July 25 2008 / by Alvis
Category: Technology Year: Beyond Rating: 4
A favorite debate topic for many futurists, humanists, advanced
defense theorists, sci-fi authors and Future Bloggers is the nature of
future terrestrial intelligence increase. As change accelerates,
how how exactly will we and/or the system around us get
smarter?
The most popular scenario by far is Artificial General
Intelligence , aka AI that equals or surpasses that of
humanity, probably because it is the most immediately 
relatable and due to the fact that so much money is being
poured into AGI research. In fact, some
researchers are predicting a breakthrough in the field in just
5-10 years.
But there are a variety of other scenarios that could either
outcompete this paradigm or conspire with it to accelerate
intelligence in our system. These include human-based, alien-based,
deeply systemic, or even exo-systemic possibilities.
Applying your particular brand of intelligence, which
of the following do you think is the most optimal path to
intelligence increase in the acceleration era? (Survey at end
of post)
AGI: Human-generated machine
intelligence such as in the films 2001: A Space
Odyssey and A.I..
Individual Intelligence Amplification: Individual humans
that grow vastly smarter due to hard, biological and/or soft
cognitive upgrades, such as Bean in Ender’s Game.
Social Intelligence Amplification: A group or humanity as
a whole collectively grows smarter, thus taking on the stewardship
role for our Earth and species.
Biological Intelligence Amplification: One, more or all
of the other species on Earth evolve or emerge, aided or
automatically, the foremost intelligence on the planet. This could
be viewed as a Gaiian awakening.
Alien Contact: Through efforts like SETI or
those of the aliens themselves, we come into contact with some
extra-terrestrial intelligence based in our universe that either
stewards us or gives us a nice boost, a la the Vulcans in
Star Trek,
although this would likely be considerably more extreme.
External Upgrade: Intelligence or forces outside of our
universe deliberately or unintentionally effect an intelligence
upgrade by tweaking our system or its rules. Imagine the 13th Floor
but on steroids.
Replacement by Superior Substrate: Converse to an
external upgrade, it is possible that as we manipulate our universe
we could generate a MEST compressed
physical life form, pattern or simulation that then usurps our
system because it is far more efficient. This scenario is distinct
from AGI because it need not be smarter
than us at the outset, just more efficient, and could then quickly
evolve/develop superior systems intelligence. Think of it as Life
2.0.
System-Wide Intelligence Amplification, Our universe as a
whole becomes smarter all at once through a process called evodevo.
Systems theorists like John Smart argue that the cosmos
could be a computer that is fundamentally “rigged” to get smarter
in a distributed fashion.
Some of the Above: A few of the above scenarios compete
for dominance as life on Earth rapidly transforms.
None of the Above: Either we go extinct or some other
scenario (thoughts welcome) generates a dominating
intelligence.
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