Gene Unlocking: I Evolve Every Day

Chapter 436: Chapter 378: Civilization Levels

The night was deep and impenetrable, like viscous ink flowing through time.

Inside the room, Gu Wei, with a look of curiosity, asked ”Nuwa,” ”Mr. Lu, is this the super AI you said is even more advanced than ’Sunday’?”

Lu Li nodded, ”Yes.”

Gu Wei was very intrigued, ”You mentioned before that ’Sunday’ is the third phase of AI, the ’Agent,’ whereas the most advanced AI humans currently have has just progressed from the first phase ’Chatbot’ to the early second phase ’Reasoner’. It’s already able to solve many problems for humans, like AI painting and writing novels, even though its current performance is quite average. But as the technology matures in the future, it will definitely shine and even possess human-level reasoning, capable of solving various complex problems. ’Sunday’ is even more remarkable; it can learn, think, take independent action, and perform tasks better than humans. So, this more advanced AI of yours, at what stage is it, and what functions does it have?”

Lu Li introduced, ”’Nuwa’ is the name I gave this super AI assistant. It is in the fourth stage of AI development. Besides possessing all the abilities of AI from the previous three stages, it also has the powerful ability to assist humans in completing new inventions. To give a simple example, humanity’s controlled nuclear fusion technology is still not fully developed or mature. If I instruct ’Nuwa’ to assist, it could, with its exceptionally advanced algorithms, develop truly controllable nuclear fusion technology in a very short time. Its capabilities include but are not limited to this. If there is enough time and a suitable and vast technological industrial chain park, it could elevate human civilization from the currently perceived Kardashev 0.7 level to the early stages of a Type III civilization. Of course, this would require an enormous amount of time, possibly several hundred years.”

The reason a suitable and vast technological industrial chain park is needed is that ’Nuwa’s’ computation and research do not happen overnight.

It requires continuous updates and upgrades based on existing technological products to develop more advanced technology.

Creating such a technological industrial chain park requires massive funding support as well.

This is only the initial stage.

To develop to the early stages of a Type III civilization within several hundred years, the resources and funding needed might be beyond what Earthlings can imagine.

In short, the computation and research of super AI are not as robust as the simulation deduction function.

It can skip the process of developing products and just use the simulation deduction function to understand if a product can be developed, what its effects would be, and then bring out advanced technology several generations ahead.

Lu Li understood this logic quite well.

Unfortunately, Gu Wei didn’t; he was astonished upon hearing how amazing ”Nuwa” was.

What?

A super AI, in just a few hundred years, can elevate human civilization to the early stages of a Type III civilization on the Kardashev scale?

Hearing this, Gu Wei was particularly shocked internally.

Why was he so shocked?

The classification of cosmic civilization levels is mainly based on the standards of energy use and consumption by civilizations, dividing them into different levels.

This classification was initially proposed by Kardashev, originally only consisting of Types I to III.

Later, through development and expansion, it evolved into a classification of seven levels of civilization.

Type I civilization is also known as planetary civilization.

A civilization at this level can utilize and control all the energy of its home planet.

This means the civilization can control weather, rivers, land, life, oceanic phenomena at will, and even changes within the planet’s crust.

Currently, humanity’s civilization level can barely reach 0.7, not yet achieving all the capabilities of a Type I civilization, but it has already broken free from its home planet’s gravitational pull and can travel to space relatively freely.

Type II civilization, also known as stellar civilization.

A civilization at this level can control the entire star system’s energy.

For instance, it could control the solar system and the operation of the entire stellar system, such as using Dyson Sphere technology to capture solar energy.

A civilization at this level would essentially not face an energy crisis and would be able to send research-based manned spacecraft to other stars.

Type II civilization is already so impressive.

How wondrous is a Type III civilization?

Type III civilization is known as galactic civilization.

A civilization at this level can utilize the entire galaxy’s energy, including black holes.

Humanity will then be able to use technology for basic navigation within the Milky Way Galaxy.

In places found within Hanoi, navigation and habitation can be achieved.

Scientists speculate that for humanity to truly reach the level of a Type I civilization would require at least several hundred more years of development.

Reaching a Type II civilization would take at least tens of thousands of years.

Because the hallmark of a Type II civilization is the Dyson Sphere, a colossal structure that can completely encapsulate a star, wasting not a single bit of its light and heat.

To understand, the energy released by the Sun in one second could supply human civilization for millions of years.

The energy Earth receives from the Sun is only one twenty-two billionth of what the Sun emits.

So a civilization that has mastered Dyson Sphere technology has virtually limitless energy.

The entire star’s light and heat would be collected and stored by the Dyson Sphere, converted into electricity or other forms of usable energy.

Then, how much accumulation is needed to develop to a Type III civilization?

In fact, many scientists believe that a Type II civilization might be the ultimate limit of human civilization.

Because to reach the level of a Type III civilization, humanity needs to master faster-than-light technology.

As everyone knows, when an object approaches the speed of light infinitely, the energy required also becomes infinite.

Therefore, accelerating an object to the speed of light is almost impossible.

Let alone reaching a faster-than-light level of technology.

In this regard, a Type III civilization is a bottleneck humanity can never break through.

So now, hearing that ”Nuwa” might break this limitation naturally left Gu Wei utterly astonished.

Lu Li didn’t care about Gu Wei and walked slowly to the super artificial intelligence platform, commanding: ”Show me the main data of the gamma-ray burst, and the methods you’ve calculated to solve it.”

Nuwa replied: ”Okay, master.”

The next moment, it collapsed, transforming into a series of information and data presented before his eyes.

Lu Li looked at the presented data and information with great interest.

It briefly introduced the causes of gamma-ray bursts, the energy changes after its occurrence, and the effects it caused.

For example, the super bright gamma-ray burst observed by ”Rappel”.

The energy it released in ten seconds was equivalent to the total energy released by our Milky Way Galaxy over 500 million years.

And this gamma-ray burst was 2.4 billion light-years away from Earth.

That is to say, the photons it emitted traveled for 2.4 billion years before reaching Earth.

This gamma-ray burst even indirectly verified that Einstein’s theory of relativity remains very robust.

The reason Lu Li noticed this particular piece of data among the myriad datasets and information was that he felt this information completely overturned his previous assumptions.

”I previously thought that after a gamma-ray burst travels tens of light-years, due to the nature of energy decay, it would no longer have a devastating impact on planets.”

Lu Li thought to himself: ”If a gamma-ray burst is powerful enough, it might be able to travel much further distances and have a devastating impact on planets. For instance, this gamma-ray burst discovered by ’Rappel’, the energy it releases is so vast, it’s simply unbelievable.”

However, what he couldn’t figure out was what exactly could produce such an enormous energy gamma-ray burst?

He couldn’t believe it was from a so-called supernova explosion.

A supernova is a specific stage in the evolution of a star, marking the end of a star’s life.

For a star to evolve into a supernova explosion, a prerequisite is that the star’s mass must be more than eight times that of the Sun.

Supernovae are the largest scale variable stars, during which they can eject most or even all of their material at speeds up to one-tenth the speed of light, and could possibly produce gamma-ray bursts.

The radiation energy released by a supernova explosion is ninety times the total radiated energy of the Sun over its lifetime.

The largest star currently observed by humans is 1,800 light-years away from the solar system in the direction of Sagittarius V1943.

Its radius is 2361±118 times that of the Sun.

Even calculated at the lower error limit, Sagittarius V1943’s radius is 2,243 times that of the Sun.

If calculated as 2,361 times the solar radius, Sagittarius V1943’s radius can reach 1.64 billion kilometers.

Sagittarius V1943 is extremely massive, capable of containing 13.1 billion Suns.

It appears that if Sagittarius V1943 evolved into the supernova stage, it might be possible to release a gamma-ray burst with the energy observed by ”Rappel”.

In fact, this is not the case, because the mass of Sagittarius V1943 is only twenty times that of the Sun.

Based on its mass, it should release energy 225 times the total of the Sun over 10 billion years when it evolves to the supernova explosion stage.

Meanwhile, the Milky Way Galaxy has approximately 400 billion stars, and the energy they release in 500 million years is far greater than that of any single supernova explosion.

Thus, how could the enormous energy gamma-ray burst observed by Rappel be born from a supernova explosion?

”There must be other ways to generate gamma-ray bursts!”

Lu Li squinted his eyes slightly, ”Unfortunately, current human scientific literature does not introduce any celestial movements that can release such intense gamma-ray bursts.”

He continued to look at the initial simulation response methods provided by ”Nuwa”.

It listed four methods.

The first is prevention, such as establishing detection stations.

The second is for humans to hide in deep-sea or underground cave shelters; but this is just temporary survival.

The third is to vigorously promote the rapid development of complex social systems and technology. When humans can reach the pinnacle of stellar civilization, they might have methods to deal with gamma-ray bursts, and to reach this level, ”Nuwa” needs to calculate for several centuries given sufficient conditions.

Finally, to increase the research efforts in life sciences, allowing organisms to live in the planetary environments damaged by gamma-ray bursts.

After reading, Lu Li frowned, ”It seems none of these methods work.”

At this moment, Gu Wei also saw the data and information presented by Nuwa.

He looked pale and said, ”Mr. Lu, even a super artificial intelligence that’s reached the fourth stage cannot provide effective methods to deal with gamma-ray bursts. Are the organisms on Earth really going to be extinct because of this?”

Lu Li looked at Gu Wei, genuinely unable to answer this question.

Currently, whether himself or Nuwa, indeed cannot offer a solution.

It seems that Earth’s ecological environment being destroyed by the gamma-ray burst and the extinction of surface organisms is already a fact.

This answer truly brings a deep sense of powerlessness.

Lu Li was momentarily confused.

Is it that even if I become a god, I still can’t protect Earth?

This made his heart feel very heavy, and his ”Dao heart” somewhat unstable.

Is attempting energy counteraction the only way left with no other method?

Lu Li was very unwilling, extremely eager to think of a way to solve the gamma-ray burst problem.

But, what should be done?