Yann LeCun at Brown University: 'LLMs Do Not Possess Intelligence' — Defines Intelligence as Novel Task Performance Without Training

Brown Daily Herald·medium signal

In his annual Lemley Lecture at Brown University in early April, Yann LeCun defined intelligence as 'the ability to accomplish new tasks you've never been exposed to and solve new problems without any prior training' — explicitly arguing LLMs fail this test. LeCun used the lecture to advance AMI Labs' world model thesis, contrasting sensory-trained models that understand physical reality against language-only systems. With AMI Labs having raised $1.03B at a $3.5B valuation, LeCun is putting real money behind the contrarian bet that the LLM paradigm is fundamentally limited.