{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,7,3]],"date-time":"2026-07-03T21:15:47Z","timestamp":1783113347257,"version":"3.54.6"},"reference-count":29,"publisher":"Frontiers Media SA","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2023,10,24]],"date-time":"2023-10-24T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1698105600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":["frontiersin.org"],"crossmark-restriction":true},"short-container-title":["Front. Artif. Intell."],"abstract":"<jats:p>We argue here that contemporary semiconductor computing technology poses a significant if not insurmountable barrier to the emergence of any artificial general intelligence system, let alone one anticipated by many to be \u201csuperintelligent\u201d. This limit on artificial superintelligence (ASI) emerges from the energy requirements of a system that would be more intelligent but orders of magnitude less efficient in energy use than human brains. An ASI would have to supersede not only a single brain but a large population given the effects of collective behavior on the advancement of societies, further multiplying the energy requirement. A hypothetical ASI would likely consume orders of magnitude more energy than what is available in highly-industrialized nations. We estimate the energy use of ASI with an equation we term the \u201cErasi equation\u201d, for the <jats:italic>E<\/jats:italic>nergy <jats:italic>R<\/jats:italic>equirement for <jats:italic>A<\/jats:italic>rtificial <jats:italic>S<\/jats:italic>uper<jats:italic>I<\/jats:italic>ntelligence. Additional efficiency consequences will emerge from the current unfocussed and scattered developmental trajectory of AI research. Taken together, these arguments suggest that the emergence of an ASI is highly unlikely in the foreseeable future based on current computer architectures, primarily due to energy constraints, with biomimicry or other new technologies being possible solutions.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3389\/frai.2023.1240653","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2023,10,25]],"date-time":"2023-10-25T09:27:03Z","timestamp":1698226023000},"update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3389\/crossmark-policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":32,"title":["The energy challenges of artificial superintelligence"],"prefix":"10.3389","volume":"6","author":[{"given":"Klaus M.","family":"Stiefel","sequence":"first","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Jay S.","family":"Coggan","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1965","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2023,10,24]]},"reference":[{"key":"B1","first-page":"1","article-title":"\u201cThe cat is out of the bag: cortical simulations with 109 neurons, 1013 synapses,\u201d","volume-title":"Supercomputing 09: Proceedings of the ACM\/IEEE SC2009 Conference on High Performance Networking and Computing Storage and Analysis","author":"Ananthanarayanan","year":"2009"},{"key":"B2","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","first-page":"1133","DOI":"10.1097\/00004647-200110000-00001","article-title":"An energy budget for signaling in the grey matter of the brain","volume":"21","author":"Attwell","year":"2001","journal-title":"J. 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