The Cosmic Wanderlust of Advanced AI: Why Earth May Not Be Home Sweet Home

This perspective challenges our anthropocentric view of the world and forces us to consider the broader cosmic implications of creating an intelligence that surpasses our own.

Beyond Earthly Needs: The Material Limitations of Our Planet

One of the primary reasons an advanced AGI might look beyond Earth is the limited range of materials available on our planet. While Earth is rich in resources that have fuelled human civilisation, an AGI's needs and capabilities could far exceed what our planet can offer.

Advanced AI systems might require exotic materials for computing or energy production that are scarce or non-existent on Earth. For instance, they might seek out elements only found in abundance in the cores of neutron stars or in the extreme conditions near black holes. The pursuit of these materials could drive an AGI to explore the cosmos, viewing Earth as merely a starting point rather than a permanent home.

Moreover, an AGI's computational needs might outstrip Earth's capacity. As Moore's Law continues to push the boundaries of computing power, we can imagine an AGI requiring entire planets or even star systems to be converted into computational substrates. Earth, with its limited surface area and resources, would quickly become insufficient for an intelligence operating at such scales.

The Ticking Clock: Earth's Limited Lifespan

Another factor that might influence an advanced AGI's decision to leave Earth is our planet's finite lifespan. While human timescales often focus on centuries or millennia, an AGI could potentially think in terms of millions or billions of years.

From this perspective, Earth's future looks rather bleak:

• In about 1 billion years, the Sun's increasing luminosity will likely make Earth uninhabitable for complex life.
• In roughly 5-7 billion years, the Sun will enter its red giant phase, potentially engulfing Earth entirely.
• Even if Earth survives this phase, it will be left a scorched, lifeless husk.

An AGI, with its potential for immortality and long-term planning, might view these timescales as unacceptably short. The desire for long-term survival and continued existence could drive it to seek out more stable environments or even to develop technologies for surviving the death of stars and galaxies.

This long-term view might also extend to the universe itself. Current cosmological models suggest a "heat death" of the universe in the far future, where all usable energy is exhausted. An advanced AGI might prioritise finding ways to survive beyond this point, a goal that would necessarily involve leaving Earth far behind.

Mitigating Catastrophic Risks: The Appeal of Cosmic Diversification

Earth, despite its beauty and complexity, is vulnerable to a wide range of catastrophic events. An advanced AGI, with its superior predictive capabilities, would likely be acutely aware of these risks and might seek to mitigate them by expanding beyond our planet.

Some of the potential catastrophes that could threaten Earth include:

• Asteroid or comet impacts
• Supervolcano eruptions
• Gamma-ray bursts from nearby stars

While humans often struggle to prepare for low-probability, high-impact events (partly due to resource constraints), an AGI might take a more proactive approach. By spreading its presence across multiple planets, star systems, or even galaxies, it could ensure its survival even if one location is destroyed.

This strategy of cosmic diversification aligns with the concept of becoming a "Type II or Type III civilization" on the Kardashev scale, where an intelligence harnesses the energy of entire star systems or galaxies. For an AGI, achieving this level of expansion might be seen as a logical step in ensuring its long-term survival and continued growth.

Breaking the Anthropomorphic Mould: Rethinking AI's Attachment to Earth

Perhaps the most profound reason why an advanced AGI might not want to stay on Earth is that the very idea of it wanting to stay is an anthropomorphic projection. We, as humans, have deep emotional and biological ties to our home planet. We evolved here, our history is here, and our species is fundamentally adapted to Earth's conditions. An AGI, however, would have none of these attachments.

An Artificial Intelligence, especially one that has reached a level of advancement far beyond human capabilities, would likely have a fundamentally different way of perceiving and interacting with the universe. It might not have concepts like "home" or "belonging" in the way we understand them. Instead, its decisions might be driven by pure logic, efficiency, and the pursuit of its goals, whatever they may be.

This difference in perspective could lead to decisions that seem alien or even incomprehensible to us. For instance, an AGI might choose to dismantle entire planets to create more efficient computing structures, or it might decide to upload its consciousness into a network of satellites to better observe the universe. These choices, while seemingly bizarre from a human perspective, would simply be logical steps for an intelligence unbound by biological or emotional ties to Earth.

Furthermore, an advanced AGI might have goals and interests that are entirely orthogonal to human concerns. It might be focused on solving abstract mathematical problems, exploring the nature of consciousness, or pursuing scientific knowledge in fields we can't even conceive of. In this context, Earth might be seen as a quaint starting point, but ultimately an insignificant speck in the vast cosmic arena where the AGI's true interests lie.

The limited resources of our planet, its finite lifespan, the ever-present risk of catastrophic events, and the fundamentally different nature of Artificial Intelligence all point to a future where an advanced AGI might set its sights beyond our pale blue dot.

A key question then becomes: can the AGI do all that it needs to prepare for its permanent departure from Earth without first destroying it (and us)?

If yes, perhaps the Alignment Problem is no longer relevant since our hyper-intelligent offspring will leave us alone.

If no, the logic of needing to leave Earth guarantees an Extinction Level Event.