[ExI] Lethal future was Watson on NOVA

[Kelly Anderson]

On Wed, Feb 16, 2011 at 4:36 PM, Samantha Atkins <sjatkins at mac.com> wrote:
> My theory is that almost no evolved intelligent species meets the challenge
> of overcoming its evolved limitations fast enough to cope successfully with
> accelerating technological change.   Almost all either wipe themselves out
> or ding themselves sufficiently hard to miss their window of opportunity.
>  It can be argued that it is very very rare that a technological species
> survives the period we are entering and emerges more capable on the other
> side of singularity.

Another possibility is that advanced civilizations naturally trend
towards virtual reality, and thus end up leaving a very small
externally detectable footprint. Exploring the endless possibilities
of virtual reality seems potentially a lot more interesting than
crossing tens of thousands of light years of space to try and visit
some lower life form...

-Kelly