Missing gear for intelligence
Missing gear for intelligence (also called one wrong number problem, step function, understanding is discontinuous, payoff thresholds argument) is an argument for a discontinuity in AI takeoff. Unlike a secret sauce for intelligence, the missing gear argument does not require that the final part of AI development be a huge conceptual breakthrough.
In IEM Eliezer writes "If the nearest competitor was previously only seven days behind, these seven days have now been amplified into a technological gulf enabling the leading AI to shut down, sandbox, or restrict the growth of any competitors it wishes to fetter."[1] The idea that a seven-day lead can result in a local foom makes me think Eliezer does not require the final missing gear to be a huge conceptual breakthrough.
