Superintelligence Could Cure Rare Diseases and Cancer by Solving Drug Delivery
owl_posting · x · 2026-08-17
The author offers a steelman argument for AI solving diseases, focusing on the concept that superintelligence could solve the "delivery problem"—designing drugs that target arbitrary body tissues exclusively.
If achieved, this would enable:
- Curing rare diseases via precise gene editing delivery.
- Eliminating solid tumors using radionuclides that target only cancer cells, combined with highly selective PET ligands for early detection.
- Treating autoimmune diseases by selectively removing autoreactive cells without destroying systemic immunity.
While acknowledging complexities like the blood-brain barrier and immune evasion, the author argues this is an engineering challenge solvable with more data and iteration, not an insurmountable biological mystery.
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