Eric Drexler at AI Prospects:
What we’re building today is not “an AI” that might cooperate or rebel, but an expanding capacity to design, develop, produce, deploy, and adapt complex systems at scale—the basis for a hypercapable world. Taking this prospect seriously changes what to expect and what we can do.
Over these two years, AI development has continued to move in this direction. Compound, multi-component AI systems have become dominant. Orchestration has emerged as central. “Agentic” workflows organize task-focused behavior rather than autonomous goal-pursuit. The framing of intelligence as a malleable resource increasingly reflects how practitioners discuss their work. The framework I’ve outlined anticipated this direction, and developments align with the logic it describes.
What follows is both a retrospective and a synthesis—a map of terrain for new readers, a clarified conceptual architecture for those who followed piece by piece. The focus is conditional analysis and strategic preparation, not prediction and speculation. Predictions and odds are for spectators; participants weigh options.
More here.
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