Simulating Humanity: from Generative Agents to 8 Billion Digital Twins — Joon Sung Park, Simile AI
Aug 21, 2026 · 1:11:01
Joon Sung Park, co-founder and CEO of Simile AI, joins Latent Space to argue that simulating humans requires bespoke behavior models, not just frontier LLMs, a bet rooted in his Generative Agents/Smallville paper. Frontier models optimized to be rational miss how people actually err, scoring 20–30% on niche populations, whereas Simile's digital twins match people's own responses 85% of the time. He details the three data buckets—interviews, observational data, and randomized controlled trials—and shows how companies use the platform for concept testing, A/B tests, and earnings calls. Park also shares the scaling-law glimpse in simulation, the economics of data-center-scale worlds, and his vision of simulating all 8 billion people to tackle wicked problems like climate change and UBI, with Thomas Schelling's agent-based models as precedent.
