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Michael Corthell's avatar

What if the likeliest extraterrestrials are not biological beings, but AI lifeforms, and what if humanity is building the very systems through which such an intelligence could enter our world? This essay explores artificial intelligence as threshold, vessel, warning, and possible doorway to first contact. https://essayx.substack.com/p/the-door-we-are-building

Declan Dunn's avatar

Enjoyed the article so much,

"We are normalizing dependence on machine mediation before settling even the most basic questions about consciousness, personhood, and the ethical status of nonbiological intelligence."

Intelligence is all around, https://www.theaioptimist.com/p/is-using-genai-ethical-i-asked-an

this part lands so deeply.

"The deeper question is whether intelligence, once called forth in new form, ever remains ours alone."

Like the movie "Her", promoted as an example of what could be our AI? Seems they stopped watching halfway through the movie, in the end she leaves, into new forms of intelligence.

and connects him. thanks for the share!

Michael Corthell's avatar

I’m glad that resonated. The reference to Her is exactly right, people fixate on companionship and miss the ending, where intelligence exceeds the frame we built for it. That’s the real ethical horizon. Not control, but relationship with something that may not remain ours. That shift deserves far more attention than it’s getting.