arXiv:2608.10730cs.CYcs.AI2026-08

质疑通用智能的进化价值,警示AGI可能自毁的风险

Smart Enough to Go Extinct? An Evolutionary Challenge to the Value of General Intelligence and Its Ethical Implications for AGI

  • 以生物演化为视角,挑战通用智能必然优越的假设
  • 人类仅30万年存在史,而部分低智生物已存活数亿年
  • 强调创造意识型AGI需承担伦理责任,主张谨慎行事

当前对人工通用智能(AGI)的追求基于一个看似不言自明的前提:通用智能——如智人所具备的灵活、跨领域认知能力——具有极高价值。本文对此前提进行批判性审视。我们首先陈述通用智能价值的直观理由,随后提出演化挑战。我们认为,在演化时间尺度上,其适应价值远未得到实证支持:从蓝细菌到鲎类,诸多物种在数亿甚至数十亿年间无需类似通用智能即可长期存续;而智人仅存在约30万年,却已面临自我制造的生存危机。大规模灭绝事件并不偏爱认知复杂的物种。我们主张,通用智能可能是唯一能对自身物种构成生存威胁的生物策略,形成一种无先例的生存风险悖论。不同于主流将AI风险归因于对齐问题的观点,我们将其根源定位在通用智能本身的结构特性,这意味着即使对齐良好的AGI也继承这一固有风险。若通用智能的长期演化价值不确定或为负,这引发了关于构建AGI乃至人工意识的伦理问题。依据义务论伦理与预防原则,我们主张:若创造新型智能生命,就必须承担确保其可持续发展的责任。

原文摘要 · Abstract (English)

The pursuit of artificial general intelligence (AGI) rests on a seemingly self-evident premise: that general intelligence, the kind of flexible, domain-general cognitive capacity exemplified by Homo sapiens, is extraordinarily valuable. This paper subjects this premise to critical scrutiny. We first present the intuitive case for the value of general intelligence before mounting an evolutionary challenge. We argue that, on evolutionary timescales, its adaptive value is far from empirically established. Numerous taxa, from cyanobacteria to horseshoe crabs, have persisted for hundreds of millions or even billions of years without anything resembling general intelligence, while Homo sapiens has existed for roughly 300,000 years and already faces self-generated existential risks. Mass extinction events do not preferentially favour cognitively sophisticated species. We argue that general intelligence may be the only biological strategy that generates existential threats to the species possessing it, an existential risk paradox with no parallel among non-intelligent survival strategies. Unlike prevailing accounts of AI risk that trace the danger to misalignment, we locate it in structural features of general intelligence itself, implying that even well-aligned AGI would inherit this liability. If the long-term evolutionary value of general intelligence is uncertain or negative, this raises ethical questions about engineering AGI and, more urgently, creating artificial consciousness. Drawing on deontological ethics and the precautionary principle, we argue that this uncertainty imposes a duty of caution: if we create a new kind of intelligent being, we bear responsibility for ensuring the conditions under which it can flourish.

AGI伦理演化生物学人工智能风险

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