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What Is Intelligence?

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What Is Intelligence?

Lessons from AI About Evolution, Computing, and Minds

MIT Press,

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Whether human or artificial, intelligence is about prediction — and explains the origins of life.

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What do the origins of biological life have to do with the foundations of computational theory? According to Blaise Agüera y Arcas, CTO of Technology and Society at Google, computation and intelligence mirror how biological life adapts and replicates itself. Moreover, intelligence isn’t limited to complex, reflective creatures like human beings: It hinges on modeling, predicting, and navigating the future. His text offers a wide-ranging, speculative examination of the nature of intelligence, complete with precise explanations of scientific and mathematical concepts, fascinating footnotes, and references that invite readers to dig deeper.

Summary

Life is computational.

At least since Charles Darwin proposed the theory of evolution by natural selection, scientists have wondered how life on Earth began. Darwin himself admitted he had no idea how to answer that question. Scientists who research “abiogenesis,” the study of the chemical origins of life some five billion years ago, have since come up with several theories, most of which involve the emergence of self-replicating RNA molecules. One of the major issues with these and other theories is how evolution can get started without DNA and heritability — and how more complex living entities emerged. Scientists also posit that another critical evolutionary step took place roughly two billion years ago: “symbiogenesis,” when simpler, self-sustaining, and replicating entities connected with one another to form more complex entities. The connection between these entities enabled them to survive over time. 

The field of computer science offers other insights into the nature of life on Earth. In a failed attempt to find out whether there’s an algorithm that can decide the validity of all mathematical statements, British ...

About the Author

Blaise Agüera y Arcas is a vice president at Google, where he serves as the CTO of Technology and Society. He is the founder of Paradigms of Intelligence, an organization focused on AI research, particularly the foundations of neural computing, active inference, evolution, and artificial life. He is also the author of Who Are We Now? and Ubi Sunt.

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