DEUTSCH: Yes, but you have to distinguish between hardware and software when you’re thinking about how this cognitive closure manifests itself. Like … - Sam Harris

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DEUTSCH: Yes, but you have to distinguish between hardware and software when you’re thinking about how this cognitive closure manifests itself. Like I said, it seems plausible that the hardware limitation is not relevant even for chimpanzees. I imagine that with nanosurgery, one could implant ideas into a chimpanzee’s brain that would make it able to create further knowledge just as humans can. I’m questioning the assumption that if everybody with an IQ of over a hundred died, then in the next generation nobody would have an IQ of over a hundred. I think they well might. It depends on culture.
HARRIS: Of course. This wasn’t meant to be a plausible biological or cultural assumption. I’m just asking you to imagine a world in which we had seven billion human beings, none of whom could begin to understand what Alan Turing was up to.
DEUTSCH: That nightmare scenario is different. It’s something that actually happened — for almost the whole of human existence. Humans had the ability to be creative and to do everything we’re doing. They just didn’t, because their culture was wrong. It wasn’t their fault. Cultural evolution has a nasty tendency to suppress the growth of what we would consider science or anything important that would improve their lives. So yes, that’s possible, and it’s possible that it could happen again. Nothing can prevent it except our working to prevent it.