Schmidhuber: no ASI without self-improving hardware and mastery of the real world
SchmidhuberAI · x · 2026-09-17
Jürgen Schmidhuber argues that recursive self-improvement must go beyond software: true AI requires combining software research with the physical world of machines and robots. In Section 9 of his report, he traces physical self-replicating machines back to Descartes, Eliot, Butler, Capek, von Neumann, Zuse and Penrose, noting that self-replicating software (like computer viruses) is almost trivial, while general-purpose physical self-replication remains unsolved. His Gödel Machine embodies this software-plus-physics approach: "No Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) without mastery of the real world!"
Related event: Schmidhuber Claims Priority: First Concrete RSI Algorithm Dates to 1987(10 posts)→
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