[enupten]

Realistically though, a super intelligent AI, would require far more fundamental breakthroughs. People who say otherwise, should take a look at problems in Control theory.

The effect of scaling things up should be interesting though. Perhaps there is a "Phase transition" like thing, where suddenly something awesome happens. This also means that, sadly, Universities would no longer be able to provide adequate resources for research.

[Houshalter]

What makes you say that? It may seem that it would take a lot of work, but really, how can we know? Often times difficult problems seem obvious in retrospect.