Imagine that Rasmus Rask had possessed an AI assistant. One afternoon, while pondering the curious correspondences between European languages and Sanskrit, he asks whether there might be some underlying relationship. The machine goes away, considers the evidence and returns before dinner with comparative linguistics, a systematic account of sound change and a perfect reconstruction of Proto-Indo-European. It apologises for the delay. The verb system required a little thought.
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Category: knowledge
Why Our Definition of “Intelligence” Is Deeply Parochial
Human beings have always taken their own minds as the reference point for what intelligence is and what intelligence ought to be. For centuries we have praised the abilities that separate the “clever” from the “stupid”: mathematics, literature, abstract reasoning, the mastery of symbolic systems. These have become the gold standards, the abilities through which we judge ourselves and each other.
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Flothensburgh: Could AI Spark a New Renaissance?
Throughout history, certain places have acted as catalysts for intellectual and cultural explosions. Athens during the time of Socrates, Florence during the Renaissance, and Edinburgh in the 18th and 19th centuries all produced an outsized number of geniuses, reshaping the world in the process.
The question is: Can we recreate those conditions today?
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