We Built Calculators Because We're STUPID! [Prof. David Krakauer]

Description

Prof. David Krakauer argues that intelligence isn't about knowing more—it's about doing more with less. His core thesis flips our assumptions on their head: while emergence in complex systems is about "more is different," intelligence is fundamentally about "less is more." Why Large Language Models Miss the Point LLMs are "more is more", Krakauer explains. They're essentially sophisticated libraries that know everything but understand nothing. When a student looks up answers in a library during an exam, we call them a cheater, not intelligent. Intelligence Across All Life Perhaps most surprisingly, Krakauer claims that all living things are intelligent—even bacteria. His reasoning: intelligence is the information accumulated through evolution's selective pressures. It's why we can say an elephant is "smarter" than a worm, but we'd never say it's "more alive." The difference is accumulated capacity. Three Dimensions of Intelligence Krakauer proposes intelligence exists in three distinct flavours: - Strategic Intelligence - Adaptation and survival where viruses actually beat us/ - Inferential Intelligence - Math and computation (where we built calculators because we're so bad at it) - Representational Intelligence - Finding better ways to encode problems (the most uniquely human) The Soma Cube Insight Using a Soma Cube puzzle, Krakauer demonstrates something incredible: a four-year-old can solve a combinatorial problem with 15,000 logical clauses—not by computing, but by using physical representation. The physical world does the computing for us. This is intelligence: making impossibly hard problems tractable through clever representation. This talk was recorded at DISI 2025 https://disi.org/ David Krakauer President and William H. Miller Professor of Complex Systems https://www.santafe.edu/people/profile/david-krakauer Note this version is edited down, you can watch the full version on our Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/posts/masterclass-on-142898847 Watch interview we published with David - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXa8dHzgV8U TRANSCRIPT: https://app.rescript.info/public/share/Cs8QFwMw_FiOEROkNPiIf6Y-e_ahAxNMl0oFiL7_4QA TOC: 00:00:00 - Complexity, Life & Intelligence 00:00:45 - Ptolemy vs Newton 00:01:30 - Purpose of Science 00:02:15 - Feynman on Rules vs Strategies 00:03:00 - Entropy as Unifying Rule 00:03:45 - Intelligence in Physics 00:04:15 - Complex Systems & Broken Symmetries 00:05:00 - Historical Definitions of Intelligence 00:06:15 - Herbert: Capacity to Acquire Capacity 00:06:45 - Problems with Turing Test 00:07:30 - Intelligence vs Knowledge 00:08:00 - LLMs as Libraries 00:08:30 - Humanistic Perspectives 00:09:00 - Unified Theory: Life & Intelligence 00:09:30 - Intensive vs Extensive Properties 00:10:30 - Selection Gradient Analogy 00:11:15 - Universal Intelligence (Bacteria to Elephants) 00:12:30 - Three Dimensions of Intelligence 00:13:00 - Strategic Intelligence & Viruses 00:13:30 - Inferential Intelligence & Calculators 00:14:15 - Encoding & Representation 00:14:30 - Different Paths: Life vs AI 00:15:15 - Soma Cube Problem 00:16:00 - Principle of Materiality 00:17:15 - Embodied Representation 00:17:45 - Intelligence Makes Hard Problems Easy 00:18:00 - Stupidity & Conclusion REFS: Papers and Academic Works "More is Different" by Phil Anderson [https://www.tkm.kit.edu/downloads/TKM1_2011_more_is_different_PWA.pdf ] Recent paper with Melanie and John Krakauer on emergence [https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.11135 ] Formal treatment paper on intelligence/evolution duality from David - Darwinian demons, evolutionary complexity, and information maximization [https://wiki.santafe.edu/images/b/b1/CHAOEH213037110_1.pdf ] "The Unreasonable Effectiveness of Mathematics in the Natural Sciences" by Eugene Wigner [https://webhomes.maths.ed.ac.uk/~v1ranick/papers/wigner.pdf ]