Here is my thoughts on whether life on other planets would inevitably (or typically) evolve until advanced intelligence arise.
My answer is mixed, first: No, if the environment is simple, there will be very little obstacles to "overcome" and thus there will not be many genes that die out, I guess some sort of equillibrium would arise pretty quickly and I think simplicity would actually be favored.

But what happened on Earth? Life took over the entire planet, and that's what caused complexity to arise.
I guess there is a crucial point in a inhabited planets life where by sheer coincidence ( a huge volcanic eruption, meteor etc.) changes things drastically over a short time period which forces only the very strongest and best adaptable to survive. These could co-exist fine in a "equillibirum" up until this catastrophy, but now they are the only survivors, and resources become scarce and I guess this is what causes sudden "jumps" in evolution, I guess the harmony has to be broken over and over by such things to make giant leaps until eventually something intelligent exists...
And then comes my other part argument: the organism has to posses BOTH intelligence and a body that can utilize it. This is quite a coincidence, if a human brain with an IQ of 100 evolved inside of any other being than a human/great ape it could never have created complex structures because that always requires dexterity.
So I actually think that it is a complete coincidence that apes happened to have to evolve advanced arms, legs and balance which later enabled us and our ancestors to manipulate our surroundings.

Kea's have the intelligence of a 6 year old child and I think noone would object to the fact that 6 year olds can create simple technology, but birds can't due to being trapped in a body that cannot manipulate their surroundings.

I'm sure some of this might be wrong, this is just musings to a glass of wine, but I am pretty sure about the part about humans having advanced technology only being a coincidence due to the fact that we needed our hands as apes in the jungle first.

Now I'll head over to the Many Worlds Quantum question that I noticed you had replied to

Technology is a loose term. The way birds build nests is what I would consider a technological. They are not hatched with a nest ready, they have to think about how to build it, even if it's instinct...
Some birds, like the Kea's in New Zealand can do incredible things and are considered to have the IQ of a human child..

What do they lack? hands... they have an extreme hard time to build ANYTHING, they dont got the strength or the ability to balance something for long enough to actually construct anything, so it is not efficient enough or them to spend much time on, even if it can be proven that they posses the intelligence.

Again think of dolphins and other whales, killer whales have been observed to learn spontaneously how to take advantage of the terrain, for instance there was a whale that knew when the tides came, baby seals would be possible to trap in a corner, so she did this for years and her offspring learnt it from her and continue the "tradition".
this is unquestionably intelligence that could create at least SOMETHING, but they do not have the bodies for it.

So I think the answer lies in how humans first came out of the jungle and onto the fields of Africa.
It seems to me that it was kind of coincidential that we had first been apes who are good with their hands AND happened to posses the intelligence we did.
To me, a spear is not very impressive, even considering that they were at the dawn of mankind.

If you go to youtube you will find a documentary about Kea's, they can use random pieces of metal and manipulate them into hooks and then fish things out of otherwise unreachable spots. How is this technology different from humans doing the same thing?

Im summary: I think we are a result of 2 coincidences coincidentially merging. Both having the body that can perform the task of manipulating nature and construct objects energy efficiently AND having the IQ to do so. In nature in genera you usually only have one or the other...

A very interesting post!
Too bad you haven't written any continuation of this subject.

Have you come any closer to a decision on wheter you think MWI is viable or not?
Also do you feel that the probability/Born rule issue is the *only* issue of MWI or do you find any of the other aspects technically problematic?