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94 people, organisations and other records · 122 relationships · 34 claims about a valueEverything recorded up to the chosen year, whether or not still in effect · Undated records included
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Bostrom’s message of 1996-09-04 supposes that an AI, once sufficiently intelligent, could think out a radical improvement to its own design, which would make it more intelligent and let it accelerate further. Copy claim link
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Machine-checked, not reviewed by an editor Stated in source Supported
Supporting evidence: primary · 1 source
Date 1996-09-04 · publication Role Articulation Register (kind of text) Nonfiction Scope of the passage Presented as a supposition and attributed to Dan Clemmensen. Scope and limits Bostrom raises this to challenge Hanson and adds "(I think this is Dan Clemmensen’s view.)"; the attribution is the message’s own, not evidence of influence.
The evidence 01 primary source Supports the claim
Re: Thinking about the future... (Extropians mailing list) ↗ Extropians mailing list · 1996-09-04
Archived copy, captured 2015-04-27: Re: Thinking about the future... (Extropians mailing list) ↗
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Source excerpt “think out a radical improvement to its design; which would make it more intelligent, allowing it to accelerate further” Location in source Message body, first unquoted paragraph of the reply
Machine-checked · 2026-10-06
Source details and check notes Authors Nick Bostrom Version Archive HTML as served, retrieved 2026-10-06 with the hash recorded by the 1996–2022 candidate search; quoted lines excluded when reading the author’s text. Archive at extropians.weidai.com. Canonical address Open the canonical source ↗ Accessed 2026-10-06 Language English (en) Archive copy Open archived copy, captured 2015-04-27: Re: Thinking about the future... (Extropians mailing list) ↗ . Captured 6809 days after the recorded publication date. An archive copy shows only what the archive retrieved on 2015-04-27. It does not prove what the page said earlier, and it can differ from the copy checked on 2026-10-06.Attribution Nick Bostrom, "Re: Thinking about the future...", Extropians mailing list, 1996-09-04. Reuse No open redistribution licence asserted. Bibliographic metadata, editorial paraphrases and short attributed quotations (at most 50 words each). Recheck terms before wider redistribution. Check notes Checked against the archive HTML on 2026-10-06. Status and meaning Editorial status. Not reviewed by an editor . An exploratory record that no editor has accepted. This status does not say whether a person has read any linked passage. Each evidence record above shows how it was checked.
Relation. A passage of the document meets the proposition’s criterion. The record documents what the text states, in its register (fiction and satire are labelled); it is not evidence that the proposition is true and implies no influence on or from another text.
Date. Archive receipt: Wed Sep 4 10:09:44 1996 MST. The Sent header is garbled in the archive.
Record ID ts-a1-bostrom-1996-09-04