The PostHuman Ecology of Intelligence

That’s Frez, one of our cats. I really loved him. For a psychopathic murderbeast he was remarkably gentle and tolerant. Never scratched, bit or hissed at anyone. I would come home and lie down on the bed and he would come and sit on my chest. Probably thought he was my boss! Remarkably intelligent as well, as Fiona discovered one rainy day. Frez obviously did not like going out when it was wet and she caught him jumping into the bath and pissing down the plug hole. Contrary to malicious rumors, it was not because he saw me doing it…

Almost the polar opposite was a homeless cat we took in one winter who we named Godfrey. A real beast who extracted blood from every member of the household and all pets before he settled down. One day two of our other cats had cornered a fox outside the bedroom window. Godfrey got onto the window ledge and was just about to jump onto the fox when Fiona opened the window and pulled him in. A few month later he just disappeared — almost certainly dead. Maybe he did finally get around to that fox.

Anyway, in the UK cats are above the law. They are protected by law, and can wander wherever they like, do what they like and kill what they like. If, for example, they bite or scratch a child, the child is told that it is their fault for annoying the cat.

Contrast that with a dog. In many cases the above behavior would be a death penalty offense with the owner prosecuted. This is partly because dogs are physically more powerful and hence dangerous, but it also appears to involve a kind of betrayal. Dogs are supposed to be loyal companions of people — protectors and guardians. When they turn on a Human it is a far more serious matter than with cats, which are assumed to be exploitative and disloyal. Both species though are loved as companion animals and helpers. We still use dogs to protect our property and cats to keep down the smaller vermin. Indeed, we have spent thousands of years breeding all kinds of dog for all kinds of purposes, unlike cats which are only lightly domesticated. Despite that, cats choose to live with us because they prefer to. Dogs do not get much of a choice.

The way cats and dogs see us is interesting. Apparently dogs see us as “non-dog” but part of their pack and as someone to run to for help. Cats are the opposite. They appear to think we are some kind of big dumb retarded cat unable to hunt but which inexplicably has large quantities of food available that we are willing to share (suckers). If times get hard they do not immediately seek our protection but likely go their own way, although there are exceptions.

In both cases if they do injure themselves we look after them, take them to the vet and generally do what is best to keep them well fed, happy, healthy and occasionally entertained with bits of string, thrown balls or laser pointers. Neither species has a clue as to how powerful we are as a collective (think nuclear bombs). So while the tougher members might consider themselves rulers of the neighborhood, if they could comprehend who we are and what we can do their reaction might be one of horror and despair, or possibly worship (dogs are almost at that point already).

As for how they see the world, well, for them everything is “natural” from grass and trees to cars and buildings. It’s just the environment in which they live.

But what of Artilects?

This word is a neologism, a compound of “artificial” and “intellect”. What we would now view as a machine intelligence, or artificial intelligence (AI) vastly beyond contemporary Human capability. How far beyond is a moot point, but at a minimum as far beyond us as we are beyond cats and dogs. And at the upper end of the scale who knows? Maybe they will outclass us to the degree we outclass ants. And everything in between — a hierarchy of superhuman intelligences.

But in such a future, who are “we”?

At the most basic level there would be something recognizable as “Homo Sapiens”, but not quite what we have today. Same overall form, but genetically optimized for non-aging, extremely high intelligence and cybernetic implant enhanced. However, the concept of “natural environment” is crucial. In this context it is not just the existing world, it is myriad virtual realities where the real business of the universe is conducted and where most of the artilects reside. In some ways it would probably not look much different to our world now if we could see it with Human eyes. Looking at it with PostHuman eyes it would be of dazzling complexity far beyond anything our minds could grasp, with superhuman creatures moving between the virtual, the machine and the biological at will. Homo Sapiens at that time would have access to some of that peripherally, the same way cats and dogs can enter our houses but the latter certainly don’t get to use computers, run businesses, carry firearms, fly aircraft etc etc.

In the same way there would be much beyond Homo Sapiens that they could not comprehend at all, any more than a chimp can understand Quantum Mechanics, no matter how much it tries. In the contemporary world our intelligence advantage is not merely quantitative, but qualitative. At some point we passed a threshold that allowed us to manipulate symbols, record and pass on knowledge, create science and technology. It would be surprising if artilects have not passed similar thresholds that are far beyond us, to the point where we cannot even comprehend the nature of such thresholds.

But there would be other varieties of PostHuman somewhat further removed from those Homo Sapiens above. These would be the ones who could move like natives in virtual realities of the artilects, communicate with them, ally with them, work for them as mobile extensions of “the will of the god”. They could switch forms between the worlds and have access to the other planets in our solar system and beyond, where travel would almost exclusively be by data exchange. If they needed a physical form at the other end, they could take one.

One can quite imagine a symbiotic relationship with artilects (some of which might have old Human ancestry) akin to cats and dogs. The “dogs” themselves might be able to merge their minds Borg style so that their “pack” (society, nation, tribe) can rival that of artilects.

The latter having a tradeoff between the power they can wield and the freedom to use it, and “cats” having less power but almost total freedom — possibly beyond that of any one artilect. They may be loyal to one in exchange for resources, but ultimately they would still be “wild”.

I think I want to be a cat when I grow up.