[opensrcken]

I disagree with part of this. Nature has proven that general intelligence can be achieved in a compact, energy-efficient form: humans.

Has nature ever proven that nuclear fusion can be sustained at human scale?

I would bet that agi comes first.

[marginalia_nu]

I think they're both sort of in the same place.

We're fairly certain it can be done given unbounded resources, we have some idea of the principles involved, but then there's a rather significant element of "draw the rest of the fucking owl" between where we are and where we imagine we could go.