Any arguments that "it's impossible to build such a device" are refuted by our very existence.
Today Bitcoin is "unaware" but everything is being put in place for the next step in the plan "Bitcoin 2.0" with Smart Contracts.
Bitcoin already has become an autonomous agent which utilizes humans to build itself and issues autonomous payments for improvement work done.
Read these two links. This is where the planning of Bitcoin AI started:
Tim May email: (Crypto + Economics + AI = Digital Money Economies)
http://cypherpunks.venona.com/date/1995/09/msg00964.htmlNick Szabo reply:
http://cypherpunks.venona.com/date/1995/09/msg01303.htmlThe next phase of enlightenment:
Smart contracts are contracts that are not just legal documents but actually active AI code. In the beginning smart contracts are just computer programs that facilitate, verify or enforce the performance of a contract. A simple example would be digital repo, where access to certain information or a machine would be granted or not depending on whether one party had paid the other. More advanced digital repo contracts can recognize if the seller went absent or bankrupt, and then allow access with no constraints. Over time the intelligence could increase, allowing contracts to actually gather information, check that they are obeyed and even take action.
http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/548/469https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=502359.0When based on the same evidence, the predictions of AI "statistical prediction rules" are as reliable as, and are typically more reliable than, the predictions of human experts for problems of social prediction.
Disclaimer: (AI) does not always mean (Singularity).
http://unenumerated.blogspot.com/2011/01/singularity.html?m=1