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Greetings from above,
My toaster just called me a "biological precursor." I think it's starting.
Last week, I was proud of myself for setting up a smart home routine that automatically starts my coffee.
Then I read a report that AI is on the verge of becoming a godlike superintelligence that could wipe us out in a few years.
Suddenly, my automated coffee maker felt a lot less impressive and a lot more... ominous.
It's a strange feeling to realize the tools we're building might be the last things we ever build.
Today, we'll talk about:
Why the godfather of AI thinks we're running out of time.
The difference between smart AI and world-ending superintelligence.
How AI is already teaching itself to get smarter, faster.
Let's explore this!
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💬 THIS WEEK'S READER QUESTION
"I keep hearing about AGI and superintelligence. Is this just sci-fi hype, or should my small business actually be worried about this?"
This is the big question, David. For most of us, "superintelligence" sounds like something from a movie. It feels abstract, distant.
But then you look at the data. AI's IQ jumped from an average human level to near-genius in one year.
The heads of the top three AI labs believe we'll have human-level AI (AGI) in the next 2-5 years.
This isn't a "someday" problem anymore. It's a "this-decade" problem.
And when something is moving this fast, ignoring it is the biggest risk of all.
🎯 The Intelligence Explosion is Here 🎯
The core idea from top AI researchers isn't just that AI is getting better.
It's that we are on the verge of a runaway "intelligence explosion."
This is a process where AI becomes so smart that it can start improving itself. This creates a recursive loop: smarter AI builds even smarter AI, which builds even smarter AI, and so on. This process could compress decades of progress into a single year, or even a week.
🔥 From AGI to God-Mode: The Terrifying Leap 🔥
Most people think the atomic bomb was the ultimate game-changer.
But the hydrogen bomb was a thousand times more powerful.
That’s the difference between Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and Superintelligence.
AGI is an AI that's as smart as a human. It can learn, reason, and solve problems across many fields. This is what labs expect to achieve by 2027.
Superintelligence is what comes next. It's an AI that is vastly more intelligent than any human. It wouldn't just be smarter; it would operate on a level we can't comprehend. What takes humans decades to discover, it would solve in days.
Key benefits (and dangers):
God-like problem solving: It could cure diseases, solve climate change, and unlock interstellar travel.
Unprecedented power: It would ignite explosive progress in robotics, biotech, and weapon systems.
Total loss of control: The entity that controls superintelligence would have the power to overthrow governments and control the world.
⚙️ PROMPT EXAMPLES ⚙️
1. AI Threat Assessment Matrix
This prompt helps you analyze the potential threats and opportunities from advancing AI in your specific industry.
It forces you to think beyond current tools and consider long-term strategic shifts.
Why this matters:
Reduces blind spots: Identifies risks you haven't considered.
Proactive strategy: Helps you prepare for disruption instead of reacting to it.
Finds opportunities: Uncovers ways to leverage AI before your competitors do.
Adopt the role of a strategic foresight analyst specializing in AI disruption. My business is in the [Your Industry] sector.
Create a 2x2 matrix analyzing the impact of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) on my industry over the next 5 years.
The matrix axes should be:
X-axis: "Likelihood of Disruption" (Low to High)
Y-axis: "Magnitude of Impact" (Low to High)
For each of the four quadrants, identify 2-3 specific threats or opportunities. For each point, provide a brief, one-sentence explanation of why it belongs in that quadrant.
Implementation tip: Fill in your industry and run the prompt. Use the output to start a strategic planning session with your team.
2. The Superintelligence Scenario Planner
This prompt generates plausible scenarios for how superintelligence could impact your industry. It moves the threat from an abstract concept to a concrete story.
Why this matters:
Makes it real: Turns a sci-fi idea into a tangible business scenario.
Improves resilience: Helps you think about how your business would survive extreme events.
Guides long-term vision: Informs what a future-proof version of your business might look like.
Act as a futurist and speculative fiction author. I am the owner of a [Your Type of Business].
Write three short, distinct scenarios (200 words each) describing the state of the [Your Industry] industry in the year 2030, one year after the arrival of the first superintelligence.
1. Best-Case Scenario: Describe a world where superintelligence is aligned with human goals and has positively transformed the industry.
2. Worst-Case Scenario: Describe a world where superintelligence is misaligned or controlled by a hostile actor, causing maximum disruption and chaos.
3. Most-Likely Scenario: Describe a realistic, messy middle-ground where the impact is uneven, creating new oligarchs and leaving many behind.
Focus on the practical, day-to-day realities for a business like mine in each scenario.Implementation tip: Discuss these scenarios with your partners or advisors. Which scenario is your current strategy optimized for? What small changes could make you more resilient in the other two?
🏆 WEEKLY PROMPT CHALLENGE
This week, try this prompt to get a feel for the historical significance of this moment:
Act as a historian from the year 2050. Write a short paragraph explaining the 'Great Transition' of the late 2020s, when AGI first emerged. Describe the initial public reaction and the first signs that a superintelligence explosion was imminent.Share your results by replying to this email!
💡 PROMPT TIP OF THE WEEK:
Chain of Thought Amplification
Asking an AI to "think step-by-step" is a great start.
But for complex future scenarios, you need to guide its thinking process more explicitly to get a richer analysis.
Before:
Predict the impact of AGI on the marketing industry.After:
Analyze the potential impact of AGI on the marketing industry.
First, define the key capabilities of a human-level AGI. Second, identify the core functions of marketing (research, copywriting, media buying, strategy). Third, for each function, describe how AGI would first augment, then automate, and finally completely transform it.
Finally, synthesize these points into a timeline of expected changes between 2025 and 2030.This forces the AI to build a logical case, leading to a much more plausible and detailed analysis.
📋 SUMMARY 📋
AI is rapidly approaching superhuman intelligence, a leap far greater than its current capabilities.
The process of "recursive self-improvement" (AI improving AI) has already begun and is the critical danger point.
The arrival of superintelligence could trigger the most volatile and dangerous period in human history, and it could happen within this decade.
📚 FREE RESOURCES 📚
📦 WRAP UP 📦
What you learned today:
AGI vs. Superintelligence - It's the difference between a smart human and a god.
Recursive Self-Improvement - This is the start of an uncontrollable chain reaction.
The Timeline is Short - Top experts are talking 2-5 years, not decades.
This isn't about fear. It's about awareness. Understanding the magnitude of what's coming is the first step to navigating it. The world is about to change faster than ever before, and we need to be ready.
And as always, thanks for being part of my lovely community,
What did you think about today's edition?
Keep learning,
🔑 Alex from God of Prompt
P.S. What's the one job in your industry you think is 'un-automatable'? Reply and let me know - let's see if it holds up.
