On the evolution of intelligence bit, he’s probably right.
On the enhancement of intelligence, part, he’s not… entirely wrong. Given a fixed energy budget (i.e. evolved environment), it seems reasonable that you can’t improve the brain very much with gross chemical intervention (which is what he’s talking about, in context). Of course, the energy budget isn’t necessarily fixed, but it still is interesting.
Surely this depends on what you mean by ‘improve the brain’. You might be able to make it better at things you consider important, by undermining things that the evolutionary environment deems important.
You could also trade off things that were more important in the ancestral environment than they are now. For example, social status (to which the neurotypical brain devotes much of its resources) is no longer the evolutionary advantage that it used to be.
On the evolution of intelligence bit, he’s probably right.
On the enhancement of intelligence, part, he’s not… entirely wrong. Given a fixed energy budget (i.e. evolved environment), it seems reasonable that you can’t improve the brain very much with gross chemical intervention (which is what he’s talking about, in context). Of course, the energy budget isn’t necessarily fixed, but it still is interesting.
Surely this depends on what you mean by ‘improve the brain’. You might be able to make it better at things you consider important, by undermining things that the evolutionary environment deems important.
You could also trade off things that were more important in the ancestral environment than they are now. For example, social status (to which the neurotypical brain devotes much of its resources) is no longer the evolutionary advantage that it used to be.
You two realize you are just reinventing Bostrom’s EOCs, right?
People, I wrote a thorough essay all about this! If I left something out, just tell me—you don’t need to reinvent the wheel!
(This goes for half the comments on this page.)