Blaise Agüera y Arcas, a Google vice president and chief technology officer of Technology & Society who leads the Paradigms of Intelligence research group, is featured in a Big Think discussion about his 2025 book What Is Intelligence?, in which he argues that modern AI systems aren’t just tools that mimic human thought but operate on the same computational principles that underlie natural intelligence in brains and throughout evolution. He explores how prediction, computation, and neural network architectures connect biological intelligence to artificial systems and challenges conventional divides between “artificial” and “natural” minds. His work weaves together insights from evolution, neuroscience, physics, and AI to suggest that intelligence should be understood as a continuum spanning life and machines, reshaping how we think about cognition, consciousness, and the future of AI.
