Introduction
My now 7-year-old son's favorite “relaxing” bedtime book is Who Would Win? Extreme Animal Rumble. Sixteen creatures in a bracketed battle. Single elimination. Nothing like a fight to the death between sharks, dinosaurs, deadly insects, and jungle animals to lull him into a peaceful sleep at night. He's so inspired by these rumbles, he has taken to writing his own version, which he calls “The Intelligence Rumble”—smart animals vs. smart animals. (He excitedly gave me the full rundown on the list of competitors, which include the highly anticipated matchups of giant squid vs. octopus and crow vs. raven.)
“The Intelligence Rumble?” I asked, as thoughts swirled in my head. “What do you think about this intelligence rumble: humans vs. robots. What would a matchup look like? Who would win?”
“Well, humans are smarter than robots because they invented robots; robots did not invent people,” he reasoned. “People can control what robots do, but robots cannot control what people do. Some people are smarter than robots, and some robots are smarter than people. Both minds are getting smarter and smarter, but robots are catching up a little bit to humans.”
“Oh, and add this part,” he later added over one of our breakfast chats. “Humans have been evolving and have been on this planet for a lot longer than robots. So, they must be smarter.”
It's amazing to see how new perspectives of the future can unfold when the world is seen through the eyes of a child. And once I got over my ...
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