At @flourishailabs, we are tackling one of the hardest problems in AI: human-level intelligence and learning with human-level efficiency. We are inspired by biology, seek guidance where appropriate, but aren't dogmatic about it. If this appeals to you and you'd like to embrace the age of research, consider joining us. We are hiring in NYC and SF.

I think narratives like the "permanent underclass" mindset can be very harmful. Not because they cause emotional depression, but they change the game-theoretic dynamics. People cooperate in prisoner's dilemma/commons scenarios when they believe the game has many turns. But if you believe the game only has a few turns, and that you should win otherwise you become the "permanent underclass", then the rational self-interested move is to defect: do whatever you can to win in the short term. I think the whole AI research community is in that scenario now. No one stays in academia to educate new talent. Frontier lab competition becomes more and more aggressive and toxic. I can't imagine how much public benefit those doomer narratives alone will cost us. Especially if they're wrong, which I think they are

I find motor control to be a particularly compelling example of the discrepancy between human and AI sample efficiency:

NEWS 🚨 We first partnered with the inimitable Thomas Reardon at CTRL-labs (acquired by @Meta) Now we're proud to back him again at @flourishailabs Elite AI powerhouse recruiting insanely smart computational talent to solve AI's massive energy and data crisis Full story via @StevenLevy 👇

I recently left @DbrxMosaicAI to join @flourishailabs. Why did I decide to make the jump? I believe that some of the most interesting problems in science might now be within reach. With all the wild advances in AI, there’s no better time to pursue the big questions. Flourish is doing just that. We are a mix of AI researchers, engineers, and neuroscientists tackling one of the most ambitious problems in the field: human-level intelligence and learning with human-level efficiency. I have immense respect for the founders @TRReardon , Robert Williams, @jovo, @_vishar and for the team - many of whom built CTRL-labs from the ground up. I really loved my time at @databricks and MosaicML before that. The caliber of the people and the research is sky high, and I am incredibly proud of the work we did over the past 5 years. In particular I’d like to thank my mentors @jefrankle , @mcarbin and @bemikelive, as well as the cracked @DbrxMosaicAI team. If you’re interested in working at the intersection of AI research and human intelligence, don’t hesitate to reach out.

ARCH is excited to back Flourish in its initial financing. Low power, distributed cognition is how humans invented these words and LLM’s. Exploring how it can be harnessed and expanded further will be fun and maybe world-changing.

Neolab made in NY 🗽

We created @FlourishAILabs not to compete with LLMs but instead to attack the AI "efficiency crisis" head-on.

Thanks for your support, @wolfejosh!

📢 @JoshMerel (CTO, @faunarobotics ( Acq by @Amazon) is joining Deploying Robotics and Embodied AI panel @southpkcommons June 4th Alongside: @evanbeard (CEO, @standardbots) CTO, @Ultraroboticsco @PimDeWitte (CEO, @gen_intuition) @22Astronauts_ CC @IlirAliu_ @newyorkrobotics

Same for "frontier lab". You don't "found a frontier lab", you have to do the work until you become one.

worldmodels.github.io/ now reads well ahead of its time.

We’ve published our first technical report on Sprout. Our paper outlines the design choices behind a lightweight, compliant humanoid platform built to operate safely in human environments and the system architecture that makes experimentation possible. arxiv.org/abs/2601.18963

My favorite part of the Sprout launch video is when he demonstrates soft compliance of the robot by lifting his little leg. Tells me they're perhaps the first ones to implement soft compliance in a humanoid product, similar to FACET, SoftMimic, etc. Overall, the policies demonstrated, even though the behavior was basic, impressed me even more than the robot (though it is a very cuddly robot)

Congratulations, @faunarobotics team!

Join us tomorrow for an exciting announcement.

Excited for this!

Dishoom's quality at scale is so impressive. The King's Cross branch has 340 seats; it has 15 branches across seven cities; it has lots of Deliveroo dark kitchens. As far as I can tell, it maintains a high quality bar across all of this. *And* it is hugely popular – the King's Cross branch was heaving last night, in mid-January, and Americans love it. Incredible success!

Rolling out some awesome updates to Meta Ray-Ban Display, like teleprompter (clutch for public speaking) and EMG handwriting in early access. EMG handwriting is one of the best examples of how you and AI can co-evolve to develop over time a personalized input scheme that makes it faster and more reliable. Excited at the progress we continue to make ✍️

That's the problem. People who are responsible for the issues are not the people who got laid off😅 In January, our team put down all the research we are currently doing, was (forced?) to move to GenAI <2 months before the llama 4 release deadline to help with all the post-training dirty works, figures out and fixes lots of problems after the release, and then get laid off later.