OpenAI co-founder says he is in a ‘state of psychosis’ — Here’s why Andrej Karpathy is nervous about the future

OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy admitted that he had not written a single line of code since December last year and explained that he was in a “psychosis state” trying to understand that anything is possible with artificial intelligence.

Karpathy, who previously worked as a manager at Tesla, said that despite all his successes in this field, not being at the forefront of the artificial intelligence industry made him nervous.

Speaking on the No Priors podcast on Friday, Karpathy, an independent AI researcher and founder of Eureka Labs, explained that he was suffering from what he called “psychosis” at a time when AI agents are adding more convenience to work and home life.

AI founder hasn’t written code since December

Andrej Karpathy said that he realized how big a change his life had undergone in December. During this time, he realized that he had only written 20% of his code and 80% was handed off to a representative. This was a complete U-turn from the previous period, when Karpathy wrote 80% of the code and 20% was handed off to a representative.

“I don’t think I’ve written a line of code since probably December, so basically it’s an extremely big change,” Karpathy said on the podcast.

This trend continued.

“I don’t think the normal person really realizes this is happening or how dramatic it is,” he added.

Karpathy added that he is not alone in this and that the default workflow for building software has been completely overhauled in the last few months as agent AI has grown exponentially.

‘Psychotic state’

The OpenAI co-founder noted how OpenClaw has taken over the tech industry, with people using it to do a variety of tasks like managing calendars, surfing the web, writing emails, reading files, shopping online, and even sending messages through apps like WhatsApp.

Karpathy acknowledged that the potential was still huge and said he had a hard time fully understanding what could happen next.

“I’m just in a state of psychosis trying to figure out what’s possible, trying to push the limits,” he said.

He admitted that he was nervous about not being able to be at the forefront of this AI revolution.

“I want to be at the forefront of this, and I’m very nervous that I can’t be at the forefront. I see a lot of people on Twitter doing all kinds of things, and they all look like really good ideas. And I need to be at the forefront, too, otherwise I feel extremely nervous,” Karpathy said.

He also revealed that he went through what he called “claw psychosis” in January while integrating an agent to perform various tasks at home.

His “House Elf Paw Dobby” now controls his home’s sound system, lighting, security functions, blinds, HVAC, pool, and spa.

“So Dobby is in charge of the house,” Karpathy said. “It was really fun to do these macro actions that maintain my house. I didn’t really like going beyond that, and I think people do much crazier things with it.”

He said he now texts Dobby on WhatsApp in natural language to get the job done.