Advanced Superintelligence as the next level of reliance on systems the lie at the fringe of our understanding

One of the more curious concepts to emerge from the world of AI is the idea of artificial superintelligence (ASI): a system capable of generating powerful insights that may lie beyond our understanding - like a five-year-old trying to follow Einstein explaining relativity. At that point, humanity will face a fascinating dilemma: Do we trust the recommendations of an intelligence we don’t fully understand and potentially benefit enormously - or do we dismiss it and risk missing out on a better life?

In a way, this isn’t a new problem. Humanity has long depended on systems we didn’t fully comprehend. We awoke to a world of natural forces - weather, seasons, disease, the movement of game - too complex to explain, yet essential for survival. We built myths, rituals, and early sciences to navigate these mysteries, gradually improving our health, harvests, and longevity.

Later, we came to rely on governments and markets - systems no individual could fully grasp but that shaped our prosperity and freedom. And again, we developed theories—some insightful, some inadequate - to guide how best to engage with these forces, even as democracies and dictatorships alike sometimes smoothed and sometimes amplified the chaos of economic life.

There is always a cost - whether we embrace or reject the systems that exceed our understanding. One might argue that Donald Trump’s rejection of global trade is rooted less in policy than in a basic distrust of a system too complex to fully grasp. But turning away from these systems carries a price: diminished prosperity, missed opportunities, isolation. His supporters distrust what they cannot understand. And yet, much of modern life depends on precisely that - trust in systems larger than us.

In this sense, ASI may simply be the next layer in a long human tradition: benefiting from systems we do not fully comprehend. Like nature, like markets, it may become essential before it becomes fully understood. Perhaps acceptance - grounded in results rather than full explanation - isn’t a surrender, but an acceptance of the realities of an interdependent, complex world.