  We discuss scenarios and branch points to four major possible consequences
regarding future machine intelligence; 1) the singleton scenario where the
first and only super-intelligence acquires a decisive strategic advantage, 2)
the multipolar scenario where the singleton scenario is not technically denied
but political or other factors in human society or multi-agent interactions
between the intelligent agents prevent a single agent from gaining a decisive
strategic advantage, 3) the ecosystem scenario where the singleton scenario is
denied and many autonomous intelligent agents operate in such a way that they
are interdependent and virtually unstoppable, and 4) the upper-bound scenario
where cognitive capabilities that can be achieved by human-designed intelligent
agents or their descendants are inherently limited to the sub-human level. We
identify six major constraints that can form branch points to these scenarios;
(1) constraints on autonomy, (2) constraints on the ability to improve
self-structure, (3) constraints related to thermodynamic efficiency, (4)
constraints on updating physical infrastructure, (5) constraints on relative
advantage, and (6) constraints on locality.
