OpenAI’s August launch of its GPT-5 large language model was somewhat of a disaster. There were glitches during the livestream, with the model generating charts with obviously inaccurate numbers. In a Reddit AMA with OpenAI employees, users complained that the new model wasn’t friendly, and called for the company to restore the previous version. Most of all, critics griped that GPT-5 fell short of the stratospheric expectations that OpenAI has been juicing for years. Promised as a game changer, GPT-5 might have indeed played the game better. But it was still the same game.

Skeptics seized on the moment to proclaim the end of the AI boom. Some even predicted the beginning of another AI Winter. “GPT-5 was the most hyped AI system of all time,” full-time bubble-popper Gary Marcus told me during his packed schedule of victory laps. “It was supposed to deliver two things, AGI and PhD-level cognition, and it didn't deliver either of those.” What’s more, he says, the seemingly lackluster new model is proof that OpenAI’s ticket to AGI—massively scaling up data and chip sets to make its systems exponentially smarter—can no longer be punched. For once, Marcus’ views were echoed by a sizable portion of the AI community. In the days following launch, GPT-5 was looking like AI’s version of New Coke.

Sam Altman isn’t having it. A month after the launch he strolls into a conference room at the company’s newish headquarters in San Francisco’s Mission Bay neighborhood, eager to explain to me and my colleague Kylie Robison that GPT-5 is everything that he’d been touting, and that all is well in his epic quest for AGI. “The vibes were kind of bad at launch,” he admits. “But now they’re great.” Yes, great. It’s true the criticism has died down. Indeed, the company’s recent release of a mind-bending tool to generate impressive AI video slop has diverted the narrative from the disappointing GPT-5 debut. The message from Altman, though, is that naysayers are on the wrong side of history. The journey to AGI, he insists, is still on track.

Numbers Game

Critics might see GPT-5 as the waning e...