There are probably natural limits to intelligence, as there are to digestion and circulation of bodily fluids or any other purely natural biological function. There is probably some reason to believe technological improvements to cognitive functions are possible, but it is not clear how much progress can be made in this area, or if it can, that anyone has bothered to do so.
This is not the same as saying there are definitely no intelligences vastly superior to ours, just that if there are, they have never manifested themselves to us in any way and we await either evidence of their existence of at least some reason why they should arise in the first place.
I suspect this concept of cosmic "intellects vast, cool and unsympathetic" has at its root the human quest for immortality, and owes much more to religion than to technology or science. For starters, just what do these computronium entities spend their time thiking about? At some level of knowledge, it must be pretty clear that there really isn't anything fundamentally new to learn, just more of the same.
Maybe I'm just a carbon chauvinist...
Space/Science » in reply to Okay
I don't think there are any artilects.
The whole thread (30 posts)
- Will Super Smart Artificial Intelligences Keep Humans Around As Pets?
- Some interesting opinions: The Singularity Summit 2007
- re: Will Super Smart Artificial Intelligences Keep Humans Around As Pets?
- As long as they feed me and provide a flea collar I'll have no complaints. Woof!!! (n/t)
- If so, it can only be attributed to human logic (n/t)