In conversation with friends I tend to use George W Bush as the other endpoint—a dig at those hated Greens but it’s uncontentious here in the UK, and if it helps keep people listening (which it seems to) it’s worth it.
This seems a bad example to use given the context. If you are trying to convince people that greater than human intelligence will give AIs an insurmountable advantage over even the smartest humans then drawing attention to a supposed idiot who became the most powerful man in the world for 8 years raises the question of whether you either don’t know what intelligence is or vastly overestimate its ability to grant real world power.
Wikipedia gives him an estimated IQ of 125, which may be a wee bit off for the low end of the IQ distribution. Still, if that’s the example that requires the less explanation in practice, why not.
In conversation with friends I tend to use George W Bush as the other endpoint—a dig at those hated Greens but it’s uncontentious here in the UK, and if it helps keep people listening (which it seems to) it’s worth it.
This seems a bad example to use given the context. If you are trying to convince people that greater than human intelligence will give AIs an insurmountable advantage over even the smartest humans then drawing attention to a supposed idiot who became the most powerful man in the world for 8 years raises the question of whether you either don’t know what intelligence is or vastly overestimate its ability to grant real world power.
For the avoidance of doubt, it seems very unlikely in practice that Bush doesn’t have above-average intelligence.
Wikipedia gives him an estimated IQ of 125, which may be a wee bit off for the low end of the IQ distribution. Still, if that’s the example that requires the less explanation in practice, why not.
Maybe Forrest Gump would work as well?
My most recent use of this example got the response George W Bush Was Not Stupid.