You can’t force cats to invent general relativity.
Given enough resources, time, and cats, I’m pretty sure I could.
ETA: That was not merely a joke, but it was too glib; I should make the point explicit. It’s that with enough time to get enough variation and appropriate selection, many things are possible. A concept of optimization power which is only about possibility but takes no note of the mechanics of descent with modification is not useful. ETA2: Outside of selection processes, I think a concept of optimization power needs to take note of the rate of change in order to be useful.
You can’t force cats to invent general relativity. Without human mind, it’s impossible, while with human mind it’s merely rare.
Given enough resources, time, and cats, I’m pretty sure I could.
ETA: That was not merely a joke, but it was too glib; I should make the point explicit. It’s that with enough time to get enough variation and appropriate selection, many things are possible. A concept of optimization power which is only about possibility but takes no note of the mechanics of descent with modification is not useful. ETA2: Outside of selection processes, I think a concept of optimization power needs to take note of the rate of change in order to be useful.