Tesla’s AI head Andrej Karpathy calls it quits, Honda’s museum accidentally leaks the new Civic Type R, Jeep offers some new colors. All this and more in today’s issue of The Morning Dump.
Welcome to The Morning Dump, bite-sized stories corralled into a single article for your morning perusal. If your morning coffee’s working a little too well, pull up a throne and have a gander at the best of the rest of yesterday.
Tesla’s Head Of AI Has Left The Building
It’s been a great pleasure to help Tesla towards its goals over the last 5 years and a difficult decision to part ways. In that time, Autopilot graduated from lane keeping to city streets and I look forward to seeing the exceptionally strong Autopilot team continue that momentum.
— Andrej Karpathy (@karpathy) July 13, 2022
We saw this coming, right? After a months-long sabbatical, Tesla’s Director of AI Andrej Karpathy has decided to part ways with the Texas-based EV firm. Karpathy took to Twitter on Wednesday to announce his departure, with the reasons for his decision to part ways remaining unclear. Here’s what Karpathy had to say in a statement about next steps.
I have no concrete plans for what’s next but look to spend more time revisiting my long-term passions around technical work in AI, open source and education.
Well, leaving a job without having anything lined up on the other side usually speaks volumes of the working environment, so good on Karpathy for pursuing his dreams. By departing from Tesla, Karpathy joins the likes of Tesla Semi lead Jerome Guillen, Chief Technology Officer J.B. Straubel, and Director of Autopilot Software Christopher ‘CJ’ Moore in having left high-ranking technical roles at Tesla in the past few years.
Interestingly, Karpathy’s departure comes just as Reuters reports that Tesla is laying off 229 data annotation workers assigned to its Autopilot advanced driver assist suite. If the future of Tesla’s driver assist program didn’t look shaky before, it sure does now.
This Is Likely The New Civic Type R
While the next Honda Civic Type R is set to launch on July 20, Honda’s Japanese web team seems to have had other plans. The above image surfaced on Honda’s Japanese factory museum website a full week ahead of schedule, and it seems to depict a Civic with all manner of sporty add-ons.
Honestly, if this is the next Civic Type R, it looks pretty good. Handsome, refined, a bit more mature. The massive rear wing and mail slot hood scoop definitely prevent it from being Golf R subtle, but it feels like it strikes the right balance. The trademark red seats still look a touch overstuffed [Editor’s Note: Can you really tell that from this picture, Thomas? Really? – JT] and the new front end still has some of the Civic’s Beluga face going on, but I could drive this thing to an office building without looking like a juvenile dork.
Of course, there’s still lots we don’t know about the next Civic Type R. Mechanical revisions and interior additions are tightly under wraps, but it won’t be long until we know a whole lot more about Honda’s next superhatch. Truth be told, I liked the old Civic Type R a lot. While it wasn’t the most livable thing on the planet, it just felt so special and cohesive, proof that a good car is so much greater than a spec sheet. Will the new one continue that cohesion while fending off fresh competition from Hyundai and Volkswagen? Only time will tell.
Holy Crap, The Cadillac Celestiq Has One Gorgeous Interior
While the electric age isn’t the first time Cadillac’s tried to reinvent itself, it holds promise to be the most successful reinvention yet. The Lyriq electric crossover is already so distinctively Cadillac, and a range-topping hand-built Celestiq promises to rocket Cadillac back up to Standard Of The World status. Cadillac’s recently shared some additional photos of the Celestiq before its unveiling on July 22, and my god, they’ve pulled out all the stops with this one.
Wow, that’s a whole lot of red in there. Once the shock of the colorway dies down though, you begin to notice how absolutely exquisite most of the materials look. The woods, the leathers, the metal, the screens. Everything in here looks fit for something costing several hundred thousand dollars. Secondly, look at the sculpting. It’s so art deco, so quintessentially American. What we’ve seen of the Celestiq’s interior so far is wonderful because it shows that Cadillac knows who it is. Honestly, I can’t wait to see a whole lot more.
Get It In The Good Color
David’s off in Germany right now, so I’m pleased to be the one reporting this little tidbit of Jeep news. Stellantis has always offered some really good colors, and the 2023 Jeep Wrangler is getting some fresh ones. Let’s start with the less interesting one, Earl. It’s a shade of gray, which means the name is a pun and that’s very alright indeed. While I’m not entirely sure if the tinge of aquamarine goes far enough to prevent Earl from looking like Nardo Grey shot with a tungsten white balance, Earl is likely to be a popular one in the new Wrangler community.
If you’re original and inspired though, you’ll want to tick the box for Reign. It’s also a pun, this time a shoutout of sorts to Prince. Purple is either merely good, or your favorite color in the whole wide world. I own purple shirts, a purple phone, and purple under-counter lighting for my kitchen, so it shouldn’t be surprising that I absolutely adore Reign as a color. In this press photo, it appears to have this wonderful dusty silver metallic quality that adds just that tiny level of extra dynamism most pigment nerds are seeking.
It’s worth noting that Earl and Reign are both limited-time colors that are expected to go away after the 2023 model year. So, if you are awesome and want your Jeep in an equally-awesome shade of purple, you might want to act quickly. Both colors are available on Sport, Sport S, Sahara, Rubicon, and 392 trims of the Wrangler, so you should just be able to tick the box. Proper choice in color, how about that?
The Flush
Whelp, time to drop the lid on today’s edition of The Morning Dump. Thursday is here which means the weekend is right around the corner. You know, these new Jeep colors have me wondering, what colors are in your fleet? While black, white, and gray are all quite popular, it’s nice to see something with a pop of color, or a crazy pearl, or some neat micro flakes.
Fire-engine red and Barney purple for my fleet. No boring car colors for me.
red, pastel blue, ice blue, dark green metallic, kelly green, titanium, yellow, and multi-colored.
Just to let you know i always enjoy your comments. They’re a mixed bag of mostly good,occasionally great,and sometimes idiotic.
But always interesting 😀
I assumed Karpathy resigned because he, like all sensible persons, didn’t want to return to the office…
Our cars are Night Blue Metallic and Sonic Silver Metallic (pandemic buy; would have loved Soul Red instead if it had been available).
Wifes Leaf White
MY BMW 850 Black
Ford Transit a very pretty blue
Son’s Ford 500 is a rather ugly blue
Taking a sabbatical in the midst of heavy product development was not the best move by Andrej Karpathy. Lack of internal leadership and Elon reaching down to drive things did not help either. I am sure Elon asked him what are you doing for me on this project and Andrej Karpathy quit.
My wife’s Santa Cruz is white because it was the only one on the lot and they couldn’t tell us when another would be available. My Mustang is Velocity Blue which is excellent. My Suzuki motorcycle is No Imagination black.
Mr. Musk worries me. One day he’ll just decide he’s tired of making cars and will sell Tesla. Probably to GM. Five years later they’ll kill it off so they can save Buick.
3 red, 1 tan. And I don’t really like red, but at least it’s not black, white, or silver. Unfortunately our next car is going to be a dark greyish color. Because that’s what my wife wants. I voted for blue.
I don’t think you could be any more right about the Tesla situation. Pedo Guy will be the death of that company.
I like purple on Jeeps. I would love to see plum crazy return for cars as well.
While it may be a limited time color, nothing saying you can’t buy and older one and have your spin on purple put on.
Does rust count as a color? because my jeep is definitely black and rust colored
I’m thrilled someone is doing a colored interior again even if I’ll never have it. I miss all the weird interior colors of the 90’s
All my cars are various shades of blue, except my first car which is a tan color Corolla. My motorcycles are red.
So after Jeep’s 2023 model year, does that mean it’s Goodbye Earl?
I’ll see myself out.