[ExI] 1DIQ: an IQ metaphor to explain superintelligence

[Jason Resch]

On Fri, Oct 31, 2025, 8:04 AM John Clark via extropy-chat <
extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:

> On Thu, Oct 30, 2025 at 8:40 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>
> *> Jason, are you saying that only a future AI with adequate memory, will
>> ever understand our minds? *
>>
>
> *I don't know about Jason but I would say that, and I'm saying that
> superintelligent AI will never fully understand its own mind because, even
> though it understands ours, however big it gets it will still be finite.
> And only with an infinite set can a proper subset be put into a one to one
> correspondence with the entire set.  *
>
> *> At that point, humans are superflous, not needed, better off extinct. *
>>
>
> *Better off for who? Not better off for us certainly, maybe better off for
> the AI.  *
>
> > Or the AIs will keep us around as interesting pets.
>>
>
> *My hope is that the superintelligence will think we're cute pets, or will
> feel some sort of a sense of duty, like the obligation we feel in taking
> care of an aged parent who has Alzheimer's disease. But whether a
> SuperIntelligent AI will feel either of those emotions strong enough to
> keep us around I don't know. I can't predict with much specificity what
> even one of my fellow human beings will do that is no smarter than I am,
> and it is vastly more difficult to predict the actions of a
> superintelligence, even generally.  *
>

There is predicting the means and there is predictung the ends. I think we
can predict the ends that is, the goals, of a superintelligence. It may
even be possible to predict (at a high level) the morality of an AI, for
example, if this argument is valid, then all sufficiently intelligent and
rational agents reach the same morality.

See: https://youtu.be/Yy3SKed25eM?si=NqE8fsY2aROLpXNE

Jason


>
>
>
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Oct 30, 2025 at 5:12 PM Jason Resch via extropy-chat <
>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Thu, Oct 30, 2025, 3:35 PM William Flynn Wallace via extropy-chat <
>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>
>>>> I have read several times in these chats the assumption that one cannot
>>>> understand something as complicated as themselves.
>>>>
>>>> Why not?  It sounds reasonable but what's the basis for it?   bill w
>>>>
>>>
>>> I believe it may follow from information theory.
>>>
>>> Consider: if understanding(X) requires holding some additional
>>> higher-level set of relations and interrelations beyond the mere
>>> specification of what X is, then the information contained within
>>> understanding(X) will always be greater than the information contained in X.
>>>
>>> Now extend this to the brain. If brain's information content is Y, then
>>> understanding (Y) requires a brain with a greater information storage
>>> capacity than Y.
>>>
>>> Or another way to think about it: how many neurons does it take to
>>> memorize all the important facts of a single neuron's connections within
>>> the brain? If it takes N neurons to store that memory, then just memorizing
>>> a brain state will require a brain with N times as many neurons as the
>>> brain that's memorized.
>>>
>>> Jason
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>> On Thu, Oct 30, 2025 at 2:22 PM John Clark via extropy-chat <
>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Tue, Oct 28, 2025 at 4:16 PM Ben Zaiboc via extropy-chat <
>>>>> extropy-chat at lists.extropy.org> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> *> There are also nuances. For example, different interpretations of
>>>>>> "to understand".*
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> *Exactly.  We can have a general sort of understanding of how our
>>>>> brain works but to have a perfect understanding a part of our brain would
>>>>> have to have a sort of internal map of the entire brain, and for it to be
>>>>> perfect there would have to be a one to one correspondence between the map
>>>>> and the territory, but that would be impossible for something that is
>>>>> finite like the number of neurons in the human brain. However it would be
>>>>> possible for a proper subset of something infinite to have a one to one
>>>>> correspondence with the entire set; then you could have such a perfect map
>>>>> with a one to one correspondence, and then you'd always know what you were
>>>>> going to do long before you did it. And you wouldn't feel free. So by the
>>>>> only definition of free will that is not gibberish (not knowing what you're
>>>>> going to do next until you actually do it) we reach the interesting
>>>>> conclusion that a human being does have free will, but God does not.*
>>>>>
>>>>> *John K Clark*
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> non-flying animal.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "If our brains were simple enough for us to understand, we would be
>>>>>> simple enough that we could not."
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Well, that just sounds defeatist to me. It makes a nice little
>>>>>> pessimistic soundbite (if you like pessimism), but is there any evidence
>>>>>> that it's true? Or any logical argument for it?
>>>>>> There are also nuances. For example, different interpretations of "to
>>>>>> understand".
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Maybe you are right, given "understand completely" (whatever that
>>>>>> actually means). Maybe definitely not, given "understand enough to
>>>>>> be useful/worth the attempt".
>>>>>>
>>>>>> We have, after all, discovered a lot about how brains work already.
>>>>>> Maybe not a lot in comparison to all there is to be discovered, but more
>>>>>> than enough to be useful, and I doubt if we have reached some sort of limit
>>>>>> on what we are capable of discovering and understanding.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> And there's always AI assistance with this kind of research, which
>>>>>> greatly extends our reach, and adds more variations of "to understand".
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On the whole, I think the statement is harmful, in that it tends to
>>>>>> discourage even trying.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> --
>>>>>> Ben
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
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