Intelligence feels like a hard scientific concept, but scratch the surface and you find a circular definition: we measure it with tools we designed for the purpose, then declare it real because the tools say so. That’s affirming the consequent.
If intelligence were an objective property of the universe, we’d define it like mass or charge—quantifiable, invariant, fundamental. Instead, it shifts to match whatever we decide to measure. The instruments don’t quantify intelligence; they create it.
If intelligence were an objective property of the universe, we’d define it like mass or charge—quantifiable, invariant, fundamental. Instead, it shifts to match whatever we decide to measure. The instruments don’t quantify intelligence; they create it.