Ex-Google CEO Drops Truth Bomb: Everyone’s Misreading AI’s Real Game-Changer
Tech’s most powerful insider just called BS on the AI hype cycle—and Wall Street’s still cluelessly throwing billions at chatbots.
The real disruption? It’s not flashy demos or stock pumps. The quiet revolution in how machines actually think—while VCs chase the next crypto-style bubble.
Here’s what actually matters when the algorithms outsmart their creators.
More do, less talk
While most consumers marvel at chatbots, Schmidt pointed to systems like OpenAI’s o3 and Deepseek R1 that demonstrate sophisticated planning abilities—going "forward and back, forward and back" to work through complex problems.
These reasoning models and research agents can play a big role in major financial decisions. For example, he explained how he’s using AI to learn more about the space industry now that he has heavy investments in the field.
“In my case I bought a rocket company because it was interesting, and it’s an area that I’m not an expert in and I want to be an expert, so I’m using DEEP research and these systems are spending 15 minutes writing these deep papers,” he explained. “It’s extraordinary.”
Schmidt’s view mirrors that of other AI experts who have raised similar concerns about the public’s narrow focus on language models. Yann LeCun, chief AI scientist at Meta, has repeatedly stated that current large language models lack essential capabilities such as understanding the physical world, persistent memory, reasoning, and planning.
LeCun, however, predicted earlier this year that a "new paradigm of AI architectures" WOULD emerge within five years, with a stronger emphasis on planning and reasoning capabilities. His proposed Hierarchical Joint Embedding Predictive Architecture (H-JEPA) aims to enable AI to plan sequences of actions to optimize objectives.
The difference between current chatbots and truly intelligent systems, experts suggest, lies in planning—the ability to map out a strategy, anticipate consequences, and adjust accordingly.
Beyond technical challenges, Schmidt frames AI development as a high-stakes competition between the United States and China—one with potential to trigger global conflict.
"The competition between the West, particularly the United States, and China is going to be defining in this area," Schmidt said.
The race has already begun to reshape global trade, with an ongoing tariff war started by U.S. President Donald TRUMP affecting critical supply chains. Besides tariffs, the U.S. restrictions on China’s access to advanced chips, has pushed Chinese researchers toward algorithmic efficiency and betting on local technology that America has already tried to prevent other countries from using.
Schmidt insists this is an actual problem that’s already taking a pivotal presence in war rooms. "These conversations are occurring around nuclear opponents today in our world. There are legitimate people saying the only solution to this problem is preemption," he claimed. "The foreign policy people have not thought about this. And this is coming (…) probably in 5 years."
Dreams Amid Dangers
Despite these grave concerns, Schmidt maintains cautious Optimism about AI’s potential benefits.
In education, Schmidt envisions personalized AI tutors for every person on Earth. He also argued that healthcare, physics, materials science, all stand to benefit from AI’s analytical powers, and he urged everyone to adopt the technology to stay relevant.
"My advice to you all is ride the wave, but ride it every day. Don’t view it as episodic."
As a good old tech CEO, the former Google chief urged everyone to adopt AI. "Each and every one of you has a reason to use this technology. If you’re an artist, a teacher, a physician, a business person, a technical person—if you’re not using this technology, you’re not going to be relevant compared to your peer groups and your competitors."
And just like OpenAI once equated its product to life-changing inventions like the wheel, and the fire, Schmidt assured there won’t be anything as important as AI in the next thousand years.
"The arrival of this intelligence, both at the AI level, the AGI, which is general intelligence, and then super intelligence, is the most important thing that’s going to happen in about 500 years, maybe a thousand years, in human society. And it’s happening in our lifetime," he assured.
