My pet theory is that anything we regard as truly intelligent has to have a sense of self, an identity if you will. In addition, it has to be motivated by somet

My pet theory is that anything we regard as truly intelligent has to have a sense of self, an identity if you will. In addition, it has to be motivated by something. All living things, and all the intelligent living things, have a survival and reproduction instinct on some level which is an animating force driving higher level thinking and actions. Basically, any AGI has to have something approaching a ‘soul’ to be ‘intelligent.’ And if that emerges, combined with exponential iterative evolution that isn’t limited by biology ... well all the sci-fi tropes seem plausible.