Original show with Kenneth from 4 years ago:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhYGXYeMq_E

Kenneth Stanley is SVP Open Endedness at Lila Sciences

https://x.com/kenneth0stanley

Akarsh Kumar (MIT)

https://akarshkumar.com/

AND... Kenneth is HIRING (this is an OPPORTUNITY OF A LIFETIME!)

Research Engineer: https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/lila/jobs/7890007002

Research Scientist: https://job-boards.greenhouse.io/lila/jobs/8012245002

TRANSCRIPT:

https://app.rescript.info/public/share/W_T7E1OC2Wj49ccqlIOOztg2MJWaaVbovTeyxcFEQdU