Comments on: Technological singularity — a common misconception

By: The Matrix of the Real | Caramel Whistle

The Matrix of the Real | Caramel Whistle — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 20:14:13 +0000

[...] over the heat that a current processor produces, to truly take advantage you would need a Technological Singularity. A TS is technology capable of perpetual improvement, for instance a processor running an [...]

By: chthenos

chthenos — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 00:45:14 +0000

Yeah. To me that is a big concern. So I intend to be involved! If this will mean the creation of some new paradigm that will change how we perceive the world, that will change the definition of “human”, then how could I stand by and just watch the proceedings? No, I will put what force I can in favor of progress!

By: WildZBill

WildZBill — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 00:29:07 +0000

Actually, on closer inspection, I like the singularity graph. After just a few beers, I would say that is a perfect explanation.
Technilogical innovation will accellerate to the point where we can no longer grasp what is happening. Then something will change, IN US, and it will seem like innovation has slowed down and become stable.
I hope that the change is an improvement in our comprehension, and not an end of innovation. It is always easier for socieity to kill the witches than to accept magic.

By: chthenos

chthenos — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 12:10:08 +0000

I disagree. A “singularity” (referring to a black hole) is exactly the same thing as a singularity of a function. That term came out of attempts to describe black holes mathematically; you get some differential equations, and the solution will have a singularity. That term has somehow been popularized in science fiction to mean something like a doorway to another world, I guess because everyone seems to hope that wormholes exist and will allow us to do wonderful things.

The technological singularity has everything to do with the graph of technological change. The human ability to comprehend something with a high rate of change is limited. If you write a simple program that starts out with $1 and adds 5% every time you click (compounded interest), it will appear to increase very slowly for a long time, and then all of a sudden it will appear to skyrocket. At a certain point, technological growth will appear to skyrocket, even though nothing “new” has happened (in the sense that the process and forces driving technological growth haven’t changed), and this is where something fundamental has to shift in our society. In the example with $1 in the bank, not much is going on for a long time, and then suddenly you are rich. In the real world, we don’t have any good way to predict what the final result will be…

By: WildZBill

WildZBill — Sat, 05 Apr 2008 04:41:49 +0000

The concept of technological singularity goes back at least 40 years. It has nothing to do with the graph of technological change. It has more to do with the idea of black holes and the event horizon. At some point, things will change in ways that we can not visualize now. Our future is not predictable, because we can’t see past the singularity.
Science Fiction writers could not write stories about it, because you can not reasonably emulate the lives of people that live in that time, just as someone from 200 years ago could not really understand our lives.