Artificial intelligence has learned to write, code, reason, and create—but the next great AI race will not be won inside a chatbot. It will be won in the physical world.
In this episode of The Burtov Podcast, Michael Burtov explores why embodied AI, also known as physical AI, may become the most important frontier in artificial intelligence.
The first wave of AI learned from the enormous amount of information humanity uploaded to the internet. The next wave must learn from reality itself: movement, pressure, friction, temperature, distance, failure, risk, and the unpredictable behavior of people and physical environments.
This episode examines why AI learned to speak before it learned to act, how sensors are becoming the nervous system of the AI economy, and why companies with robots, vehicles, factories, warehouses, hospitals, and other deployed systems may develop powerful data advantages.
Michael also explores the growing importance of simulation, edge computing, digital twins, robotics, safety systems, and real-world feedback loops—and explains why the earliest commercial breakthroughs may come from narrow, practical applications rather than general-purpose humanoid robots.
A chatbot can make a mistake and apologize. A machine operating near a patient, factory worker, vehicle, or surgical instrument does not have that luxury.
The last decade was about teaching machines to understand our words. The next decade will be about teaching machines to understand—and safely operate within—our world
