• Question: Is there a limit to how smart individuals and communities can be?

    Asked by The Ge Ni U S to Andrew, Jade, Jessica, Kevin, Lynn on 22 Jun 2015.
    • Photo: Jess Wade

      Jess Wade answered on 22 Jun 2015:

      I used to think so, with a few absolute genii who resided the dusty halls of cambridge and oxford, but now I think not- we’re training computers to think (artificial intelligence) and they are quickly becoming more intelligent than us. There is every possibility that soon they will have power to shut down our bank accounts, turn off our heart rate monitors and close all of our airports. We need to figure out how much to teach computers before they do this! This whole type of science is called artificial intelligence.

    • Photo: Kevin Honeychurch

      Kevin Honeychurch answered on 23 Jun 2015:

      I think that the way that intelligence is measured can be misleading. However, I think that the next step would be extending the life span of humans, by the forming of some form of machine cognitions. This would mean that are experience and intelligence would not be lost.

    • Photo: Andrew Fensham-Smith

      Andrew Fensham-Smith answered on 23 Jun 2015:

      I think the idea of being able to measure intelligence is a bit over-rated. It’s only a measure of how quickly you can understand something – not how well you understand something, which is why people do exams. It’s a pretty worthless metric, though there is some evidence to suggest that it is quite a good indicator of how much money you might earn later in life.

      I think there is a limit, but I don’t think we’re there yet. Taking the lead out of fuel, iodised salt, better nutrition have all helped increase the collective intelligence of our population by a whole bunch in the past fifty years. There will always be a few really intelligent people who push the boundaries.

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