The Kardashev Scale & AI: Likely Bedfellows
How can we use one astronomer’s classification of alien civilisations to inform our thinking around AI?
This week, I’m keen to dip into a little science-fiction — shock horror! As you may have ascertained from a few other articles to date, I enjoy watching, reading and writing about sci-fi. And what would my commitment to the genre be without a fascination with the great speculators of our future?
One I stumbled upon recently is Nikolai Kardashev, a Soviet and Russian astrophysicist and SETI (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence) pioneer who passed away just last year.
During his long and colourful career, Kardashev became known for many things, but one that stands out above the rest is his method of measuring and classifying an alien civilisation’s level of technological advancement based on the amount of energy it is capable of storing and using.
Known as the Kardashev Scale (KS), the method describes 3 levels, expanding through various orders of magnitude:
- Type I Civilisations (somewhat close to humans), also called planetary civilisations, which can capture and harness all available energy on their planet.
- Type II Civilisations, also called stellar civilisations…
