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What is needed for Artificial Superintelligence.
Here is an overview of what is needed for AGI and ASI level AI. I will briefly review some key concepts around the development and the scaling of large language models in detail. The evidence is showing a lot of the hype is quite real.
Brian Wang is a Futurist Thought Leader and a popular Science blogger with 1 million readers per month. His blog Nextbigfuture.com is ranked #1 Science News Blog. It covers many disruptive technology and trends including Space, Robotics, Artificial Intelligence, Medicine, Anti-aging Biotechnology, and Nanotechnology.
Known for identifying cutting edge technologies, he is currently a Co-Founder of a startup and fundraiser for high potential early-stage companies. He is the Head of Research for Allocations for deep technology investments and an Angel Investor at Space Angels.
A frequent speaker at corporations, he has been a TEDx speaker, a Singularity University speaker and guest at numerous interviews for radio and podcasts. He is open to public speaking and advising engagements.
What’s needed for sustainable interstellar colonization? I see it every night in Star Trek reruns on televison. A warp engine or similar technology, for starters.
“from Earth to Mars in weeks, not months/years.”
That is nice to have, not need to have.
Need to have is life support that can keep people healthy for however long it takes to get there and back. Preferably by recycling materials to reduce the amount of mass to be sent.
You (and many other people) seem to be historically ignorant. For centuries after 1500 people were sailing for months to get from Europe to eg: Indonesia for the spice trade, or paddling and portaging for months to get from Montreal to Fort Edmonton for the fur trade. Yes, when steamships and railways cut those time scales a lot, then more people were willing to make the trip, but the early trips were done on the months/years timescale to get there and back.
“Historically ignorant”? Oh please There is a difference between knowing certain historical “moments”, and knowing the actions and consequences that created a future from them. And recognizing those things we do now, can and will create the actual future we will think is “OK, nice, but not bad”. Sometimes “OK or even boring”, ain’t bad at all.
Please don’t call me “historically ignorant” I’ve spent most of my professional life “predicting” the future by knowing a lot about how to to create the present by knowing what was, what is and what many expect will be. What’s so cool is when one introduces technology, or ideas that are so “new”, we need to make up new words to define them. That’s not so hard w/new technology. (I know, been there, done that) As for new ideas? I know I have that power.
Do you?
In 1976, July, the National Geographic magazine published an article that blew my mind, like nothing before or since. It talked about mining the moon , using mass drivers, to send lunar material to “Lagrange” positions in static position between the Earth and Moon. (A LaGrange point is a location, there are 5 I know of between the Earth and moon) where gravity equals itself out. To capture that material sent to those locations, and use it to build whatever we want. As a 15yold boy then, to say this revelation blew my mind may be the biggest understatement of my life.
This taught me, NOTHING is impossible. From going to the planets, and on to the stars. One step at a time. But we need to take those steps.
My first guess? Start w/sustainable inter-planetary transportation. We have vast resources in our solar system, which we must use if we want to move off Earth in any numbers and stay there. We need to develop propulsion technologies that get us say from Earth to Mars in weeks, not months/years. Not impossible. Radio-frequency plasma propulsion nuclear, or even solar powered could do this. This may be more pragmatic (and a lot less dramatic/complex) then Orion type bomb detonation type propulsion.
Almost certainly any advanced propulsion that gets us from here to where ever fast enough for people to survive, and give a damn if they do, will involve multiple and varied technologies. But we need to know how to walk before we can run. But first, we need to stand up. I think we’re still working on that last one.