Technological singularity - is a hypothetical moment in the development of mankind when speed and complexity of technical progress would make it unreachable to human understanding. Futurologists believe that technological singularity would be achieved once artificial intelligence capable of self-improvement and reproduction was invented. The Singularity Is Near (2005), written by Ray Kurzweil, proves that mentioned moment is round the corner.
John von Neumann was the first who adopted the term "singularity" from astrophysics and used it in the futurological context. Astrophysicists mention a singularity in the sense of exceptive point inside black hole, where processes can't be described by the laws of modern physics. Von Neumann, followed by Vernor Vinge, refers to this term to describe the moment when the extrapolation forecasting method starts to give absurd results (divergent).
Inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil is one of the most famous inspirers of technological singularity. Ray refers to Moore's law and states that by 2030, the computational power of the computer and the human brain will be equal, and by 2050 it will exceed power of all human brains in the world and then nothing will be impossible. Now Ray Kurzweil is a director of engineering at Google and he has every opportunity to realize his dream.
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Kurzweil gets into Google is not accidental. As early as in 2000, Google co-founder Larry Page stated that “The ultimate search engine will understand everything in the world.” In 2006, an internal document of Google contained such words as "Google wants to have the world's top AI (artificial intelligence) research laboratory". What is more, in 2005 one of Google's insiders said (according to George Dyson) that the data collected by Google as part of projects such as "Google Books", "Street View" and "Google Voice Local Search" — are mainly for training artificial intelligence and not for human use. Machines would take advantage of all human knowledge, learn to drive a car and talk with the people. Google clearly prepares a stage for this stunning breakthrough!
A few decades ago, humanity foresaw its future in space colonization. Technological singularity may likely to claim the role of ideology that gives new meaning to the human development.
Technological Singularity is near. Kurzweil and Google do their best approaching its impending arrival!
Technological Singularity is near. Kurzweil and Google do their best approaching its impending arrival!
This post was written as part of my homework on the course "Medicine: SciWrite Writing in the Sciences" (Stanford University), which I attend remotely.
