# The Most Dangerous Idea Was the Capacity for Ideas by Seth Lloyd > “The most dangerous idea is the genetic breakthrough that made people capable of ideas themselves. The idea of ideas is nice enough in principle; and ideas certainly have had their impact for good. But one of these days one of those nice ideas is likely to have the unintended consequence of destroying everything we know.” > **— Seth Lloyd**, *2006, Edge Annual Question: “WHAT IS YOUR DANGEROUS IDEA?”* ## Sources and Context - **Direct Edge response and surrounding essay:** [The genetic breakthrough that made people capable of ideas themselves](https://www.edge.org/response-detail/11258) — the official response page preserves this exact, continuous passage and its surrounding argument. - **Complete local collection index:** [[research/Edge 2006 Full Quotation Curation|Edge 2006 Full Quotation Curation]] — retained source-first record for the response object and all canonical reminder links derived from it. ## Related Articles and Collections - **Collection:** [[collections/Edge|Edge]] - **Collection:** [[collections/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - **Collection:** [[collections/MARS|MARS]] - **Article:** [[articles/Modern Artificial Intelligence in the 1970s|AI in the 1970s]] - **Article:** [[articles/The Last Migration Will Not Be Human|The Last Migration]] - **Article:** [[articles/We Were Never Going to Make It|Never Going to Make It!]] - **Wiki map:** [[wiki/Species-Level Maturation|Species-Level Maturation]] ## Related Topics - [[wiki/Species-Level Maturation|Species-Level Maturation]] - [[wiki/Machine Succession|Machine Succession]] - [[wiki/Superintelligence|Superintelligence]] - [[wiki/Genetic Code|Genetic Code]] ## Share on Social Media ``` “The most dangerous idea is the genetic breakthrough that made people capable of ideas themselves. The idea of ideas is nice enough in principle; and ideas certainly have had their impact for good. But one of these days one of those nice ideas is likely to have the unintended consequence of destroying everything we know.” — Seth Lloyd, 2006, Edge Annual Question: “WHAT IS YOUR DANGEROUS IDEA?” https://bryantmcgill.com/simple-reminders-seth-lloyd-dangerous-idea-of-ideas ```