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.
Colors in our fleet?
In order of acquiring:
1. 2007 Cobalt – Summit White
2. 2014 Cruze Diesel (wife’s) – Black Granite Metallic
3. 1981 Camaro Z28 – Maroon (with silver graphics); top half is heavily patina’d
4. 2017 Volt – Summit White
I also have a Cruze in Black Granite Metallic. It pops when it’s clean and the polished aluminum Eco wheels are clean. The rest of the time it’s ehh.
I have a bit of a green fetish, but my fleet consists of:
3 green (two cars, one truck)
2 gray (one car, one truck)
1 red (truck)
3 green (motorcycles)
1 yellow/orange (motorcycle)
2004 Toyota Tundra: Silver Sky Metallic (yeah, it’s gray)
2017 Fiat 500e: Celeste Blu (saweet little car that has a size, shape and color that just makes me smile every time I look at it)
My primary car (1996) is green, my secondary car (2004) is white, my tertiary car (1997) is grey.
My kids cars are grey (2015), black(2016), and blue(2008).
The only one I purchased was the green one. The secondary/tertiary are hand me downs from my dad’s fleet that my kids learned to drive on and then their mother bought them newer/nicer cars.
Our current car is a 2019 Golf in Titan Blue, and we’re pretty happy with it. Our six-year old niece told me that it makes her smile every time she sees it, since it’s not “just another boring white car like everything else.”
Looking highly forward to seeing that Caddy! I haven’t been this excited to see a new Cadillac since going to the Chicago Auto show back when the rolled out the “Sixteen”.
I think that since I tend to gravitate towards the cheap and cheaper end of the vehicle spectrum, seven of the current fleet are white. Even the goofy little Spark is white, the one that actually had an abundance of wonderful factory colors to choose from. If I can ever find time, I need to dust off the paint gun and squirt something onto one of those blank canvases. The Volt in Jungle Green would likely be first.
You would 100% look like a juvenile dork pulling up to an office building in that Type R. It screams “boy racer”, which is fine, but it’s not mature by any stretch of the imagination.
Kudos to Cadillac for taking advantage of electrification to build something big, a little ostentatious, and extremely American again. Maybe MB will get the right idea and do something better with the next EQS.
The idea of a purple 392 Wrangler also warms my bitter heart (although less so than Tuscadero Pink).
My (four-wheeled) fleet is silver (like nlpnt, because I wanted a manual, but also because Mazda had dropped all non-greyscale options except maroon by the 2’s last year). I spraybombed the hubcaps lime green though (not the launch colour Mazda used, just whatever Home Depot had), so at least it’s a little less gloomy in the dead of winter.
I’ll believe it when I see it in the flesh, Cadillac. You’ve teased me with gorgeous photos of things that never happened too many times.
FCA’s color-naming game is the best in the business.
I have yellow, blue, and silver. The silver was not by choice, but beggars can’t be choosers in this car market.
Not a Honda guy but that new Civic looks infinitely better than the last ‘all the vents’ model.
Colors in our car fleet at home are one black work-provided truck, one black Mustang, one metallic brown Forester and one two-tone orange/white D100.
My car is a blue so nice they used it for most of the press fleet.
Now that you mention it, reign would look great on a GC Trailhawk 4xE
Mopar did have fun colors. Let’s not kid ourselves, dealers are killing colors and MT.
Fight me. They want you to walk out the door with the lowest common denominator. Not your preference.
“Yeah, but that Tri-Coat!”
This is speculation on my part, but I suspect that the primary driver for going visual camera only is not an executive decree, but burned bridges with suppliers, and then the executive had to spin it.
I do hate that I tried to find a totally logical answer to what this guy does, when I’m also 100% sure that the yoke was designed entirely because he had too many edibles while watching Knight Rider.
I think it’s sadder than that, I think he was sober.
You have to know Karpathy realizes the Autopilot is a failure and will never work. He’s jumping ship now before the whole thing blows up and makes him a joke and unhireable.
My wife, despite my pleading, went with white. On the other hand I hopefully will never have to part with my 12 Wrangler, which in addition to being manual and having roll-up windows is in the color called Dozer. It’s the orange/yellow of school buses and is incredibly easy to find in parking lots. I’ve often thought of trading it for an automatic (wife can drive stick but doesn’t like the Wrangler trans) but I just can’t fathom the thought of driving something greyscale.
Good for her on disliking the manual. Just cause it has it, doesn’t mean you gotta take it. Bummer though, as my previous comment, a dealer doesn’t want you to get a slow moving MT, what I got on the lot. And just say “there you go, don’t want the stick”.
Just my $.02
That interior of the Caddy….wowza! And racing blue pearl for me on the CTR.
That caddy is fucking beautiful. I would absolutely be first in line if I could afford it.
Currently we have two good colors: Bronze Yellow and Forest Service Green. The other two are less interesting, but not unpleasant: a color called Taupe Silver Metallic, and a nice pewter-y dark silver.
Historically, I’ve always preferred bold colors. I’ve had a yellow Focus, a smurf-blue Escort, and a Coupe deVille and Saturn SC1 that were both very similar shades of royal blue. And my wife has had an Eclipse in a nice cranberry color and a sage-green BMW 325i.
We’ve also both had a few bright red cars, but it’s not my favorite. I’d rather have silver than red, in most cases, actually. But if a good yellow or blue green is an option, I’m there.
Mine is a color I call “Settle-For Silver”. I wanted a real color but I wanted a manual transmission more.
Still waiting for the soft gentle earth tones of 70’s Chryslers…show my the golden toasted browns with carmel interiors, Yeah Baby.
I currently own
3 Blue
1 Black
1 Red
1 Orange
1 Green
Never have owned a yellow car, which is one of my regrets. Hope to rectify that at some point.
Yellow is on my one-day list too!
When I order a Maverick it’ll be that yellow color.
I had a yellow 79 Mustang 5.0. Ghia trim. White leather. Was really surprising how well it looked when dirty. Didn’t love leather, but it did pretty well. Yellow seemed to blend in with a lot of dirt. Cop magnet though.
????
My fleet is small so I don’t really call 2 cars a fleet LOL. One is light brown and the other is green
My ‘fleet’ is Mica Blue with-dependent on my weekend route-either red mud or gravel-gray accents
Regarding Jeep colors, I have to say one of my favorites is Black Forest Green. Which, incidentally, is the color of my JKU. It’s one of the main reasons I bought it.
A man of taste, I see. Yes, Deep Beryl Green was wonderful. As I recall, you could even find it on the Commander. Recalling that, I briefly owned a Commander in Steel Blue Metallic (much more handsome in person) with a camel interior. It was a pretty good rig.
That said, I also enjoyed the TJ’s iteration of Forest Green. I appreciate the wide variety of colors offered for Wranglers, which makes all the white and black ones so disappointing.
Is Cadillac bringing back red velour interiors? I’m down