Unless it is an omniscient and omnipotent deity in the true sense of the word, it is impossible for all other beings to know what the end point of natural evolution is. If you don't know, you can't set it.

It's not something that can be set up randomly, every step of evolution has to be extremely precise and unambiguous, otherwise the robots will be at a loss. It doesn't make sense to simply set the first step of evolution as an interplanetary voyage and then the second step as a faster-than-light voyage. If you set it up like this, I'm afraid that all the robots will die and you won't be able to find the right path by exhaustive means. The correct setting method must be fine-grained, for example, this step of evolution needs to evolve the material performance to how it is, and the next step to evolve the thruster performance to how to make sense of this setting.

Therefore, what the genius didn't know, he couldn't set. In other words, no matter how long the robots have evolved, their technology level cannot exceed the scope of that genius's knowledge. And in that case, why let the robots evolve? Wouldn't it be nice to build the most advanced robot within the scope of your knowledge from the beginning?

As for "whether the number of robots is enough to use the exhaustive method", Xiao Yun also has some thoughts on it. Xiao Yun dismissed this possibility after a simple calculation.

The so-called exhaustive move, that is, every possibility must be tried, otherwise it cannot be called exhaustive. Then there is an example of a group of 266 people, and they are divided into any combination between one and two hundred and sixty-six, that is, one person is counted as a combination, and any two people are also counted as a combination. Any three. Four. Ten, fifty, can be considered a combination, then...... How many combinations are there?

This is a very simple arithmetic problem, and the final result is a total of two combinations to the power of 266. And how big is that number?

According to scientists' estimates, all the mass and energy in the universe are equivalent to about 10 atoms to the 80th power according to the theory of relativity. Whereas...... The number of two to the power of two is to the power of two and is a little bit larger than the number of ten to the power of eightie. Other words...... Just a collective of 266 people. The number of different combinations between them is already more than the number of atoms in the entire universe, but what about in specific scientific research?

The development of a new type of material may require the addition of many different elements and compounds in different proportions, the content of these added elements is uncertain, the smelting time is uncertain, the order is uncertain, and everything is uncertain...... And how many ways can they be combined?

This is an incomposibly large number, which cannot be calculated, and it must be more than the number of different combinations between the collectives of two hundred and sixty-six people. So in this case, how can infinite replication robots use the exhaustive method to exhaust all these possibilities? If you don't exhaust all of these possibilities. How can they know which combination is the right and optimal?

The development of just one new material would take all the energy of any robot. If you use the exhaustive method, you can't use all the matter in the universe to make robots, and this is just the research and development of a material, and you can't even overcome this obstacle, let alone the real technological evolution.

So...... Based on the above two points, Xiao Yun knew that it was not feasible to rely on the combination of exhaustive methods and clear evolutionary purposes to make robots evolve continuously, even beyond the scope of the manufacturer's own knowledge. No one can do that, not even if that genius is the most outstanding of all intelligent life in the universe.

These are the two conjectures that Xiao Yun has thought of most likely to succeed, but these two conjectures were all rejected by Xiao Yun in subsequent in-depth thinking.

In the process of thinking, Xiao Yun made some improvements to the second way of evolution and added some restrictions. The basic idea of these improvements is that the exhaustive method is actually the most inefficient method of attempt, and there are many combinations that are not necessary to try at all. For example, if a person wants to make a food without knowing anything, and since he knows nothing about it, the food could be made of anything in the universe - including a cloud of hydrogen, a fragment of an iron-rich asteroid, or something like some liquid, or the soil on a planet, or even the feces excreted by some living organism...... These could be part of the combination of ingredients needed to make this delicacy.

In an exhaustive way, the person would need to try all the combinations of an unlimited number of forms of matter in the universe. This is an unimaginably large number, even if this person had a life span of 100 trillion years and the equivalent of 100 trillion universes of matter for him to use, he would not be able to make this delicacy in the end. The reason is simple, there are so many combinations that it is impossible to try them all within a time frame that can be understood by humans.

In this example, it is clear that there are many combinations that do not make sense, for example, the combination between hydrogen and ammonia does not make sense - this combination obviously does not make a good meal, the combination of iron ore and soil does not make sense, and in addition to this, there are also combinations of wood and plastic, carbon dioxide and methane and copper ore...... And so on and so forth, these combinations are meaningless.

But the most crucial point is that the person knows nothing about the dish, and since he doesn't know anything, it is impossible for him to know which combinations make sense and which don't. Putting it to the infinite replication robot to develop new materials, it is impossible for the infinite replication robot to know which combination makes sense and which combination does not.

However, just because the infinite copy bot doesn't know which combination makes sense and which one doesn't, doesn't mean that the genius doesn't either. He might be able to set a simple filter rule - like someone who wants to make a meal but is confused by the infinite number of combinations of ingredients, and a simple rule of "using only the products of the earth" can eliminate all combinations of matter except the earth, reducing the number of combinations he faces by an infinite number of times. If you add a rule to this rule, such as "organic matter must be used for the main ingredient", then the number of combinations that the person faces will be reduced by an infinite number of times, because this rule will remove all inorganic matter from the main ingredient combination.

In the same way, the genius can set a rule for those robots who are struggling to develop new materials, "Iron is the main body, and the rest of the trace elements are not more than one percent at most", and then countless combinations are ruled out, because the number of combinations is reduced, and it is possible for the robots to use the exhaustive method to develop new materials.

Merely...... This is only to solve the obstacle of developing new materials, but the development of science and technology is not as simple as developing new materials. In that case, if the genius needs to set some rules for each branch of science in the development of science to exclude meaningless combinations, then the genius will be faced with the same problem as before: how can he set rules for technology that is beyond his knowledge?

That genius's knowledge must be limited, and within the scope of his knowledge, he can certainly set detailed rules to help the robot evolve and avoid meaningless exhaustive combinations, but when the robot's technology develops to the level of his own, how should he set it? - He can't set it. In other words, the path of exhaustive evolution by adding restrictive rules is still not working.

So...... Is there such a rule that runs through the whole development of science, that it applies to people in the age of savage, that it still applies to people in the interstellar age, and that it applies to people who can sail across river systems?

If this genius discovers this fundamental rule and applies it to the infinite replication robots, so that the infinite replication robots can use this rule to eliminate useless combinations in the early stage of evolution, and can still use this rule to achieve exhaustive evolution after evolving to be more advanced than the genius himself, wouldn't it be possible for the robots to evolve without self-independence consciousness and the scientific system?

So...... What exactly is this rule?

Coupled with the speculation of "adding restriction rules to help exhaustive evolution", Xiao Yun made a total of three speculations about the way robots evolved themselves. In addition to these three, Xiao Yun pondered for several months but did not find a new way to evolve. Of these three speculations, Xiao Yun believes that the combination between the third mode of evolution and "fundamental, rules that permeate the whole of science" is the most likely. Therefore, Xiao Yun's thinking focused on "what are the fundamental rules that run through the whole of science".

But Xiao Yun couldn't figure out what this rule was. Xiao Yun thought when he was resting, thought when he was eating, thought about it every moment, and even thought about it to the extent that he was mentally weak and had to rely on strong anesthetics to fall asleep, Xiao Yun still couldn't think of what this rule was.

Without this rule, robots cannot evolve themselves. The genius was almost certain to have allowed the robots to evolve themselves, which meant that the genius had thought of the rule. But...... Xiao Yun couldn't think of it. (To be continued.) )

PS: It's a bit hard to write these two chapters today......