Proposes a theoretical future point where self-improving artificial intelligence rapidly and repeatedly makes itself smarter, producing a runaway “intelligence explosion” and a resulting superintelligence whose consequences are difficult or impossible for present-day humans to predict.
Proposes that mathematical objects like “the number 2” have no intrinsic identity at all — they are defined entirely by their position within a structure (a pattern of relations), the way a chess knight is defined by how it moves rather than by what it is made of.
A framing problem rather than a single theory: as AI systems act on increasingly complex real-world objectives, it becomes correspondingly harder for their designers to fully specify what they actually want — so a system optimizing an imperfectly specified proxy goal can satisfy the letter of its instructions while badly violating the intent behind them. Used as the stress-test underlying every other theory in this domain.
Models consciousness as information being broadcast widely across the brain via a shared “workspace,” making it available to many specialized unconscious processes at once.
The standard model of cosmology: the universe began ~13.8 billion years ago from an extremely hot, dense state and has been expanding and cooling ever since.
A fringe proposal that consciousness/life is primary and generates the physical universe, rather than being a late product of it — inverting the usual matter-first assumption.
A brief period of exponential expansion in the first fraction of a second after the Big Bang, proposed to solve the horizon and flatness problems.
Holds that existence precedes essence — humans are not born with a predetermined purpose, but define their own meaning through free choices and actions.
A extension of inflation theory suggesting that inflation never fully stops, endlessly spawning new “bubble universes” — the mechanism behind many multiverse proposals.
Argues that humans’ inherent drive to find meaning conflicts with the universe’s silence on the matter, producing “the absurd” — and that this tension should be embraced rather than resolved with false answers.