I am trying to turn this concept of Quality Intelligence into something more precise.

Here are some items from history which most people will think of as improvements in quality intelligence.

I am thinking about quality with the context of collective intelligence. The concept of AGI = the intelligence of a single human I do not find useful for predicting a recursively improving system, for reasons we can look at later.

Development of symbolic language from pictographs Development of the number zero Development of set theory Invention of calculus Development of Newton's method for approximating functions Invention of Bayes' Rule Matrix theory Closed-form solutions to many kinnds of partial differential equations Procedural programming languages Approximations to vast numbers of functions using Newton's method on computers (Quality or Quantity?) These are advances in reasoning and improve intelligence quality.

I am not sure whether to chalk up the following to advances in quality intelligence, or not: Formulation of gravity Development of the periodic table General relativity Demonstration of nuclear fission Development of the transistor Discovery of DNA Development of the microprocessor (Quality or quantity, or both?) Mechanisms of transcription and translation within the cell.

Certainly, figuring all of these things out about the real world advanced our ability to solve practical problems. I am inclined to consider the distinction between them and the discoveries in logic, computer programming and applied math somewhat arbitrary.