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Not OP but yes. Electron size vs band gap, computing costs (in terms of electricity) any other raw materials needed for that energy, etc... sigh... its physics, always physics... what fundamental property of physics do you think would let a vertical take off in intelligence occur?

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If you look at the rate of mathematical operations conducted, we're already going hard vertical. Physics and material limitations will slow that eventually as we reach a marginal return on converting the planet to computer chips, but we're in the singularity as proxy measured by mathematical operations.

> If you look at the rate of mathematical operations conducted, we're already going hard vertical.

Not if you remember to count all the computations being done by the quintillions of nanobots across the world known as "human cells."

That's not only inside cells, and not just neurons either. For example, your thyroid is busy brute-forcing the impossibly large space of antibody combinations, and putting every candidate cell-release through a very rigorous set of acceptance tests.

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