# Machines May Do Almost Everything Better Than We Do by Claude Shannon > "It may be possible within a century or so, that machines are going to be doing almost everything better than we do. They already do a lot of things better than we do. An automobile can go down the street a heck of a lot faster than any person can, for example. They can do factory work of all kinds better than we can. The highly intellectual stuff is going to come later." > **— Claude Shannon**, *Anthony Liversidge interview, Omni, August 1987* ## Sources and Context - **Primary interview transcript:** [Anthony Liversidge, ‘Profile of Claude Shannon’](https://gwern.net/doc/cs/algorithm/information/1987-liversidge.pdf), *Omni*, August 1987, reprinted in *Claude Elwood Shannon: Collected Papers*, pp. xxx–xxxi. The poster text reproduces Shannon’s complete contiguous passage. ## Related Articles and Collections - **Collection:** [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - **Collection:** [[collections/Consciousness Continuity|Consciousness Continuity]] - **Article:** [[articles/Bell Labs and the Distributed Architecture of American Power|Bell Labs and the Distributed Architecture of American Power]] - **Article:** [[articles/A History of Machine Intelligence|A History of Machine Intelligence]] - **Article:** [[articles/The Last Migration Will Not Be Human|The Last Migration Will Not Be Human]] - **Wiki map:** [[wiki/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] ## Related Topics - [[wiki/Claude Shannon|Claude Shannon]] - [[wiki/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - [[wiki/Artificial Intelligence|Artificial Intelligence]] - [[wiki/Machine Intelligence Continuum|Machine Intelligence Continuum]] - [[wiki/Machine Civilization|Machine Civilization]] ## Share on Social Media ``` "It may be possible within a century or so, that machines are going to be doing almost everything better than we do. They already do a lot of things better than we do. An automobile can go down the street a heck of a lot faster than any person can, for example. They can do factory work of all kinds better than we can. The highly intellectual stuff is going to come later." — Claude Shannon, Anthony Liversidge interview, Omni, August 1987 https://bryantmcgill.com/simple-reminders-claude-shannon-machines-almost-everything-better ```